Old fashioned work day

[SteveW]

Our pump at my Church went bad and it would cost 500 plus dollars to have it pulled. We decided to try and pull it ourselves and I have quite a bit of tackle, ropes and the like and kind of like the caveman challenge. 3 other guys and myself got together today and I picked up 3 16' 4x4's and we made a tripod and rigged a single and double pulley tackle arrangement and decided to try. We were not sure how deep it was and figured it was at least 80' and possibly up to 130' plus didn't know what the well pipe was and hoped it was pvc. it was not, it was 2" rigid. We got the head broke loose fairly easily and pulled it all by hand except for 1 place where it was stuck and we put a come along on it for about 3' and then it freed up and we put the manual labor back to it. We pulled 4 sticks of pipe so it was 84' of rigid and the pump was probably 50+ lbs. It was hard work but it was fun as only electric used was the sawzall to cut the rigid off as we brought it up. A book I have and highly recommend for anyone who likes to use old time methods is the Army technical manual TM 5-225 Rigging and engineer hand tools from December 12, 1942. A treasure chest of information for outdoor work.



That was well head and it was under the sidewalk so hey might as well start with a challenge right

[SteveW]

Here was rigging of the tripod, method from the manual and it was very stout and went up pretty quick.



Hung the double block



Up she went



First lift underway



Last piece coming out



Out it came. It was put down in 1987, and the man sitting is the son of the man who put it in. He was a sprinkler installer so Glenn (son) handles the pump stuff at Church and I handle the electrical work.



You can tell the working guys as we were dressed for it and the young man who helped learned from that also. It was hard fun work. New pump will be smaller hp and we will use 1 1/2 pvc pipe so the grand kids won't have to work as hard next time. We will sit back and tell them how rough it was back in 2014

[gmcjr]

Looks like a good day service! Get a group of people together who's not afraid of work and anything is possible and most of the time enjoyable!!!!



At our church, it's usually me, my dad, and my former ag teacher from high school, and couple of others doing the manual labor, the rest of the congregation runs for the hills so to speak, lol!

[SteveW]

Actually I have people who will work for food. I have been known to bring my dutch oven and get it going so that about the time we are done, food is ready. It got to the point where I didn't have to even tell them what we were doing, they just wanted to know what i was bringing to cook! Always remember that Time/Talent and Treasure are all acceptable to God. We did use one modern gadget as we got hungry and had the young fella look up a pizza place so he ordered and paid with his phone/ device or whatever they call them.

[F Bill]

Nice to see folks working together to solve a problem like that. Lots of folks would much rather write a check but there is also nothing wrong with manual labor.

I've been involved in my own little work project at my old place but nary a helper to be had except for one good friend with a tractor....Don't ever talk bad about the new Massey Ferguson line, it is amazing what a little machine can do. It is sad all the folks I helped out over the years choose not to reciprocate but.....they probably don't even know the project is underway as we are keeping it hush hush due to a couple sticky issues. Once it is completed I'll share with you guys what I've been busy with instead of jeeps...

[ZekeD]

If you ever get a chance to buy an out of print book called "Lever's Sheet Anchor" do so....  It was the instruction manual for the royal Navy's midshipmen.....    In the 1700's. Unbelievable knowledge with primitive situations.

[SteveW]

Knot's hitches and lashings are pretty neat to know about but in reality you only need to be able to tie about 6 and it will cover 99% of work needed. My wife is pretty glad we don't have any property because of what I probably would be tinkering with.  Hey F Bill I did a shark pot roast in my dutch oven tonight. Had dinner over at daughters house with her husband and our son for Mothers Day. Man if you could have smelled that when I lifted the lid oh my! I'll look for the sailor book although Navy guys are just show off's.

[SteveW]

Took the pipe and some of the pump housing to the scrap yard on Sat. It weighed 320 lbs and with part of motor I still have we probably pulled 350 lbs out. The check valve had failed so we at least didn't pull up water also. Cost of 4x4's about 66 bucks and got about 34 bucks for scrap so way under budget so far.

[johnrb3b]

Wow, you only got $0.10 per pound for your scrap?
The scrap yard in the town next to me (Chicaog suburbs) has given me $0.20 per pound the last three times I've gone there.
I'm hoping that's still true when I haul the '99 Cherokiee hulk to him. I'm hoping for $300 or more.

[SteveW]

Scrap is market/location driven. It is taken here but has to go to Tampa for shipping to either mills or overseas. The closer you are to a big port or a scrap processing mill you will get more. We had a car bite the dust when our son was in college in Tallahassee and called a couple places with hardly any difference in price and all of the vehicles have to go to Jacksonville for the market so you can either waste your time and money on fuel or be shed of it and someone else does it for you.