Shock your well?

Who routinely "shocks" their well to disinfect it and the house plumbing? I do mine every few years when the house water starts to smell or taste funny. I ALWAYS wait until my wife is out of town, as it's best she doesn't see the crap that comes out of the pipes.

Here's how I do it:
1. Set the water softener to bypass and turn off the water heater.
2. Dump about 3 gallons of bleach (swimming pool chlorinator is best) down the well.
3. Run a garden hose into the well until I smell bleach, then run it a bit longer.
4. Run all the other hard water hose bibs until bleach comes out.
5. Take the screens out of all the faucets and run cold water until I smell bleach.
6. Remove the shower heads, run cold water through the showers until bleach comes out.
7. Run all the other cold water faucets and flush the toilets a couple of times.
8. Run hot water until I can smell bleach, then repeat for all the other hot water faucets.
9. Wait four hours.
10. Run the garden hoses until the bleach smell is mostly gone.
11. Take the softener off bypass.
12. Run the cold water faucets, etc. until there's no bleach smell.
13. Run hot water until the water heater is flushed out and all the hot water outlets don't smell of bleach.
14. Turn the water heater back on and replace all the faucet screens and shower heads.

And then play a song:
Shock the Monkey

I have to do it twice a year, keeps the sulfides out.

No health issue, just do not like the smell.

I would recommend letting some chlorinated water run through and sit in softener before bypassing.

> I would recommend letting some chlorinated water run through and sit in softener before bypassing.

I'm told that bleach is harmful to the resin bed. So I wait until most of the chlorine is out of the well water before running it through the softener.

We had an old Sears water softener that was on its last legs the first time I shocked our well. The bypass valve was broken, so I ran the full strength solution through the softener. It never worked well after that, and I suspect the bleach is what finished it off.

I just like to get some in it

Not routinely but it is a good idea to shock it anytime work has been preformed. Here any property that sells and has a well must be tested and you can bet your last buck it will fail unless you shocked it just prior to testing.

I have done it once in 38 years on our well.
Never really had a problem, just thought I would do it.
Richard in NW SC

The last time I did that I loosened up enough scale in the well casing that it jammed up the submersible pump, it was 25 years old so I just replaced it. It was only down 30 feet so it was easy to do myself. I later took the pump apart and cleaned it out so it would pump again, when we moved I sold all my surplus well supplies at the garage sale.

Never dumped bleach into any well.
But have "shocked" a well with a hollow point 22LR.

I have a shallow well, hand dug. Ever so so often I dump bleach in it. It will clear up and taste good. I grew up doing that because my grand dad did, my dad did and that's what I do.

Wayne

> I just like to get some in it

I had to give the softener an extra regen last night because it was putting out hard water, so I think it got enough chlorine to kill any bugs in it.