Deep well drilling in the desert near Joshua Tree (part 1)
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- Опубликовано: 26 сен 2024
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View part 2 here: • Well drilling near Jos...
Let's learn about drilling a deep, DEEP water well, through mostly granite, in the middle of the desert in Southern California, near Joshua Tree.
Not a sponsored video, but the actual work (and high quality work, at that) was done by North American Drilling.
Video equipment used:
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Not the usual review you see on my channel, but some cool stuff to learn none-the-less. What do y'all think?
How much did end up costing?
How did you pick the spot to drill ?
@@jimsjacob he replied and said his options were limited . I was wondering in they used ground based radar or some modern technology to find the best spot to drill ? I guess not .
@@ryanlangford2333 Probably $25K - $30K.
@@ryanlangford2333 a big splash
Thank you for explaining those steps for us. It is more complicated than I thought.
Thanks for the video. Memories!!
I grew up on a cattle and sheep ranch near Piñon New Mexico. My grandfather and mother homesteaded 1-section of land around 1910-/+ 5 years (we haven’t found the records). Anyway we had 3 water wells on the ranch they grew to about 10,000 acres in th 1960’s. Both of my grandparents were born in the 1880’s/90’s and my dad was born in 1939, he was their only child.
Anyway I came along in the 60’s. The area got a lot more rain than your land but with changing weather patterns, rain water was insufficient by 1950. So we drilled 3 wells at 1000+ feet. The water was amazing except for our property below the edge of the Sacramento. It was a yellow cake (sulfur) well. The water smelt like rotten eggs.
Our cattle loved it, but I hated it.
my grand pa did 500 acres in Wyoming in 1921 his friend left gave him 500 more acres but the acres is desolate still open land there now, they found oil hundred miles away
Wow, memories indeed! No sulfur smell here but lots of other stuff that shows up in my water rest video coming soon.
Really enjoyed your story though. Thanks for sharing it.
Bret
Thanks for the share!
Great history
This is the best video on the drilling process I've ever seen.
Thank you
Wow, thanks! Much appreciate hearing that.
Good job. Pretty much the same process is used to drill 20000 foot wells and deeper. Different equipment, fluids, pumps, etc. But the basic process is the same. They were using an “Air Hammer”, with compressed air, some water, an a commercial soap to make the foam. I’ve dried many wells to 10000’ or more in Pennsylvania using this process. You did a great job explaining for the novice. 😊
Thanks! Really appreciate the comment. And thx for watching.
Jim 20,000ft is more than 6,000m. 6km. What reason for so deep?
2. Can air blow out the chips from that depth? Or did you have foam assistance?
Thanks.
RSA.
@@antonhuman8446 air is only good to about 12000 ft. 20000 ft vertically is not uncommon with fluid mud. A lot of wells go horizontal at some depth and can go 30000 ft overall length.
Thanks!
@@jimjackson1087
My father and the neighbor bought a well rig and drill pump and the three of us drilled our well set the casing and blew it clean 24” X 300’ we drilled five wells for four properties in the San Joaquin Valley.
Firstly appreciate your efforts to bring these experimental videos.
Glad you like them!
Top casing is called surface casing. In the oil field they drill down past the freshwater, then push cement down the casing and up the sides to seal the surface water from the oil and gas formation. Then they start with a smaller diameter casing.
Interesting! Definitely different here with water, at least in this geology. Thx for sharing....
Different
Spent many hours welding surface casing. It was muddy and nasty in those cellars, but it paid good
Great job on video and narration! I am a retired drilling contractor of 42 years, My wife and I owned a very similar rig to this one and these are really amazing machines. Great job on putting this together and posting.
Glad you enjoyed it!
I believed I saw this water drilling operations a few years ago while driving along I-10 to Los Angeles. I'm impressed as well how the crew work as if they knew every steps of the drilling process. Thank you for uploading, very informative!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Being an 85 year old lifetime driller i appreciate video's like this,. OH the fork is actually called a breakout wrench, I lost a little finger to one like that :)
Oh man sorry to hear that! Thanks for the vernacular though!
