for 10k to drill a well id be looking into rain water collection/winter storage. If you put a big enough cistern under the frost line it wouldnt freeze.
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Surprisingly those cisterns actually cost quite a bit of money a 10k gallon tank would run you over 10k fairly easily. Although that might seem like a lot of water. 
They also arenāt legal in most municipalities. So you couldnāt tie it into your existing plumbing.
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it would actually work because I have no existing plumbing right now. but yes, it would cost about the same money to buy those tanks.
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Hi Bill, depending on how much water you need, and at what rate it refills, you could build a block tank fairly cheap. When I was building at the old farm 38 yrs. ago I built one out of blocks, stacked dry, and used surface bonding cement on both sides, then filled the floor half way up the first course of blocks. Still holding water today. Al
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Out of curiousityā¦ Did you put a roof on it and put it underground so it doesnāt freeze? Iām curious how you built the roof to it if you did.
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Hi Sean, yes, mine was feed by a spring, I had 3 courses above ground with a sealed metal roof, it was light enough to lift off to get to the pump, and to clean. If you need a bigger tank you could put an access hatch in any kind of roof.A 20x20x10=30,000 gal. The roof could be built several ways, like a house roof(if vented well) cement with access hole. This all depends on location, and what will be refilling it. Al
It is considered graywater, which is non-potable. You have to ātreatā it. I think a charcoal whole house filter works to meet the code. It was used a lot for water around the turn of the century, unfiltered it was okay for lawn/garden, and toilets. You can probably still find houses that were plumbed for graywater. But I think it is against most building codes now.
the warmer moving water keeps it from freezing. If the water isnāt moving it has to be stored below the frostline.
My aunt and uncle had something similar but smaller then what you had, and I think once the pump died they had to move to municipal water/sewage. They wouldnāt let them replace the pump. Well I think they -did- replace the pump, and they found out about it, and made them cap it.
Correct on the moving water, as long as your over flow is below frost line you can have some above ground, you could have 2 valved over flows 1 higher, so in summer when you need more water it can fill more. I use a whole house charcoal filter now because water is sulfur, it does a great job, no hint of sulfur at all. With all this being said I have always lived where there is no gov. intrusion. Al
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Hi Bill et al,
This option may not apply to your situation, but one never knows what tidbit will be the key.
I lucked out, I had water seeping out of the ground on my hillside. If itās coming out there, itās in the ground for sure. So I hired a backhoe (long boom thankfully) and started digging. See photos for soil profile which I found at the county extension service. Check for your area, it could be a big help. We ran into wet soil down about 7 feet. Whoopee! We dug down to blue clay and stopped. That was at 10 feet and right on, profile wise! Yah, we had a huge hole in that sandy soil. We laid down a foot of crushed stone in a 10ā diam circle and set the first tile plumb and level and added a second tile. We then added another 3 feet of crushed stone for a total of 4 feet, then backfilled the hole and waited. The next day there was 4 1/2ā of water in the well. It was cloudy from the crushed stone. We pumped an hour and a half down to the top of the foot valve, about 900 gallons by my pump info. It filled again overnight and we pumped again. Two days and the water was clear. I figure I have 1000 gals available in a 24 hour period. Way happy! That was 40 years ago and weāre going strong. Level only fluctuates a couple of inches per year. There is a foot valve and a 1 1/2" line to the pump in the house, about 100 feet.
Water is crystal clear and has absolutely no odor or after taste. Weāre blessed.
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looks like my set up pepe the water in general stays a tile down I could Easley use a bucket if needed .the neighbor showed me how to water wich with a willow branch you wouldnāt believe it till you try it but we have plenty. I also made a water tower of sorts two three hondred gallon tanks that we fill during the days when the sun is shining . low pressure when on the tanks but can have water all night
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Hi Paul, During the blizzard of 98, we dropped our buckets in, filled the tank on the wood stove. When right temp, into the camp shower hung in the tub. Ten glorious days without power. It was 4 days before they got to the side roads. No matter, nothing else was open anyway. Yes, a person should never have to waste energy to heat water when the sun shines. I never did get to build a tower here, but I thought it would be handy.
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That is a very cool setup Richard. Very lucky to have that on your property!
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Very nice and handy indeed. Some of my area is that way, and some needs a 150ā drilled well, and some of them are dry!
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The madrid is nearing possible eruption points in time.make sure your brick buildings are metal reanforced.Very interesting arcatechual water back up systems.That well would be full of black widows in arkansas,The wells around here like to be about 200 feet in order too keep out the rusty water.My shallow well pump hits water about 12ā and the black plastic drop pipe goes down 30 feet.
