In article ,
Jerry Kaidor wrote:

I found a video on Youtube of digging a well and fabricating a cover in a
3rd world country: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eM3gVpNflVE. For the
cover, they basically made a domed pile of dirt, a wooden ring and dumped
concrete on top, with some reinforcing steel wire inside. I am not
confident of my ability to create something like this in concrete - light
enough for say four men to lift, and yet strong enough for kids to play.

Standard approach around here is precast concrete, flat reinforced slab
about 3-4 inches thick, available at the precast concrete supplier, no
need for you to make (or engineer) it. 6 feet is a standard size - I
don't know if you could get a 5 footer, but you should be able to get a
6 footer and have 6" of overhang.

Design goal is that it takes more than one man to slide it off, though
usually a front end loader is used to pick them off in practice, when
needed. Two guys with levers and rollers could probably manage it if
they know how to use levers and rollers.

Drop a screen or sand point in to it, fill with coarse drain rock, cover

with an impervious membrane and finally, cap with topsoil.

*** But then it wouldn't work, right?

*** Wrong. The water flows through the "coarse drain rock" but nobody
can fall in. The membrane over the top keeps dirt from plugging up the
drain rock. It reduces the amount of "stored water" in the well, but
that only matters if you are pumping faster than the well refills. It's
actually a pretty good solution, assuming the water is usable. If the
water tests bad, even for irrigation, omit the well point, and the hole
is filled.

What's the depth to water/bottom? A string with a weight on the end can
be handy. If it's shallow (pump no more than 27 feet) a simple
well-point will do the job, and the pump can be on top, sucking.

If you'd like more options or it's deeper, buy enough 4" or 6" PVC pipe
to reach the bottom, drill many small holes in the section that would be
below water line, and set that in place before (carefully) adding the
drain rock - then you can put a submersible well pump down the hole.
Given that you wanted to solar-power this, that's probably your best
bet, since most of the affordable solar powered well pumps are of the
submersible type.

Filling the well with concrete (which is what the $10K solution sounds
like) is massive overkill.

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