Iam driller in iraq . I work in south iraq.
A Sah la malikom my brother...
How are things there, These days?
@@lifeisa.smalllesson4607 keep up the good work!
I like eggs
@@Trey4x4 indeed
Oil or water?
How exciting is this deep drilling technology!
I find it very exciting! ;)
I watch the drilling of wells..
There will come a day when we need that
Thank you.
I analyzed water samples from monitoring wells. On ocassion, I went out with our drilling crew. Thanks again for sharing the video.
Glad you enjoyed it!
IR THE BEST DRILLING RIG AND COMPRESSOR
Hard to beat but so is Gardner Denver.
TX for sharing, Hope u had your purpose fulfilled after drilling! I was expecting the oild drilling and came here,lol.
Looks like a GEFCO 30 K.
Mine had a thousand cfm screw compressor and 3x4 mud pimp. Sold out in 2017 to a friendly competitor.
They just purchased a new 30k to comply with CA smog..my crew is still working with the new owner..Loved the work..never a dull moment😂
Awesome, thx for commenting!
Loved working on drill rigs and great satisfaction supplying people with water. Company is now in hands of third owner..I was second.
First owner started in 1922 and I bought in in 1972 with a 71 Star cable tool.
Ran Portadrill 10 TG and TKT before moving up to Gefco 30 K..new owners just purchased a new one to be smog compliant in Nothern CA.
We're 102 years young..LOL
Reason for 7:47 When they finish drilling a rod out and pulled it back a couple of feet is to keep the head clear of the debris. Water is pump to make sure the drill head is clear and not clogged. If not doing that you can actually suck up fine rock or sand Into the head and clogging the water port/nozzles. When you add another rod on. If you clogged your drill head it will overhead. The drill head is actually called a hammer head or hammer bit
Thank you for adding clarity and color! Much appreciated 🙌
Referred to them as "downhole hammer with flat bottom bit" when working in the Arkoma Basin of Arkansas and Oklahoma and the process as "air-drilling" and when no water you are "dusting" and when you encounter some water, you may need to "mist" or "foam" the air to create a wall cake. I was a wellsite geologist in the 70s & 80s.
Great video thank you very much, always interesting to see professionals doing what they do, including the way you made this video. Play through.
Thanks! And I agree... Was a real treat to watch those guys do what they do.
before exoect ti drill in the evening you need pray if where is the good water will come out. here in phillipines 4 days before the water will come out but it is non stop flowing and very vlear water. im pilipino watching here in phillipines.
Thank you for watching!
Fascinating recovery of water------!
I thought so!
740' in Menifee, pump at 240' never an issue since for over 17yrs. drilled in 2006
This man has successfully kept me engaged for a whole 11 minutes on a topic i didn't even need to know!
Excellent narration.
Simplified video footage
And the crew of North America drilling is amazing!
There is an end missing. Have you found water?
Thanks so so much for the compliments! And thanks for watching! As for the missing part, there's a part 2 😉
thanks for this super informative video, glad you like their service. we have parcels not too far away and might eventually need them/
Ohh glad I could help and definitely would recommend. Good luck to you!
Fascinating video, thanks for sharing.
Thx for watching!
Great video. Beautiful desert too. Thanks
I am driller from Afghanistan 🇦🇫
The deeper the water, the more pure and filtered.
That's true in some ways but not so much for the naturally radioactive water you get super deep 😉
The carousel is nice. We use a rod truck and trip in and out 800-1200 ft of pipe for good water. Lol
I love the all new names you gave all of that equipment.....yep, you over-thought this one.
Yeah, clearly out of my depth here but I still hope and think it's interesting and useful to people not familiar with any of it!
@@LetsOverthinkThis Sorry if I sounded a smart ass there, many years in the drilling game and some descriptions make me cringe a bit, glad you got your water though. HNY for 2023.
Well we're all here to learn (I assume) so if you feel like it, mind correcting some of the descriptors for us all? Much appreciated!
