# Well Pump Troubleshooting Call



## Cow (Jan 16, 2008)

I listen to what customers and other trades tell me, but I verify the problem first. If I was told there was a short in the wiring, I would of lifted the wires at the pump controller, and megged the wiring back to the breaker. Then I would have isolated and megged all the wires going down the well to ground.

If you suspect the capacitor is a problem, it's a very simple check with a meter. My 289 has a capacitance function, but there are other cheaper meters out there with this function.

Franklin Pumps has a troubleshooting guide on their website that really breaks it down for troubleshooting pumps and controllers. I believe it's made for pump techs, it's a handy resource to have if you get very many of these calls. It gives you resistances to check between the red, black, yellow wires, etc as well as other tips.


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## bartstop (Sep 30, 2012)

One thing I've learned......any problem with wiring is called a "short". Don't assume they know what a short really is and take anything they say with a grain of salt.


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## wendon (Sep 27, 2010)

Could be a number of things. If there's a short, why didn't the breaker trip? Is the starter box the correct one for the pump? If it's the capacitor, why would it be hit and miss, unless the terminals are loose. I would sooner suspect the relay. Easy to fix by simply the whole start pack out with a new one. Is it a new well or did they just replace the pump?

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G870A using Tapatalk


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

wendon said:


> Could be a number of things. If there's a short, why didn't the breaker trip? Is the starter box the correct one for the pump? If it's the capacitor, why would it be hit and miss, unless the terminals are loose. I would sooner suspect the relay. Easy to fix by simply the whole start pack out with a new one. Is it a new well or did they just replace the pump?
> 
> Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G870A using Tapatalk


Not a new well, new pump, pressure switch and pressure tank for existing well.

Yes, if it was a short, then the breaker should have tripped during my testing. 

Since everything is new, I was wondering if something in the motor control panel could be causing an occasional short.


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## wildleg (Apr 12, 2009)

something just doesn't smell right (of course, you might have left out some of the story).

The first thing the plumber should have checked for is power, before he replaced the pump, tank, etc. on the ownwer's dime. So how is it that those things got replaced, and then suddenly there's no power ?

maybe I'm overreaching . . . but I've seen it before.


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## emtnut (Mar 1, 2015)

My first thought would be, does the plumber know where to measure for power on the switch ?

I can't count the number of sump pumps not working .... hit the pressure switch with a good left .... pump running :laughing:

(I learned that trick from the 'Fonze' )


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## RePhase277 (Feb 5, 2008)

This is one of those cases from that other thread where a megger is required, even if it just eliminates a candidate problem.


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

Well, after five days I got a call back, no water again.

This time however, I found the problem, one of the legs of the 240 volt line side feeder to the pressure switch read 0 voltage and the breaker was in the tripped position. Load side of the two pole breaker was solid however. 

Rewired new feed and everything was fine.

What caused this feeder to have occasional shorts?


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## telsa (May 22, 2015)

Roger123 said:


> Well, after five days I got a call back, no water again.
> 
> This time however, I found the problem, one of the legs of the 240 volt line side feeder to the pressure switch read 0 voltage and the breaker was in the tripped position. Load side of the two pole breaker was solid however.
> 
> ...


I'm not there...

BUT.

Hit and miss troubles often mean that the original install stripped the screws at this or that contactor// relay// C/B.

Slightly stripped screws = weak clamping = chitty connection that comes and goes.

But everything looks right -- visually -- and does not show via a DMM -- not even a megging.

Plumbers are gorillas. They have no 'touch.' 

After they've screwed up the field wiring -- they will 'bury' their mistake -- by pointing _you_ in the wrong direction. 

Get used to this.

Plumbers, HVAC, ... you name it ... they figure they can do your job ... and then ... when they screw up ... they dance away and blame the 'electrical ghost.'

Like they never broke that cookie jar.

BTW, when was the last time you EVER heard another trade admit that they screwed up field wiring ?

I once had to 'fix' 'my' connection to an HVAC motor. The HVAC dude had %$#@ with my perfect work -- and blown a fuse, thereby. It was a three-phase system and he didn't know how to reverse motor rotation. So he changed a 480 connection to 208, instead. His hacked up effort was instantly obvious to me... since I'd already wired it perfectly. 

[ Non-electricians can NEVER replicate a j-man's skill set. They just can't. So when you see hack work, you know a hack touched it. ]


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## Cow (Jan 16, 2008)

Roger123 said:


> Well, after five days I got a call back, no water again.
> 
> This time however, I found the problem, one of the legs of the 240 volt line side feeder to the pressure switch read 0 voltage and the breaker was in the tripped position. Load side of the two pole breaker was solid however.
> 
> ...


This is the reason electricians should have meggers. There is a VERY good chance you would of caught this when you made the first trip out there.


