On Thu, 5 Sep 2013 06:48:22 -0700 (PDT), Jerry Kaidor
wrote:

Hello,

A few years ago, I bought a house. Clearing the jungle in the yard, I discovered a ratty old shack. Under the ratty old shack was a dug well. I demolished the shack and made a temporary well cover out of plywood and 4x4's.

Now I want to make a real cover, drop down a solar well pump and actually
use the thing. Irrigating my acre with city water is expensive.

The County well guy has a strange requirement: don't paint the cover! Huh?
Whatever. Government says "jump", I ask "how high"?

I am planning to fabricate the real cover out of 1/8" steel. It's thick enough so I won't worry about surface rust, and easy to work. I have a decent
MIG welder, TIG welder, a small plasma cutter, and a ring roller, and I know
how to use them . I am very comfortable cutting and welding 1/8" stock.

I have poured a substantial foundation around the well with embedded anchor bolts for the cover. It came out about an inch low when I ran out of concrete.
I had calculated that the requirement was 25 bags, I had 41 bags on hand. Go figure.

The well diameter is about 5 feet.

So the current plan ( subject to change ) is:

* Fabricate a flange to drop down onto the foundation bolts. Make it out of
segments of 6" wide 1/8" plate, cut to size with the plasma cutter. Lay the
segments on bricks on the foundation and weld them together to form a 6-foot
diameter ring.

* Use the ring roller to make a 5-foot diameter ring of 1" strap. Weld the
strap to the big flange. That will make up for the short foundation.

* Lay some A-36 "C" channel ( 2 inches wide by 1" high by 1/8" stock ) across
the mouth of the well. Maybe one piece, maybe two pieces side by side. Maybe put a stiffening piece of 4" steel strap between the two C-channels. Cut a couple more C-channels and weld them at right angles to the main ones, forming a large "X". Weld the X to the supporting ring.

* Cut pie-shaped slices of 1/8" thick plate. Cut pump and inspection ports into two of the slices. Stiffen the ports with steel rings rolled out of 1" or 3/4" strap.

Lay the slices on top of the "X" and weld them in place. Playing with a CAD drawing, I see that I can get two slices out of a 4'x4' sheet of steel with minimal waste.

When all the welding is done, pull out the bricks and drop the cover into place on the foundation bolts.

When the cover is complete, I will build a "wishing well" gazebo over it to protect it from the weather. I made enough space on the foundation for a cute curved brick wall.

Does this sound strong enough?

- Jerry Kaidor
Gretings Jerry,
Your plan certainly is strong enough. But you also oughta have the
water tested for anything you don't want on your garden. Some wells in
Washington State have arsenic in them so that might be a bad choice
for watering anything you might eat. And you should make sure that
folks won't be drinking the water unless it has tested clean. But you
probably already know that.
Eric