Tapping a Spring

[Billhook]

We have a couple of springs half way up a hillside which have never stopped running last year or even in 1976 drought

Have any of you successfully and reliably tapped one?

i was initially going to feed a cattle drinking trough in the field but if the water tested potable I would bottle it and drink it

i assume that it would be a mass of regulations to go on to sell it.

[Matthew Storrs]

I did one for a customer of mine. Hasn’t stopped working in 2 years since I’ve done it but springs are fickle things. Make sure you have traced it to the actual spring as often they can travel for a while before breaking surface which means once you start messing around they can change course if you’re not at the source.

anyway I did it quite simply by using a 4ft section of 2ft dia twin wall pipe. I dug this in to the ground vertically (so the pipe was standing vertically flush with the level of the ground, once in place of filled rapidly with water and I made a hole the diameter of the outlet pipe (4” land drain pipe in this case) about a foot from the top into the side of the twin wall which I put the the outlet pipe into and then once the twin wall chamber filled it just flowed down the land drain all the way to the paddock, by having the outlet pipe high in the chamber it kept any crap from going down the pipe and the chamber was easy to clean out with a pair of shoveholers if it started to silt up.

[Woodworks]

We are on a spring supply. Didn't fit ourselves though. Water runs out from under rock and straight into a concrete collection system. The water flows down a short gulley with ventilation bricks on one side. Water goes through these brick and into the main collection tank. The excess carries straight out at the end of the gulley. The main tank is 3' deep and the pipe to us is around halfway up allowing sediments to collect at the bottom of the tank and not run back down the pipe. There is a filter on the end of the pipe to take out any larger particles or wildlife  (it has been known) Then the rest of the filtration is at this end. Cant find a picture of a similar system but did come across this that might be of help. https://www.indiawaterportal.org/articles/gravity-based-spring-water-supply-systems-andhra-pradesh-lessons-and-steps-towards-future

[Stubby]

Don't you need a license to do this ?

[Matthew Storrs]

put a plastic manhole cover over the top of the twin wall chamber ‘well’  to stop little animals and anything else falling in.

[Woodworks]

3 minutes ago, Stubby said:

Don't you need a license to do this ?

Shhhhhhhhhhhh

[Matthew Storrs]

Ok first go at trying to draw a diagram on an iPhone!

should give you an idea of how I did it- very easy way of doing it without concrete etc , the outlet pipe would flow to a holding tank/trough or whatever you wanted.

Edited May 6, 2019 by Matthew Storrs

[Billhook]

11 minutes ago, Matthew Storrs said:

I did one for a customer of mine. Hasn’t stopped working in 2 years since I’ve done it but springs are fickle things. Make sure you have traced it to the actual spring as often they can travel for a while before breaking surface which means once you start messing around they can change course if you’re not at the source.

anyway I did it quite simply by using a 4ft section of 2ft dia twin wall pipe. I dug this in to the ground vertically (so the pipe was standing vertically flush with the level of the ground, once in place of filled rapidly with water and I made a hole the diameter of the outlet pipe (4” land drain pipe in this case) about a foot from the top into the side of the twin wall which I put the the outlet pipe into and then once the twin wall chamber filled it just flowed down the land drain all the way to the paddock, by having the outlet pipe high in the chamber it kept any crap from going down the pipe and the chamber was easy to clean out with a pair of shoveholers if it started to silt up.

Thanks for that

i have looked at several YouTube films of doing the job

A lot seem to use quick setting cement to prevent the water creeping around the sides of the main dam or pipe or whatever 

i was thinking of carefully digging out a chamber hopefully without disturbing the Spring and putting a 50 gallon screw top grapefruit container inside which I would seal in with clay.  An inlet cut out at the Spring end,  fill the container with gravel and have an outlet pipe on the other side feeding the cattle trough with an overflow pipe slightly above

 

As for licences And regulations Stubby, I would not be surprised if some little nerd in an office with nothing better to so has already made up a series of forms to fill in and licences to be paid for before you are allowed to have a quiet pee behind a tree in the woods.

Dangerous hazardous waste and all that, especially if you have been drinking some of those Southern beers!

[Billhook]

4 minutes ago, Matthew Storrs said:

Ok first go at trying to draw a diagram on an iPhone!

should give you an idea of how I did it- very easy way of doing it without concrete etc , the outlet pipe would flow to a holding tank/trough or whatever you wanted.

Good attempt Matthew!

Where your black arrow is I would leave the botto of the 50 gallon drum intact and put it below where the Spring is coming out of the hill and cut a hole into the back of it

the advantage of a screw top is that I can inspect as well as keeping out foreign materials.

i might push some land drain tiles back into the Spring as far as I dare and fill in around them with more gravel

 

Where do you go to have the water tested?

 

[Matthew Storrs]

2 minutes ago, Billhook said:

Good attempt Matthew!

Where your black arrow is I would leave the botto of the 50 gallon drum intact and put it below where the Spring is coming out of the hill and cut a hole into the back of it

the advantage of a screw top is that I can inspect as well as keeping out foreign materials.

i might push some land drain tiles back into the Spring as far as I dare and fill in around them with more gravel

 

Where do you go to have the water tested?

 

Yeah that sounds good. I did think about filling with gravel too- but wanted the water to fill the chamber with the least amount of resistance in case it tried to find another route- but probably would have been fine anyway.

 

water testing? Absolutely no idea.  My parents live on a farm where the drinking water is pure spring water-no filtration no testing- been that way ever since the farm was built 300 years ago- we all grew up on it and no ones died as a result as far as I’m aware but living at the top of a hill on Dartmoor there is little chance of contamination from human/agricultural activities.