Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations How to run a submersible well pump effeciently

This might split into two tracks. One on how to fill a glass with water, another on running the well pump in the most effecient manner possible for maximum flow.

O.K. JKB, here ya go!

That was quick!

It may split way beyond that

We don't have to worry about slip tho. That's just about the rotor keeping up with the field. We can't do anything about that.

Please proceed with your detailed requirements. Then we will build on it.

I have to go play with a 1000HP electric motor this week. It has an Emerson VFD, but not set up with a pump, but if it had a pump, pretty sure it could pour me a glass of water!

My requirements are pretty basic. On or off. No bladder tank needed - no flow restrictions when well is on.

Probably somewhere between 150 and 200 gpm. The current house well is 66' to the bottom of the well screen but the static water column in the casing is 13' below grade. New well would be within 100' of the current house well. Aquifier can support in excess of 1,000 gpm according to the well driller. It all depends on the size of the screen and the size of the motor.

Quotes that I got for another property that is in the same aquifier said 100' deep well. 800 gpm w/10 hp pump. I don't have to go that big.

Rough guesstimate right now, but with what you explained, a Grundfos 230S pump, 1-2 stage, with a 5hp motor and the proper VFD (don't worry about that!!!), 35 feet of head, open flow after that. Probably looking in the area of 210gmp +/-, and the wattage of approximately a 2HP motor on your electric bill.

I think we may be able to get it to a 3HP motor with a different pump configuration and VFD, and get it into the 150-200 gpm range that you want.

These are just rough estimates tho, but probably not too far off.

Hey, where do I submit my time sheets here

Thanks!

I looked thru my spotting scope, and saw Lusk raising his hand.

Now that is flow!!!Scott I have only 1 word of caution, both of my wells are 100' deep and the "pump and dump" system I have for the pond is 100 yards away from the house well. When I filled the pond last year it brought in iron into the aquafer. I don't know if it will settle out with time?
How big of discharge line do you need for that, 4"?

JKB- What would you use a VFD for, a soft start or change flow rate?

Mike, thanks for the words of caution. Last year I ran an estimated 6+ million gallons of water thru my house well. It DID bring some iron to the well, but not enough that I have to run any filtration system or even a water softner on the house.

Nothing near like what the water was thru the shallow well a few years ago! That'd leave orange residue on trees if they were irrigated.

Scott,

Typically the farther west you go your way from me the iron levels drop but manganese goes up according to the test well data I have. There are exceptions though. My well driller that really knows his stuff warned me my iron level could rise if in put in a larger pump.

On an interesting note the high school down the road has very little iron, but across the highway two houses down in the direction of the high school a Cuuligan technician told me a household has twice as much iron as I do. (5 ppm)

According to a map I have the highway in front of me divides the Soloman Creek aquifer and the the Natural Lakes aquifer. I'm supposed to be on the side of the Natural Lakes aquifer.

The pump I was looking at in this application has a 3" discharge. The well would be 6".



Scott only has single phase power. The first reason is so we can take advantage of more energy efficient 3 phase motors. In the submersible pump world, there is not a huge difference, but may gain 6-8% or so. Next is as a soft starter, then to take advantage of the Affinity Laws for pumps. This is the huge part and where the most savings occur. It takes a bit of time to go thru all the possible combinations, even longer if your information sucks!!! (did I ever mention that I hate Google!)

I haven't had time to read squiggly lines and blurry PDF's today, (maybe just blurry eyes tho) but quite a few planets lined up yesterday with the 3HP and the 230S in single stage flavor. It would be nice if that would work.

Got interrupted...

Scott, measure your line voltage at your breaker panel. That would be line in, in the 200+V flavor.

How far down would the pump be?, and how far away from the well to the control?. Need to get approximate cable run length's from the VFD to the motor.

I don't know. I'll measure my current pump tomorrow. I'll also measure from the "H" frame to where the well would probably go too. What do I need to measure current "in"? Electric is my weakest subject.

You just need to measure your voltage. The 3 most common household voltages the power companies supply are 220, 230 and 240. There are some others out there like 190. You measure this at your main breaker. If you have, shall we say a 220 air conditioner outlet, you can measure it there also.

I'll get back later.

JKB, I didnt even know they made 3PH sumbs? Your one smart dude.

They make them for ag, industrial, municipal and such. Not too many residential areas have 3 phase available. We do have a couple (wealthy) residential customers with true 3 phase.

I can get 480V true 3 phase from about 3/4 mile away for an estimated cost of 60K, which that won't happen.

