Anyone know anything about wells/well pumps

Ok, I'm a city boy so the only thing I know about wells is that there's always some kid in farm country calling in them. Now I live in Farm country and want to get my well up and running.
In my neighborhood we are on city water but used to be on wells so we all have them and use them to water our lawns. Well, mine is no-workey and I need some help. When I turn it on the pump hums so I decided to take it off the well and put a garden hose in the input side. It didn't pump anything. So I went to Home Depot to talk to an "expert". He told me to prime it by putting water in the output side of the pump. There is a fitting above the hose fittings and I put the garden hose down there to prime it. It didn't pump anything. I could see water moving in the pump body but nothing pumped out.
Does anyone have a clue here ( cuz I don't)? I don't know if the pump is bad or if the well is dry. I don't think the well is dry since my neighbors water the grass all the time. I suspect the pump is bad but I don't want to spend a few hundred I don't have on a new pump if I don't need to. How does a well work anyway? I have this pipe in my garage, how does the pump pull the water from the ground? Should there be a check valve in the pipe keeping water up at the pump?
am I making sense at all?

BTW, this is not a submersible pump. I can post pics of needed.

I do know a lot of fluid pumps do have to be primed - the impeller cant draw enough head pressure to move water vertically very far without the impellers vanes being surrounded by water. You can buy little pumps that run on an electric drill that may be able to prime the pump manually. May be enough to get the big pump going, and they are nice to have around anyway just for emergencies.

Also, if the pump isnt spinning fast enough, it will slosh fluid around but not move any, perhaps the pump is ok but the power source is faltering?

Ok, I'm researching right now. The "jet pump" does produce a vacuum so I'll try to prime the pump and see if it's pulling any vacuum. There's also a check valve at the bottom of the well. I gotta figure out how to check that as well.

How deep is your well versus your neighbors? If his is deeper, all that lawn watering of his may have drawn the water supply below the depth of your well, making it effectively dry.

The check valve at the bottom is called the foot valve. If it hasn't been used in a while, and the water is really hard, the valve could be stuck (open, or closed). I've had good luck restricting the output side, to help with priming. If you're able to fill the pump body, and piping below the pump with water, you should be primed. If it doesn't pump, either the valve is stuck, there is something wrong with the pump, or you have no water. The pumps are simple, so there's not much to go wrong.

Always put your outhouse downhill from your well. That is all I know.

zomby woof wrote: I've had good luck restricting the output side, to help with priming. If you're able to fill the pump body, and piping below the pump with water, you should be primed.

I only have one pipe in the well and as far as filling the pipe I don't know how deep i is so I don't know how long it should take to fill it. I suspect the valve is open. Can I just pull this pipe out?

If it is not a submersible pump, then I am assuming that it is pulling water up from a pipe that drops down to the water source. The foot valve at the bottom of the vertical shaft holds a column of water in the pipe. When the pump comes on, it should be full of water, and be pulling against a column of water. If the foot valve has failed, the water will drain back down into the well, and the pump is pulling against air and nothing will happen. You can fill the pipe below the pump with a garden hose and see if it stays full. With the pump on the pipe, you should be able to fill the pump from the outlet and it should not all drain out.

Replacing the foot valve may be a simple matter of lifting the pipe from the well and replacing it. Or, you may have to drop a new pipe and foot valve into the well.

Dr Boost, Did you get your well up and running? pinchvalve has a great point. If it drains out you may have to replace the foot valve. Find out how deep is the well by removing your well cap drop a line with float to see how deep it is also what size is the well? Keep one thing in mind if you remove the pipe the well may cave in. Sometimes it may be best to do another well. First make sure you prime it may take more than one time to properly prime it.

Also you may have a faulty check valve.

I have a well, with a jet pump, rigged for deep. I've replaced the pump, the foot valve, pressure tank and lines. As a result, I've come to know quite a bit about them.

Since you say yours hums, I'm going to presume you've got a jet pump sitting there. They are not self priming, and you must prime it for it to work. There is a footer valve at the bottom of the pipe that is a one way valve. They all leak, it just varies how fast they leak. When the pump is left unused, the water leaks out, it looses prime, and will not work until reprimed. Water will also leak out of tree roots have worked their way into the pipe fittings. If there are any trees with branches over the well line, those roots are likely in the line, creating leaks.

If your pump still has a pressure tank, you will need to close the valve between the pump and the pressure tank in order to reprime the pump. You cannot do it with the valve open.

Remove the plug or pressure gauge that is on the top of the pump impeller housing. You pour water into it until it overflows. Immediately put the plug in, and start the pump. It will start pumping water now.

It will start "fast cycling" It will build pressure in that line between the pressure tank and the pump, cut off, drop the pressure, and cut on.

SLOWLY open the valve between the pump and the pressure tank, letting water flow into the tank. What you are after here is to start filling the tank WITHOUT letting the pump gasp or get air into the pump body. If you do, you will have to reprime the pump. Open the valve slowly until the pump stops cycling and just pumps water steadily. Leave it alone until the pressure tank is full and the pump cuts off. Then, and only then, open the valve fully.

And now you are good to go.

It's not running yet. I picked up a new pump the other day because I filled the pump with water and it wouldn't pump it out. I think I tried to fill the well pipe a few years ago and it didn't fill up so I assume the foot valve is bad. I'll be looking into it this weekend again.
thanks all for the info.

As a former farm boy, the greatest thing about living in the city is not having to know where your water comes from, or where your E36 M3 goes to. Pumps be evil.

Yeah, I like city water. The only reason I want to get this well up and pumping is to water the garden and lawn for (mostly) free.