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Submersible Pump Tear Down (With a Hack Saw)
2K views
Jan 25, 2024
My son's submersible well pump started acting up back in April. We replaced it, but never looked in the old pump to see what went wrong. Until now. Watch Part 1 here: https://youtu.be/CntPc6b34Ac FREE WEEKLY NEWSLETTER: https://bit.ly/2T3USuy PREVIOUS EPISODES: https://bit.ly/2EVDuFg WATCH MORE BAILEY LINE ROAD: Winter Tips - https://bit.ly/2rpnUcm Product Tours - https://bit.ly/2L2H54Q Woodworking - https://bit.ly/2RN83jC Real Rural Life - https://bit.ly/2RI5dvY CHECK OUT MY WEBSITE: https://baileylineroad.com/ My Cabin Building Course: https://baileylineroad.com/cozy-cabin/ How-To & DIY eBooks: https://baileylineroad.com/shop/ SOCIAL MEDIA:
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0:00
So we're about to expose the source of my grief back in, was it, early spring, I guess
0:08
Yes, if you remember, we did quite a long video about failed water pump, subversible water pump at Robert's Place
0:16
We did, the cause wasn't obvious. It was still pumping water, but we were in strange fibers in the water
0:23
A lot of backing and forthing, we eventually determined that it was the subversible pump, chewing at
0:29
itself up in some way. So we got a new pump and put it in and that solved the problem
0:36
But this pump was only three years old. It's a good name too. Jiro is a respected name. So
0:41
we got a replacement. They sent us a brand new one which is handy to have on it's a spare
0:47
because we've chosen to go with 120 volts submersible pump which is not too typical
0:53
The reason for that is so that we can power the water pump with a small generator if need be. Also
1:00
to a brand new pump, we've got a motor from the old pump
1:06
And this was bolted together once upon a time. There's nothing wrong with the motor
1:11
It was just the pumping chamber. And that's what I want to show you now
1:15
We're going to cut this apart and find out exactly what went wrong
1:19
I know something went wrong because you try to turn the thing by hand and it's
1:25
something's not right in there. No plumber that I ever called. about this and had ever heard of this sort of problem before, a pump chewing itself up
1:33
So it's kind of unusual. I'm interested to see what's inside of a pump like this bueno
1:39
I've never seen inside one and also why it's broken. So we're going to get a nice big power
1:46
half saw and we're going to cut this open and see what we find. I don't know if it'll be worth
1:52
looking at or not. I'm not sure where we should cut. What do you think, Robert? I think we should go
1:57
just slice it in the middle or try something angled or what do you think
2:02
Well, probably in the middle. I mean, it's going to be quite a long cut if we try to go angled
2:07
Yeah. Okay. So the electric motor fastens here with this coupling and this area remains open
2:14
This is where the water gets sucked in. And I guess it gets drawn in around the shaft there inside and then eventually comes out the top
2:23
There's a check valve here in the top of the pump. So stops the water from trying to get back down again once it's been pumped up
2:33
Let's see this a whirl here. Do you think I should get safety glasses
2:40
I got your little cordless there too. Yeah, not that I can use it here, but I was just going to mention how often I use these hacksaws
2:50
I mean, they're pretty handy. I don't do a whole lot of metal work, but I do from time to time
2:56
And these things are enormously helpful. This is a nice little handheld one, a couple inch throat depth, just for small stuff
3:05
But for this job, we're going to need to go with the cordless or this recorded
3:10
And actually, I'm going to move this over a little bit. Yeah so are we ready Yep
3:27
Okay, here goes. Almost through. I can tell we've been going through different sort of density. Sometimes it's taking a while to cut through. Sometimes it's just falling right through
4:00
so the mystery is almost so so. There it is interesting
4:19
But you must be Oh, okay. We're below the interesting bit, I think
4:30
Yeah, we're still into the section, I think, yeah, we're still into the section where the water gets drawn up
4:39
See, the water comes in here. But you see there's openings here, here, here, here, here, here
4:48
So the water's coming up there and there's sort of a swirling thing going on
4:55
Ah, but you know what? Doesn't this look kind of familiar? Sure does
5:02
Yeah. Cursed fibers. That's the stuff we saw floating around in the water
5:06
Give me grief in spring. But I don't really see anything wrong there
5:12
I mean, this is pretty fibers in there. Look at that. Yeah, look at that
5:19
What is that? What was that? Well, it was, well, most of it was
5:28
sawdust from the song. I think there may be something down further. Let me get a screwdriver
5:38
Start a little bit of bashing and smashing here. Going to bash and smash now? Well, maybe a little poke and pry first. But I think there
5:46
may be some sort of a pumping chamber under here. You know, these pumps are always described