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## RePhase277 (Feb 5, 2008)

Damaged cable or wire in conduit. A small nick in a UF cable can "simmer" into a full blown short depending on soil moisture.


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

The cause of the occasional short was vibration.

This NM feeder was subject to vibration every time the pressure switch contacts closed due to very loose pumping pipes. The wire was attached to the pumping pipes with tape.

After 30 some years the vibration wore down the insulation between the 240 volts legs *inside *the jacket of the feeder. 

The occasional short was depended of how the wire was vibrated.


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## splatz (May 23, 2015)

Roger123 said:


> The cause of the occasional short was vibration.
> 
> This NM feeder was subject to vibration every time the pressure switch contacts closed due to very loose pumping pipes. The wire was attached to the pumping pipes with tape.
> 
> ...





Cow said:


> This is the reason electricians should have meggers. There is a VERY good chance you would of caught this when you made the first trip out there.


How did you wind up finding it?


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Roger123 said:


> The cause of the occasional short was vibration.
> 
> This NM feeder was subject to vibration every time the pressure switch contacts closed due to very loose pumping pipes. The wire was attached to the pumping pipes with tape.
> 
> ...


Yeah boy, a megger would have told you there was a problem and a little more troubleshooting would have shown you what part of the circuit!!:whistling2:


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

MechanicalDVR said:


> Yeah boy, a megger would have told you there was a problem and a little more troubleshooting would have shown you what part of the circuit!!:whistling2:


Maybe, maybe not. Remember there was 240 volts applied to this circuits for five days without incident.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Roger123 said:


> Maybe, maybe not. Remember there was 240 volts applied to this circuits for five days without incident.


Betcha a 1000vdc for a millisecond would jump through a hole in the insulation without any vibration.


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

splatz said:


> How did you wind up finding it?


Restored power to the feeder and the breaker held until I pounded on the jacket by the plumbing pipes until it shorted out again.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Roger123 said:


> Restored power to the feeder and the breaker held until I pounded on the jacket by the plumbing pipes until it shorted out again.


Lucky you didn't find or create any loose pipe joints with that technique!


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

MechanicalDVR said:


> Betcha a 1000vdc for a millisecond would jump through a hole in the insulation without any vibration.


I own and have used a megger for some time now, my answer is the same, maybe, maybe not.

How do you meg a feed to a submersible well pump without removing the pump?


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

MechanicalDVR said:


> Lucky you didn't find or create any loose pipe joints with that technique!


:no:


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## Cow (Jan 16, 2008)

Roger123 said:


> Restored power to the feeder and the breaker held until I pounded on the jacket by the plumbing pipes until it shorted out again.


If it shorted once, that means there was most likely black soot(a carbon deposit) inside the sheath. A megger at 1000vdc will track voltage through that carbon and give you a poor reading.

Just because it's not tripping the breaker, doesn't mean a megger wouldn't pick it up. I've tested MANY cables that have had very poor readings that still hadn't tripped a breaker or blown a fuse yet.

When you use a megger on a regular basis you can get a good feel for where most wiring should test. After a while you'll know when something happened to the wire based on how it tested, and that you have a problem coming, even if it hasn't tripped anything yet.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Roger123 said:


> :no:


Be honest bro, that sounds like a caveman method.

'I knew that NM was bad so I hit it til it arced'.


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## telsa (May 22, 2015)

MechanicalDVR said:


> Be honest bro, that sounds like a caveman method.
> 
> 'I knew that NM was bad so I hit it til it arced'.


He kicks vending machines, too. :laughing:


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

telsa said:


> He kicks vending machines, too. :laughing:


When even the lowest form of thug life just shoots the lock!


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## sbrn33 (Mar 15, 2007)

Roger123 said:


> Restored power to the feeder and the breaker held until I pounded on the jacket by the plumbing pipes until it shorted out again.


You did what it took to fix the problem. It would have been nice to fix it the first time though. Would a megger have caught it? Maybe, maybe not. Mac put me on the the Supro one I am guessing it would have. It is cheap enough to keep on the truck and easy enough for someone with little experience with meggers to work with. Don't kid yourself most electricians don't really know how to read one properly, probably me included. 
It reminds me of fixing a bad backstab in a trailer. First thing I do is bang on the wall above the receptacles in question. Works about 95% of the time.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

sbrn33 said:


> You did what it took to fix the problem. It would have been nice to fix it the first time though. Would a megger have caught it? Maybe, maybe not. Mac put me on the the Supro one I am guessing it would have. It is cheap enough to keep on the truck and easy enough for someone with little experience with meggers to work with. Don't kid yourself most electricians don't really know how to read one properly, probably me included.
> It reminds me of fixing a bad backstab in a trailer. *First thing I do is bang on the wall above the receptacles in question. *Works about 95% of the time.