I also have 2 high voltage lines out front that they can tap into and they can do some funky things with transformers and get it really close, but it's a bit dirty as far as the sine wave side of things go, but works. We had this setup at our shop and everything worked fine.

Problem tho, is this rig could initially cost up to 20K, and I would get rebates over time, based on the amount of juice I was using. That kinda kicks trying to be energy efficient in the face a bit, don't ya think!

They will run 240V single phase for free. My next question will be about piping in 480V single phase? I have equipment that will run from a 480V single phase source, just have to enable phase loss and all is cool. Just have to see what they say.

The trend in Europe is to bring in 3 phase to new residential customers and convert over what they can. They have 3 phase appliances like refrigerators that don't suck hardly any juice. We are way behind!

My last electric bill was at $0.154/KWH, and we are not into AC season yet 5.2% of that is going toward paying for a new Wind Farm that another utility company installed, not the one where I get my power from.

At my rates, and I am sure others have higher rates, it's getting more reasonable for one to generate their own electricity, based on use.

Mine was $0.12928 per kwh.

"other fees" and taxes was 22% of the total bill. That figure above doesn't include those "other fees" and taxes.

Mine was totalized all into one, because that is what you are actually paying per kwh of electricity.

New bill I just opened.

If you look at the actual energy charge for that part of the bill, it's 0.114/kwh.

Total bill based on everything is 0.1549/kwh.

So the rest of the stuff is 26% of the total bill.

I was just going over my bill again. Last year at this time I used 159KW more than this year.

Last year at this time, I was running the Air Conditioner!!!

Mine is;

KWH expense is .0560/kwh
charge with everything brings it .1239/kwh...that over 100% add on.

My total is $0.166 per kwh.

That's why lowering my energy usage is important to me.

I forget what mine is but know the cost per kilowatt keeps going higher. What's crazy is if I lived on the other side of the highway my rates would be a lot higher according to a fish farmer I know. The company that services me is REMC and the one on the other sie of the highway is NIPSCO.

My Dad's is 0.124 and he has a surcharge for energy efficiency, meaning he is paying more for not qualifying energy efficient.

VFD's for motor control are qualifying items for energy efficiency credits.

Allen Bradley recently released their PowerFlex 525 series drives. They have quite a few more energy saving enhancements. I downloaded the manual but haven't had a chance to read it yet. I'll get prices tomorrow.

Econo mode requires the motor to run under Sensorless Vector Control. This requires the drive to go thru an auto tuning sequence with the motor. The motor needs to be disconnected from the pump and you start the auto tune. During this process, the drive learns everything it needs to know about the particular motor it is connected to and how best to operate that motor in the most efficient manner. Any industrial motor will auto tune.

Next question on my list for the motor mfg. engineers is, will these motors run under Sensorless Vector Control? Basically, all it would have to survive is the auto tuning sequence, which only needs to be done once. One mfg. already stated in their manual that their motors will only run in the V/Hz mode, but hey, they just purchased a Chinese VFD manufacturer, and those are the most miserable pieces of control crap out there! Trust me, I worked with this brand because a customer specified it and wanted to save some cash. It cost him more money in the long run than buying the good stuff.

I have a long story behind this, but here is the short version. Two identical drives. Both manufactured on the same day. Both have the same manual. Both have very close serial numbers. Both did not set up and program the same tho. Numerous phone calls to technical support, and then the superiors got involved. They came up with the fact that the drives had different firmware. Said they recently changed it and the two we got must have been on the assembly line when that happened. Got the manual for the new firmware (wasn't published online yet), still a piece of crap! Numerous deficiencies in these drives. They would not do what they claimed they can do. Have a PLC on this to command the drives. Should have only been simple message instructions to the drives, which would have only taken an hour or so for the whole ball game, but Noooooooo! Drives don't want to cooperate! Spent a week or so learning all the deficiencies of these drives and programming around so they work decently. Cool for now, but I expect phone calls in the future. We did ban the use of these drives, and will steer any customer away from trying to save a few bucks this way. There is quite a bit more to this, but I'll save your brain cells to be used elsewhere

Ya see, that's why I'm waiting until you get it figured out for your application. There's no way in he.. that I could get this figured out by myself!

Cecil, I have NIPSCO as an energy provider.

I have quite a few things worked out for my app.

I will tell you that my well pump will only be 3HP, and that it will only be utilized for pulling water out of the ground.

Same here JKB. This well won't be for the house, strictly for the pond (s).

I've been going thru the manual on the 525 I mentioned earlier. Boy, do I like that one! 3HP rig is 592 bucks. I'll explain more later.