No Water? Troubleshoot Your Well Before You Panic

First: is it really the well?

Open more than one faucet. If the kitchen is dry but an outside hydrant flows, the problem is plumbing, not the well. If nothing flows anywhere, look at the pressure gauge on the tank. A gauge showing normal pressure with no flow points to a blockage or valve. A gauge at zero points to the pump, the power, or the water itself.

Check one: the breaker

Find the double-pole breaker labeled for the well and check whether it has tripped. Reset it once. If water returns and stays, a passing surge may be all it was.

If the breaker trips again immediately, stop resetting it. Repeated trips mean a real electrical fault, often a failing motor or damaged wire, and each reset does more damage. That is the moment to call 806-334-0785.

Check two: the pressure switch and tank

The pressure switch is the small box near the tank that tells the pump when to run. Points that are burned or chattering, a switch that clicks rapidly on and off, or a tank that sounds hollow-full of water top to bottom all point to the pressure system rather than the pump downhole.

A waterlogged pressure tank makes the pump start and stop every few seconds. That short-cycling will kill a good pump if it runs that way for long, so it is worth fixing promptly even though water still flows.

Check three: signs the water level dropped

A well that sputters air, produces after resting then fades, or comes back weakly in the evening may be pumping the well down to the pump intake. On the eastern edge of the Ogallala this is common as regional water levels decline. It feels like a dying pump but is often solved by lowering the pump deeper into the well.

This one is not a DIY diagnosis. We measure the standing water level and pumping level, and the numbers say what the fix is.

A two-minute tour of your pressure system

Understanding four parts makes every well conversation easier. The pump, down the well, moves water up. The pressure tank stores a cushion of water against a charge of air, so small draws do not start the pump. The pressure switch watches the pressure and turns the pump on around 40 PSI and off around 60, give or take the setting. The gauge tells you what the switch is seeing.

Nearly every "mystery" symptom maps onto those four parts. Rapid clicking from the switch: tank has lost its air. Pump never shuts off: pressure cannot reach cutoff, so suspect a leak, a worn pump, or a low water level. No click at all and no pump sound: power or switch. Narrating the symptom in those terms over the phone gets you a faster, cheaper repair, because we arrive knowing where to start.

Freeze outages: the winter special

If the outage arrived with single-digit temperatures, suspect frozen pipes in the well house or the line to the house before suspecting the pump. Look for frost-burst fittings and listen for the pump running against a blocked line. Shut the pump off if you find a burst; pumping against a break floods the well house and can burn up the motor.

A proper insulated well house prevents nearly all of this. If you spent last February with a heat lamp and a prayer, read our well house page.

What to tell us when you call

Five facts speed everything up: whether any faucet flows, what the pressure gauge reads, what the breaker did, any sounds from the well house, and whether livestock are waiting on this water. With those answers, we usually arrive carrying the right parts, and stock-out emergencies go to the front of the line.

And one more that surprises people: the age of the pump, even roughly. "It was here when we bought the place in 2015" is genuinely useful. Age plus symptoms often completes the diagnosis before the truck leaves the shop.