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Hi Steve,
Thanks for the link to jerker lines. Iāve never seen this before. I guess they really went to any length to get water.
If you look at the background in my vid you will see the river about 100 vertical feet below where my well is. My first water came from a small gasoline powered pump with about 150 feet of on the ground 1 1/2" pipe while I waited for the well. Used it later for garden irrigation.
Pepe
Hi Pepe
It was actually Jeff Davis who pointed out the jerker line systems.
Iām a DYI home power guy from way back in the last millennium.
āEdisonā DC electric was fine and does work out OK for most home system with energy storage possibilities but has too much transmission power loss for even longer distance wind and micro-hydro system.
āTesla/Westinghouseā AC electric systems the way to go for transmission minimal energy loses but really NO, to poor and complex/expensive energy storage possibilities.
Thia jerker line power transmission system is really alternating direction power/energy transmission. Iād figure very efficient.
Continuous rotary power transmission as in shaft or belts although efficient at a steady RPM; loses lots of energy in coming up, or coming down RPM situations. And clutching loads in and out of that continuous rotor power add a wearing, needs maintenance clutching mechanism.
As piston engines show; and bicycles show: up and down, back and forth energy conversions and power transmissions CAN be energy efficient if you just do the proper engineering.
Regards
Steve Unruh
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Hi guys; Iām waiting for some paint to dry so---- At my age I have no need to know this Jerker Line Power Transmission but I do like mechanical contraptions. I have two deep wells which serve us well ( good?) If that proverbial ship hits the sand, I still have a 50 ft hand dug well that I could put a well down another 29 ft ( my wife isnāt impressed when I tell her she can go down the 50 ft on a ladder and with a hand pump bring up the next 29 ft of water ) Any way, my question is with the Jerker PT doesnāt it take a lot of energy to move the mass of the rods? As I understand it the rods are hanging by āropeā. You push the rod horizontally and it will move in an arch. This initial motion will require āworkā. But then the weight of the rod will pull it back along the arch and the momentum will carry it past bottom dead center. But that will not be enough past to make the rod move back along the arch in the other direction again to past bottom center. And thus you will have to keep adding power to this. The longer the run and weight of the rods, the more power required. This isnāt taking into consideration of the power that is needed to run the pump.TomC
I didnāt get all of that read but they did mention that they tried to balance the load. So if you have two wells when you are pulling up on one the other is going down. Ideally then you are only lifting the water because the sucker rods balance out. This is assuming the wells are the same depth. You could add weight to the shallower well to even it out though. Thatās how I understand i . My 2 cents. Seems you have a good set up to try it out on.
Weāll be watching you hehehe
Just had to do that last little part 
Hey JeffD I like this mechanism. Never in my life have I seen chevron cut gears. Like chevron tread patteren truck/tractor tires this cancels out gearshaft end thrusting.
TomC on the layed out jerker line/rigid rod systems I see this as a way to use a single power source to apply power out to many diffnert loads locations. Scroll down through that LowTech article I put up to the illistartions and you can see this.
Yes asTomW said a smart fellow would try to loads balance.
Load balancing is the sweat-job of 3-phase AC power supply systems. ALL of us on-grid electric are part of this even consumer using single phase. The generated legs load balancing then being done at the disribution centers. Loca/site made 3-phase the demand load balancing then gets tricky. Consumer/load unvenly the three generator output legs causes the genrator to howl/whine/overheat trying to internally phase balance. Heat IS wasted energy. Heat kills generators.
Now your actual wells for the above ground applied power pumping up though a sucker rod system you are actually having to step-by-step lift the whole sucker rod string AND the whole in column delivery pipe of water.
I do not think I can adequety in words expain why this can be enrgy effinceit.
Do observe that this is the system still used for all remote power; least pumping fuel/nergy needed pumping systems world-wide.
Deep well āJet-pumpingā and in-well submersible pumping takes MORE energy/power/fuel even after adjusting for the diffnert possible GPH delevery rates.
Just the facts of it man. Can be seen world around by applied usages. Low height (head) pumping is a whole diffnert game.
My Baker Monitor Junior system could be second pump chamber in-well intalled at the end of the down-hanging delivery piping. Then the sucker rod being pushed back down for re-set/upward cycling would be pushing up the column of water for another delivered slug of water out of the top. No free enrgy lunchās ever. This will double the water output per hour; and take twice the input energy to do this.
Regards
Steve Unruh
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