Well and Well Water Questions

Check the breaker for the well pump and whether the pressure switch has power. Look at the gauge on the tank — zero means no pressure. Tap the tank: if it sounds solid all the way up it's probably waterlogged. If none of that fixes it, call us and tell us what the gauge reads. See our no water page for the full list.

Reset it once. If it trips again immediately, stop and call — something is drawing current it shouldn't, and that's a short or a failing motor, not a breaker problem. Keep flipping it and you can make a small problem an expensive one.

Usually a pressure switch that's stuck closed, a tank with no air charge, or a well that can't reach cut-out pressure because the pump is failing or the well is low. A pump that runs constantly is heading for a burnout, so don't leave it.

That's short-cycling, and it's almost always a waterlogged pressure tank. The air cushion is gone, so the pump starts every time a tap opens and stops the instant it closes. It kills pumps. The tank is the likely culprit, not the pump.

Air in the line points at a leak on the suction side, a low water level in the well, or a failing check valve. If it came on suddenly with cloudy or sandy water, stop using it and call before you run the pump further.

Yes. A well that stops and starts again usually has a cause — a thermal breaker resetting, a pressure switch sticking, a well recovering slowly. It will happen again, and the thing that caused it is usually cheaper to fix than the thing it eventually breaks.

If you can't find a pump anywhere in your basement, yours is a submersible sitting down the well. If there's a noisy cast-iron pump next to your pressure tank, that's a jet pump. They fail differently and are diagnosed differently.

Tap the side of the tank — solid all the way up means the air charge is gone and the tank is waterlogged. Watch the gauge through a cycle. A waterlogged tank short-cycles the pump and can look exactly like a pump failing.

No. Voltage at the pressure switch, amp draw at the panel, and the behaviour of the gauge tell us most of it from the basement. Pulling a good pump is a wasted day and a wasted invoice, so we rule out everything above ground first.

Usually no. An oversized pump pumps the well down faster than it recovers, sucks air, and burns out. Pressure is set by the switch and the tank, not by the pump's size. See our low pressure page for why.

Replacing a pump in an existing well is repair work, and in New Jersey the permits that touch a well are tied to constructing one. That said, the requirement for a specific job should be confirmed with NJDEP rather than assumed from a website.

The drop pipe, the wire down the well, the safety rope, the torque arrestor, the check valve, the pitless adapter or well seal, the well cap, and on a three-wire pump the control box. Reusing a corroded fitting is how a new pump ends up back out of the well in two years.

It holds a cushion of compressed air against a bladder. That cushion gives you water between pump cycles and keeps the pump from starting every time somebody opens a tap. When the air charge is gone, the pump takes the whole job.

The pump cycles on and off rapidly while a single tap runs; pressure drops off the moment you open a faucet; the tank sounds solid all the way to the top; water spits from the air valve on top; or there's visible rust at the seams. Rapid cycling is the one that kills pumps.

Sometimes, if the bladder is intact and the tank is just low on air. If the tank is waterlogged because the bladder is ruptured, recharging won't hold — the tank needs replacing. We drain it and check the charge before deciding.

No. A bigger tank means fewer pump starts and longer pump life, not higher pressure. Pressure is set by the pressure switch. A bigger tank is more space and more cost, and the right size depends on the pump, the well's yield and the room you have.

That points at a well whose water level drops under sustained use — fine first thing, poor after two showers and a load of laundry. It's a yield question, not a pressure switch question, and the fix is different.

The manifold on the side of the tank that carries the pressure switch, the gauge, the relief valve, a boiler drain and the unions. On an old tank those fittings are usually seized or weeping, so we replace the whole assembly rather than just the tank.

Annual testing for total coliform bacteria and nitrate is the standard baseline advice for private wells. Nobody reminds you, because nobody is responsible for your well but you. See our testing page.

For a rough sense, maybe. For anything that matters — a sale, a rental, a health question — no. New Jersey requires a NJDEP certified drinking water laboratory, and a hardware-store strip is not the same thing.

It means bacteria got in. It's common, it's fixable, and it usually points at a well cap, a casing, or surface water near the wellhead. Shock chlorination kills what's there; finding the entry point stops it coming back.

Iron at 0.3 mg/L and manganese at 0.05 mg/L are NJDEP recommended upper limits for secondary contaminants — aesthetic limits about staining, taste and colour, not health violations. They're worth fixing because of what they do to your fixtures and laundry.

NJDEP recommends testing for radium-226 and radium-228 in that range. Below 5 pCi/L, no further action; above 15, further testing for uranium, radium-226, radium-228 and radon plus treatment. Find out which radionuclide it is before you buy equipment — the treatment isn't the same for all three.

A little, and not for long. Iron fouls softener resin, so a softener handling iron it wasn't designed for loses capacity and eventually needs the resin replaced. Where iron is the real problem it should be dealt with ahead of the softener.

No. A softener is not a purifier — it doesn't remove bacteria, nitrate, arsenic or gross alpha. A softener sold as a solution to a water quality problem it can't touch is money wasted.

No. UV inactivates bacteria as water passes the lamp, but it leaves no residual, removes nothing, and doesn't work properly in water that isn't clear. Iron, manganese and hardness have to be dealt with upstream of the lamp.

Yes, if the property gets its drinking water from a private well on the property. New Jersey's Private Well Testing Act requires the untreated water be tested, and title can't close until both buyer and seller have signed for the results. See our PWTA page.

Test every five years and give every tenant a copy of the results. Landlords are the group most likely not to know this applies to them. See our Private Well Testing Act page.

NJDEP regulates how a well is built; after that, oversight sits with your local health department. The agency you call depends on your question and your county. See our who regulates your well page.

Yes. NJDEP says only properly licensed individuals are permitted to install, service and decommission wells and pumps. Austen Yanish holds New Jersey Licensed Pump Installer License No. 1144775, issued by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. Ask for the number — and ask us too. See our licensing page.

No. Sealing a well requires a licensed well driller, which is a different licence. We're a pump and water treatment company. See our page on sealing an old well in New Jersey for what's involved and who to call.

Sussex, Warren and Passaic Counties, centered on Wantage. Some towns we're in every week; some we schedule in blocks because they're a real drive. See our service area map.

We answer the phone. If your well goes down at 2 AM, someone picks up — and we will travel up to an hour out at that time of the morning to get your water back on.

Yes, we accept credit cards.

Yes. We'll look at whatever's in your basement, tell you what it is and whether it's plumbed in the right order, and service it. We'll also tell you honestly when something is outside our scope.