5:51
as having different stages, like a two-stage pump, a three-stage pump. I'm kind of thinking
5:55
there's probably a series of pumping chambers. And we may be past the first one
6:00
So let's just... This will look to be some kind of a pumping chamber in there. Plexiclass
6:25
No, well, some kind of clear plastic, but That's interesting This whole thing is coming up now
6:34
It hard to tell but I think this thing is I think this thing is an impeller
6:53
And once again, look at that. Once upon a time, it was fast into this shaft
7:04
But you can see, look at the rub marks. Can you see that? the rub marks on the side here. Yeah. I think that this for whatever reason, this lost its grip on the
7:15
central shaft and then this shaft was just spinning within the within this first impeller
7:22
Wearing away the plastic of the impeller and that's what the fibers were. Exactly. Well, they
7:28
looked just like this except a bunch of them. Yeah, that's identical to what we pulled out of my
7:33
taps. We consulted a couple of plumbers. at the time because we didn't want to go out and buy another $1,000 pump, put it on and find the fibers
7:42
are still floating around. But none of them, and these are guys with 30 and 40 years experience
7:51
they've never heard of a submersible, but they deal with them all the time, never heard of them
7:55
breaking down like this. What do you figure's under there? There might be another impeller
8:04
I mean, we've kind of, we're certainly, and look at that. I hope I can get it apart more, but whatever bearing there was down there is kind of shot
8:17
There we go. Well, just your basic disaster
8:36
I'm still curious. about what's going on deeper in here. I think we found our culprit as far as why this thing broke
8:46
I'm still curious. You can't tell by the video, but this stuff here
8:57
this discoloration, it's iron. You can smell it. It smells like iron
9:01
You have a fair amount of iron in your water. Yeah. I hope there isn't something peculiar about our water chemistry that
9:07
chew up to municipal pumps every few years. I don't think so, though. I just thought I'd give you something
9:13
to worry about. Should we cut it again? Just to see what's further up? Why not? Okay
9:37
Another washer or something. Well, I'm seeing another pumping chamber of some kind
9:46
I think there's probably at least another one of these impellers. Maybe, maybe, it's kind of like a little water wheel
9:59
It spins around and you see it got these angled things Water impellers always look like this I seen them in jet pumps too and they kind of they kind of grab the water
10:14
As I understand it, they grab the water as it spins around and force it down in towards the center
10:20
That's kind of how it moves the water. So it's a sort of propeller
10:27
Here's that check valve. So I said when the water flows out
10:32
pushes it open but when it tries to go back down again it can't
10:37
Have we solved any sort of a mystery here? Maybe we should should I try bashing
10:41
one away further in? Might as well. Okay. Can't help think back to your words of wisdom
10:54
to me when I was a little kid at times like this. Robert, never force anything
10:59
Figure out why it's not opening up. Don't bash and smash. Okay, you got me
11:07
But sometimes a bash and smash is necessary, right? When you're dealing with a pump that's already broken, for instance
11:13
So now isn't this, okay, look at this. This is interesting. So here's the central shaft
11:18
Once upon a time connected to this. And this is one of the impellers, the not broken one
11:24
One of the not broke ones, I can see some more in here too. and the impeller is locked to the shaft by virtue of its octagonal, hexagonal shape
11:35
Oh, yeah, hexagonal shape. That's the thing that was broken out of the center of this one
11:42
So how exactly had it broken? Can we see that? Not exactly
11:47
The hexagonal part had just broken loose of the disc or had it worn to a circle
11:52
No, it broke. I don't know, maybe something got caught in it
11:56
There's nothing in here well though, and we were a long way off the bottom. But, yeah, another in color
12:03
I bet there's a third one here somewhere. Another one
12:18
I can see what looks like two more in there. Two more
12:26
That's a total of what? Five, it looks like one. Certainly there's at least one more
12:33
Actually, I can see two more. Two more than there. As far as we can see, it was just the one that let go, right
12:44
Yep. All the others were fine. That's why it was still kind of working
12:48
Pumping decently, yeah. Yeah, it just wasn't reaching 60 PSI. So there's no particular moral of story here
12:56
I just thought you might find it interesting to look inside and see how these things go together. See how this pump failed
13:01
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13:09
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13:14
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13:20
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#Construction & Power Tools
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