@@LetsOverthinkThis a lot of the tools are custom made and there names are made up most of the time IV been to pump convention but most of the stuff made by a machine shop 🛠️💯👍✌️🍻💦
Excellent narration. Very educational. Loved the video. Thank you!
Really glad you enjoyed it!
Ideally speaking, and just a suggestion, that retention wall & collection pit, would be lined with thick plastic sheeting. In such sandy soil, water, liquids, does go deeper down than clay, loamie soil. But cool vid, well done and informative.
Interesting! To be honest I wasn't trying to prevent reabsorption since it's all just water and ground up rock with a little bit of biodegradable foaming agent adding in but yours is definitely a cleaner approach! 👍
Great job brother
My dad had a hammer drill rig do are well in Blue Diamond NV outside of las vegas in the 70s and they lost the hammer bit at 680 feet and had to start over. And he witched it with coat hangers that well had good water tell we left it in 2013.
always wondered what goes into drilling boreholes
Great easy to follow video.
Very cool. I’ve never seen this before. Always wondered how it was done. Great vid. Good job. Thanks.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Great video thank you very much, always interesting to see professionals doing what they do
Agreed, and thanks for watching!
That’s so cool . Joshua Tree and San Bernardino County don’t allow us to do anything on our land , let alone dig for a well. Just putting up a 5ft fence was mission impossible and a few ticket violations .
Oh wow that's weird since at least where I am (also in San Bernardino)you actually HAVE to have water before you can even get a permit to build anything. Which makes sense but I wonder what they expect you to do for water?
Anyway sorry to hear that. Thanks for watching and good luck to you!
isn't that the same county where Nestle pumped millions of gallons of spring water over the state allotment?
I’m on my third well. I wish people would be more careful with the water.
Yeah. It's more precious than lots of people have been treating it...
This would be a wise business to get started in, for any high-school aged kids out there.
Right? Gotta have water and it ain't getting easier to find.
Thx for watching!
@@LetsOverthinkThis also a good reason to stay in school so you don't have to do this line of work. It not easy or fun it's hard on the body.
VERY cool!! Great narrative!! I learned something.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Saw a drill bit made with 5/8” carbide rounded end pieces in the 60’s.
Bravo.......check ur telling .....gold ......cheers
Interesting video but raises as many questions as it answers. When you drill to 1000 ft or even 2000 ft, it's important to determine the static water level because that's the depth to raise water. Ultimately the total capital cost is drilling, installing the pipe work (casing) and the pump and motor. The operational cost are then the power / fuel cost plus maintenance of pump and motor. Total costs can then determine an hourly cost against the volume pumped ( gal or L/hr), obviously the less lift height- the cheaper the water.
Agreed but I think you may be thinking agriculture-scale water pumping. This is a well for a single family home and the pump easily pumps with about 600 watts to provide around 6gpm from the hole. The static water level is around 190 which honestly isn't bad at all considering...
Very interesting, thank you
I thought so too, and thx for watching!
Sabah Al-Nour, I am very happy to work with you. I have the ability to locate valleys and underground lights all over the world
You should have doused first with a mesquite limb. I tested it with my eyes closed. It really works. Some other water drilling companies said I couldn’t find water there. I did.
Glad you found water 👍
Good job
Very interesting Video & thanks for sharing 👍
I have help drill in California valley wasn't the funniest but the pay was good not to much water out there Los padra is a little bit better. I rather stay to the coast. I'm glad I stayed doing pump work and systems 💦🛠️👍✌️🍻💯
I am driller from India🇮🇳
600 feet is a "deep well"? 😂
While that's pretty deep, it not that deep, as wells go.
When I was a kid (in the early 80's), my dad had a well (actually, 2 wells) drilled on our property in the mountains of far-eastern San Diego county. Those wells were over 800' deep. Although they hit water at around 75-100', they continued down (through hard, "blue granite" rock). The result was beautiful, ice-cold, crystal-clear water, flowing so much that it could not be pumped dry with a 3hp submersible pump.
