It would be perfect to get a nice brass piston made. but any of the high density plastics are fine, and the best price is by getting cutting boards at goodwill and the like and cutting them out with a saw. Three rings of plastic with the seal in the middle. The seal should not be tight on the piston and have a bit of clearance front and back and the pressure will be sealed between the outer edge and the back of the seal.

Generically they are called poly seals or hydraulic piston seals, and they are good for 3000 to 5000 PSI ranges. They will wear out in your pump just like they would in a hydraulic cylinder, but a dozen will last until you have plenty of cow hides tanned for leather cups.

If you are going to get a tractor you need to start making friends at the hydraulic shop anyway.

tired john

We looked at a home in Colorado and the well used a windmill to pump into a 1500 gal tank, then at the tank was a 175 watt BP solar panel that went through some kind of MPPT device and used no battery. It would pump water up the side of a mountain slowly and fill a 1500 gal tank with a head of at least 200′. It only worked when the sun shined obviously, but when it was sunny it was said to work pretty well. The water would also drainback so it wouldn’t freeze. The pipe was black somewhat flexible pipe.

I would be glad to help more if you like.

Still looking for LMI East of Kansas City.

MOFreedom

mofreedom2@yahoo.com

The take around here lately is to try and solve every problem twice. First solution is to send a bit of cash to China and get it fixed well enough to wait for an 1800s solution that will last a couple of generations. All the wells here are shallow, so I have a hand pump on a tee off of the jet pump inlet. I assume that you have a deep well, so the best solution may be to find a windmill pump even if you hook up the kid instead of the windmill. I do like the cistern solution if you can make it work. We keep 7500 gallons tanked high enough that we get marginal gravity feed to the house. Figure out half a dozen ways to get it fixed, and wait for the first farm/garage/yard sale that provides the solution. Maybe you could get a windmill down at the spring and hook it to an old piston well pump to push water up to a tank in the shop. Some clueless wonder will have just what you need if you can afford to be patient.

Chores here are slow getting done with us old folks trying to do all the doing, so we are attempting to get a doomer hippie chick to come and help with the critters. I’ll let you know if we have any luck and what kind of a deal we cut.

The new hay extension on the barn has a finished floor ( plywood A/A sides, treated exterior ), windows, a skylight, insulation, electric and finished interior walls. Don’t yet know if it was planning ahead or just making a job take three times as long. No sense in letting old age stop me from being foolish now and again.

I hesitate to say you could try a “green” solution and put a pump and a solar panel at the spring and pump it to the shop. You might have to protect it if it is visible though. I assume that already paid for solar panels will be hot items on the used market some time in the future.

tired john