With your hand or a special troubleshooting 'hammer'?


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

The reason I posted what I found was just a reminder on what vibration can cause sometime for us electricians.

That is all!

Everybody can get off their fricken high horse, I own a fricken megger.

No wonder why we are losing members.

480 is gone, Dennis Alwon barely post anymore and so on. Guess I'm next and I been here since 2007. 

Yeah, I know, good riddance.


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## Roger123 (Sep 23, 2007)

sbrn33 said:


> You did what it took to fix the problem. It would have been nice to fix it the first time though. Would a megger have caught it? Maybe, maybe not. Mac put me on the the Supro one I am guessing it would have. It is cheap enough to keep on the truck and easy enough for someone with little experience with meggers to work with. Don't kid yourself most electricians don't really know how to read one properly, probably me included.
> It reminds me of fixing a bad backstab in a trailer. First thing I do is bang on the wall above the receptacles in question. Works about 95% of the time.


The reason why I didn't meg it the first time was I don't know how to meg the wires to a submersible well pump without removing the pump.


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## frenchelectrican (Mar 15, 2007)

I got a water pump failure call and it was little tricky to find it and yes I did use the megger to find a fault and it was in the underground conduit ( it dont happend often on resdential side but commercal side ya it is common ) 

pull out the conductors and can see some arc tracking on it due the water got in the conduit so it was old style of TW type conductors so replace with modern THWN conductors and sloved it.


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## emtnut (Mar 1, 2015)

Roger123 said:


> The reason why I didn't meg it the first time was I don't know how to meg the wires to a submersible well pump without removing the pump.


And you asked that question in post #20. No one offered you help with that:blink:

Hopefully you see that most were trying to help, I personally think if you hit a pipe, and it falls apart, the owner should be happy ... It was a fault waiting to happen anyways :thumbsup:

Glad you got everything going 

If you come across it again, here is a useful post on megging well pumps
http://www.electriciantalk.com/f2/well-pump-meggering-12730/

(ignore the VFD part if you didn't have one)


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## telsa (May 22, 2015)

Accept what is said in jest.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Roger123 said:


> The reason I posted what I found was just a reminder on what vibration can cause sometime for us electricians.
> 
> That is all!
> 
> ...


I don't think anyone is on a high horse or all that serious in their responses to you. I'm a ball buster but more to provoke a response and or thought process rather than to insult and make anyone leave.


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## Cow (Jan 16, 2008)

Roger123 said:


> The reason I posted what I found was just a reminder on what vibration can cause sometime for us electricians.
> 
> That is all!
> 
> ...


I offered advice. If you want to take it the wrong way that's fine. That's not how I intended it though.

I just can't understand how written words on a computer screen can offend you that much. This place doesn't even scratch the surface compared to what's said on an actual jobsite...


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## Switched (Dec 23, 2012)

Cow said:


> I offered advice. If you want to take it the wrong way that's fine. That's not how I intended it though.
> 
> I just can't understand how written words on a computer screen can offend you that much. This place doesn't even scratch the surface compared to what's said on an actual jobsite...


Do you know how sensitive workers are getting these days? It is amazing how little it takes to hurt their sensitive little feelings on a job site.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Switched said:


> Do you know how sensitive workers are getting these days? It is amazing how little it takes to hurt their sensitive little feelings on a job site.


This amazes me, totally. What happened to growing a thick skin?


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## Switched (Dec 23, 2012)

MechanicalDVR said:


> This amazes me, totally. What happened to growing a thick skin?


It goes along with no one ever being allowed to say anything unkind or jokingly to another person in school or on the job, with the everyone gets an award, we don't keep score, there is no 1st place because we all win.....

We have raised a generation of people that will need counseling and emergency room visits for a paper cut.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

Switched said:


> It goes along with no one ever being allowed to say anything unkind or jokingly to another person in school or on the job, with the everyone gets an award, we don't keep score, there is no 1st place because we all win.....
> 
> We have raised a generation of people that will need counseling and emergency room visits for a paper cut.


Safety pins and safe spaces...oh my!


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## RePhase277 (Feb 5, 2008)

Roger123 said:


> 480 is gone, Dennis Alwon barely post anymore and so on.


It's actually better without them. Calm down. 480 would be the first one to berate you and talk down to you. I hear he can still be found over at Contractor Talk if you miss him.


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## MechanicalDVR (Dec 29, 2007)

RePhase277 said:


> It's actually better without them. Calm down. 480 would be the first one to berate you and talk down to you. I hear he can still be found over at Contractor Talk if you miss him.


Electrical posts by Dennis are good.

480 is hot or miss.


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