Those wells are still in service to this day...
It's not a competition, LOL! Was just emphasizing "deep" compared to most of the water wells I see on youtube which are much shallower. Plus, it sure seems deep when its $72/foot ;)
Glad your well is still producing BTW!
Wating for second part
Posted! Sorry for the delay.
In India there are two trucks one is used to drill the whole to the ground and another one is used to pump the pressure to drilling pipe
Thats smart, particularly if one gigantic truck can't always get to where the well needs to be. Thanks for sharing 👍
i think they need a few of those in ridgecrest where i have property.
The “large bit” you refer to is a down-the-hole hammer.
good deep underground drilling for water # another alternate to get & store water is dam construction or large pool construction to accumulate rain water sufficient for 2-3 years #
Yes although not nearly enough rain here to be useful. But true in lots of other places!
It also not legal in California unfortunately 💦🛠️👍💯
I'm in the mountains and we have good water. The drillers hit water at about 80 feet but it's just surface water. The wells can be deep or shallow. My first well was at 240 feet. I had it re-drilled and they went close to 500 feet. My neighbor just drilled his well, 500 feet for 100 gallons a minute. I have watched them drill a few wells, not exciting but it is something to see.
Thanks for the comment. Which mountains are you referring to? And are you sure that's 100gpm?! That's an INSANELY high flow if true. 🤯
Screw the last trees. That water is MINE!
This well is only for a small residence and no agriculture. There is plenty to complain about in terms of wasteful water use in the world but we'll consume the same amount wherever we are and pretty sure this isn't making a difference.
Had to subscribe based on the channel name
😉 🙌
I know of places in Australia where bores go down nearly 1km . And water free flows at over 1m ltrs per day. Bores here now are capped, sealed & water is piped to tanks, troughs, homes, garden taps etc
Yeah, definitely not the deepest well out there. Jealous of that 1M ltr/day flow, but this is a desert and we were lucky to get water *at all*. :)
@@LetsOverthinkThis we have a great artesian basin here in Australia.. some bores only need to go down a couple of hundred mtrs others about 1 km . The pressure is natural not requiring water to be pumped to the surface , but to minimise evaporation , they must be capped, sealed , piped, water stored in tanks etc . On very isolated outback properties , Open drains were used yrs ago getting water to dams & isolated homes but evaporation rates were huge
So, was it worth it? Did they it a good flow of water?
See part 2! Worth it for me for sure. Not great production compared to most wells but for the desert and my purposes, just fine! 👍
Seemed like a simple drilling. Ya, lots of rock but at least it's consistent ground. Drilled to 2,000 feet in Afghanistan and we were constantly pulling the drill rod out to change bits since the ground changed dramatically in such short distances.
Oh wow, yeah, I think the drilling was consistent. Must really add to the drilling time to keep having to pull all the rod out to change bits. Yikes.
how many days did it take to reach 600 feets?
I think day 1 was getting all set up and putting the 20' steel casing in with concrete, etc. The next day they actually drilled to 480' and the day after to 600'. That 3rd day they tried putting the PVC in but as you can see in part 2, they hit a problem and had to come back with a mud pump which added yet another day. To be honest, it still all felt pretty quick to me, considering.
Cool video. You have to drill about 900 to 1000 feet here in the high desert of Arizona to hit water.
yeah I've heard that, and to be fair, I think some parts of the high desert I'm in also require that sort of depth. These things seem to be VERY location-specific. Thanks for commenting!
