Shocking a well

12 years ago

I bought a house with a private well and septic. House was a foreclosure and sat for two years. The water has a sulfur smell. I put in a new water heater, which helped for about a week. Now the odor is back. I called two different well companies: one wants to shock it for $300, the other wants to put in an oxygen system for $4,000. Yikes. For those who have shocked their wells, how did that work out for you. There is no trace of bacteria in the water, but high iron and manganese.

Thank you.

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Comments (7)

jakethewonderdog
12 years ago
couple of questions:

1. Is the smell only on the hot water or is it cold water also?

2. How do you know about the water chemistry? Did you have it tested by an independent lab?
lindacatherine
Original Author
12 years ago
The odor is more prominent in the hot water, but slightly in the cold. There was a water analysis done for bank financing approval. The was a new water pump installed, and now I read tha a well should be shocked after any such repairs -- which I'm pretty sure wasn't done in this case.
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Very informative and interesting replies folks . . . thank you very much for taking the time. I haven't had the well water tested but I'll get around to doing that. We have finally gotten some rain here in San Diego so thankfully the bamboo will survive - a lot of it. A lot of it that I never watered at all with the well water is permanently brown and dead. The years of drought finally killed it. I'm waiting to see if the rain we're having will stimulate some of the rhizomes to start sprouting in the areas that appear to now be completely dead. The rain has certainly stimulated a lot of new growth in the areas where the bamboo is still alive. I don't have a septic system anywhere near the well, however the aquifer from which the water comes is large and there are countless possible points of contamination. Reading the online reports the water district has published, aquifer testing near its head shows the water to be very high quality. Nearer to me and downstream of the aquifer head the TDS (total dissolved solids) and and suspended solids level is very high and contaminated with compounds of various kinds, especially manganese and various sulfer compounds. I haven't used the well since I dumped about ten gallons of bleach in it. The bacteria situation might be much better now, although since the water comes from a large aquifer it may have done nothing at all, long term. As summer approaches I'll put my attention back on the well and get some circulation going and then get the water tested. I'll report back on whatever I learn. Thanks for all the great experience and information, Mike
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In general, chlorine is a bad actor when it comes to stainless steels. But, you and I don't know if the pump manufacturer used a SS that is particularly sensitive to chlorine or not; hopefully they chose a SS that was minimally or not sensitive at all. Bleach is also a diluted, weak solution of sodium hypochlorite, not a tremendously rich source of chlorine. Some people have chlorinators that drop chlorine containing pellets regularly into their wells for years with no apparent pump issues. Bottom line is I don't think that shocking your well once in a while is going to shorten the life of your pump. I shocked my well when I had a house with a submersible pump and the pump impellers (plastic) wore out first. As far as flushing your pipes, the pipes and faucets themselves will flush very quickly of old, 'contaminated' water. The water heater probably is a pretty big reservoir to dilute and should probably get dosed with some of the bleached water to insure disinfection.
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jakethewonderdog
12 years ago
The well should be shocked to sanitize it, but that's probably not going to permanently fix your sulfur smell problem.

What I suspect is iron reducing bacteria. Was that specifically tested for?

You said "no bacteria"... but I don't know that they were looking for that when on a typical well test for closing.

I admit to being out of my depth on water treatment - there are several very good people on here who know this stuff well. I'm looking for them to jump-in. Alice...?

BTW: Here is a link on iron eating bacteria:

Here is a link that might be useful: lron reducing bacteria
brickeyee
12 years ago
"What I suspect is iron reducing bacteria. Was that specifically tested for? "

If you do not look for the item you will not find it.

E-coli is what the standard test look for, along with identified chemical contaminants for the area.

Anything else is likely to be missed.
jakethewonderdog
12 years ago
lindacatherine:

Repost this as "need help with water treatment" and you will likely get the people who can help you to respond.
dave_mn
12 years ago
Had mine shocked years ago. The well guy took the cover off the well and poured 2 gallons of bleach down the well. Asked me to turn each faucet on until I smelled bleach. Let it sit overnight and drained alot of water outside until it smelled no bleach.
kkllb
12 years ago
Our situation is exactly the same- foreclosure, sat for over 2 years, private well, with a new pump installed just prior to closing. We have a sulfur smell and high iron. We were told that sulfur smell could be remedied by getting rid of the iron. So... just last week we had 4 different contractors out to try to figure out what we should do. I know, that's a lot, but they all had different things to say.

Only one suggested shocking the well before considering adding water treatment equipment. He described shocking as a slightly more involved process than what dave_mn did. After the chlorination he wanted to recirculate the water, and said the process would take 3-4 days total and we'd be unable to use the well during that time. He also stated that the risks included over-chlorination and possibly burning out the well pump if the well ran dry while he was shocking it. But our well casing is smaller than what is now standard, so I'm not sure if that was a factor. He was going to charge us $300.

The other three guys recommended various combinations of water softeners, iron filters, and other equipment, ranging from $2200 - $3500. All said that shocking the well would only get rid of bacteria, not iron. All four of them agreed that shocking was more of a short-term fix to get things back to a more "natural" state since the well had been unused for so long. The consensus seemed that we should run our water for an extended length of time to run out all the old accumulations before we put too much weight in the water sample results.

Keep us posted on what you decide. Thanks!

Shocking a well

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jakethewonderdog

lindacatherine
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Shocking a well

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jakethewonderdog

lindacatherineOriginal Author

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