looking forward to your next video, thanks
Thanks! Gotta get my butt in gear and put it together 🤦
Artesian Well south of Baghdad. 2400 GPM 24/7
Yeah that's a whole different story 😅
ok... so.. I am a geologist over in Arizona.. I have spent years walking around the desert.. I also look at satellite images and I have been for more than 30 years... you will find water along the cracks in the underlying rock... rivers and creeks and dry washes follow fault lines... all of them... that's what creates the topology of the land... they meander.. because the Planet is going round and round so water wants to flow downhill in a straight line, but the motion of the Planet creates curves and it bounces back and forth between the rocks... the water is actually flowing underground.. the sand and dust are porous... and those cracks where dry washes are is where you find water... if you look.. and find a place where the meander runs into a higher point of rock.. a cliff.. even a small one.. the area across the wash on the inside of the curve.. a fairly shallow well will give you water
vegetation is a good indicator for water... I look for saguaro here in the Sonoran desert... you are in the lowest region on Earth... below sea level... in some areas
.. if I was looking... those ankle high bushes are a pretty good indication that you should look somewhere else 😉.. in the Joshua tree areas... that's what I would look for
Except the Joshua trees aren't in any clusters.. they're pretty evenly distributed on my land. Plus you can't drill near them even if they did indicate water ...
Also sorry to say while I agree that the topography might indicate deep water flows, the vegetation around here won't. The water is hundreds of feet deep and the plants all have super super BROAD root networks, not deep ones, because they have to get as much water from the surface as they can.
What did you mean when you said "you are in the lowest region on earth, below sea level"?
Surface casing 😊
My family was having machine like this 40 years ago
Yep, they've made drilling machines for a long time.
Educational plus fun to watch ! 👍
Thanks for watching!
here in America, we call that fork thing a Wrench
The one that slides automatically on hydraulics to grab the flats on the drill rod? Surprised it doesn't have a more specific name.
excited to see the drilling machine or more in the african continent or in the sahara desert to be exact
Lol, well you won't see either of those here.
You could of try to tap Primary water that is deep in the earth and unlimited under pressure, possibly not as deep as what you drilled for an aquifer. Primary water comes up thru vertical rock fissures that can be drilled into. Been doing it for a100 yrs. Search, Primary water.
Wow awesome work in desert... Love from India
Thanks for watching and saying hi!
@@LetsOverthinkThis hello
That's cool
I live about 15 miles north of JT near the Marine Base on 2.5 acres... fortunately we have water from the JTWD but I always wondered about the cost of putting in a well.
Thanks for the very informative video 🤗
Glad you enjoyed it!
What's overall cost for yours well?
Probably 60ish but if you're going to use that as any estimate for your own purposes, don't. This process has an enormous range of costs depending on lots of factors.
Start at $100/ft and go from there. Ballpark figure.
Good job
Thanks!
Nice video. Too bad you don't have a part 2.
Indeed. Life has gotten in the way. Video half edited and still hoping to get it out!
Finally posted part 2!
For low water yield, install lower water level probes to protect the pump.
Also a high water probe which will allow pump to start again.
Mind you, a gate valve at the top of pump riser can be set to control the outlet, to allow a medium flow rate.
Cheers, from Chch, New Zealand.
Hi Tony! You're right, though things are a little different with these new-fangled pumps. The pump itself has a water sensor in it so it doesn't run dry and I've tested it.... it just shows low water on the panel top-side and resumes when submerged again. Also, not being a traditional pump, you're not supposed to gate the output of it. I don't know how much that matters since it's already pushing against a potential 500 feet of head but none-the-less being a brushless digital drive, it can get confused by being gated.
The pump will empty into a big holding tank and I will definitely have a float switch at the top to keep it from overflowing. And I will likely have another float under that one which triggers the pump to turn back on so the pump isn't cycling a lot as that top switch gets triggered on and off. IE the "band" will be wider and the water will have to fall maybe a foot in that big tank for the well pump to switch on (and then it will get to stay on for a while instead of going on and off).
I also have something else up my sleeve: the pump has a very repeatable wattage curve that is dependent on the water depth which means I may build a little box that shuts off the well pump as the water gets low in the hole but BEFORE the pump actually senses it's dry, just to safeguard things.
Thanks for watching and for your contribution here!
I'm not sure if this is true but I heard that when you drill for water the ground shrinks.
In California this has been proven to be true with farmers drilling for water
Well the ground doesn't really shrink but since part of what supports the surface is the layers below (including water) if you remove a lot of water, the surface can lower. And yeah, it's the case everywhere a lot of water is being pumped from the ground and is a real problem. My tiny personal well that is just for a house of 2 and no agriculture isn't contributing to that but it's a phenomenon for sure.
Its called Reverse Circulation Drilling. Compressors can range up to 500psi 1100cfm plus requiring several hundred horsepower to drive it all. This machine is probably running a 350/900 but I dont know this rig. The bit is attached to a hollow hammer so they have in innertube just like the rods. Air goes down between the innertube and outertube or rod driving the reciprocating hammer while pulversised rock material, air and even ground water are forced up the innertube. Depending on the size of the shroud on the bit, some of the air/water mix will come up outside of the hammer and rods which keeps the hole clean and in some cases, reduces ground water which depletes hammer peformance if ground water is excessive. This action is why casing is required otherwise the constant action of material coming up the hole would destroy the "collar" pretty much guaranteeing you will "Bog" your rod string.
My bad, its conventional hammer. No innertube. All air and sample come up outside of the rods....
I hope you called 811 before you stared digging! 😆 🤣
🤣
I'm from Morocco. I work on well drilling machines
What information or facts satisfied you that the risk of a dry hole was worth it? Also, can you tell us the cost of the well including pump purchase and installation?
I live in WV and our well is 575 feet. Friend that has farm few miles away has one that's 750.
Deep! Whatever it takes, right?
@@LetsOverthinkThis Rocky
Things like how you found water in this spot in the desert ? Then the cost ..that would be interesting too. The slush is Drillers Mud. I’ve drilled six wells in Baja California and enjoyed the discovery of water each time. None of the wells were dug using equipment anywhere near as nice and modern as this.
Thanks for watching and yeah, sorry I missed those aspects! I did answer many times in the comments since, but to summarize: Cost was around $60k for what you see here and as for the spot, I bought the land knowing it was likely (but not certain) that water could be found there based on neighbor's wells, etc. I don't believe in dowsing rods (though anyone is free to!) especially at this depth, so we picked the spot that made the most sense for my site plan: most spots on the property would have been more of a pain in the future in terms of trenching and such. The drilling company just bought the rig here after practically running their old rig into the ground over the previous few decades so I, too, was impressed by how clean and new it was :)
Anyways, thanks for the comment!
@Let's Overthink This the rods definitely work but not for locating a well, they do work for finding shallow water, water lines and wires
@@markwilliams4525 no
@@ronandingridjohnson1409 no what?
@@ronandingridjohnson1409 Yes
Looks expensive holy shit 600ft! Fun fact oil wells are way deeper
In northern Uganda, we find water after just 15 meters. However, we go for about 50m down (150 feet).
Nice! Yeah even in North America it varies a LOT from just 5 or so meters all the way to 300 meters or more! I'd love to get water 15 meters down! 😊
Not bad ⚡️
Wow ni!
Why was this well drilled. For who ?
Lol, for me.
The bit is only the piece on the end....the thick round section on top of the bit are called collars..they add weight on top of the bit.
👍
they could reach oil in that dept!
In some places, probably!
question: how to detect the drilling point? i mean, how to know if there's water underneath the surface?
Short answer is you can't. There are technologies that can sense water that is shallower than this and/or through other ground conditions. Some people believe in using dowsing rods and they're free to believe that. I don't personally believe in it, and if I did, I'd believe you could maybe sense free flowing water that is pretty shallow. Not hundreds of feet through solid rock :)
In my case, I know my neighbors have water and how deep it was so I knew it was pretty likely I'd hit it too and luckily I did.
Thx for the question!
@LetsOverthinkThis thanks, my overthinking mind always worry that we get the oil instead of the water :)
pakah waktu mengebor tidak memakai air?
How did you pick the spot to drill ?
Where it made sense for my project and build, etc. Very few options, actually that make sense in terms of not having to pump water up hill a lot or trench needlessly.