Water well pump leak, time for an expert

[Greyman50]

Be glad one does not work with Jap pipe and whitworth pipe fittings…

 

[quikdraw67]

I am not a professional Plumber, however I've been doing my own home plumbing all my adult life. When I plumbed up my whole house water filtration system I had lots of trouble getting the Chinese made Unions to seal. Long story short and after unsuccessfully trying different Chinese Unions, I went to a real plumbing supply store and bought Unions made in Italy, put them on and they sealed up tight. NO MORE Chinese fittings or valves from H-D !! Now I only buy the important parts and fittings from a plumbing supply Co.

I have found that Blue Monster brand Pipe Dope and Teflon Tape are even better than Hercules brand. Their stuff is the best I've found!

I've worked in the plumbing and heating wholesale industry my entire adult life.

It may be cheaper at the big box stores. but as another poster mentioned, you get what you pay for.

Water heaters have a lower BTU output. Delta faucets are made to their specs. They look the same but different parts.

And the aforementioned Chinese fittings.

Plus the knowledge of the countermen is usually superior to big box employees.

Pay more, get more.

 

[steelslaver]

I am pretty sure I have a 1" pipe tap I would send you but, I think you can buy a decent one for less than 2 way shipping now days. I would try cleaning up the threads. How many turns of the fitting can you get by hand now? Should be about 3

Amazon has a 3 tap set 1" 1 1/4" and 1 1/2" from Drill America for $65

 

[cougar14]

Thanks to everyone for all the ideas and recommendations. Here's the outcome:

Went back over yesterday to try and finish. Took everything apart, took steel pipe nipples and chased the threads in the pump body until they were clean and clear. Brushed and scrubbed all the male threads on the pipes. Wrapped the threads with 3/4" blue heavy duty teflon tape 4 full turns.
Applied two small beads of clear silicone sealant on top of the teflon tape. Spun the fittings until firm hand tight. Tightened 1 full turn more.
Waited one hour for the silicone to cure a bit, then fired up and inspected.
Two of the three are leak free. The last one has a TINY leak, one drop every 2-3 minutes. I believe the solids in the well water will plug this in a few days.
Thanks again to all. Lessons learned - you get what you pay for, you can pay me now or pay me a lot more later.

 

[oldbrownhat]

Thanks to everyone for all the ideas and recommendations. Here's the outcome:

Went back over yesterday to try and finish. Took everything apart, took steel pipe nipples and chased the threads in the pump body until they were clean and clear. Brushed and scrubbed all the male threads on the pipes. Wrapped the threads with 3/4" blue heavy duty teflon tape 4 full turns.
Applied two small beads of clear silicone sealant on top of the teflon tape. Spun the fittings until firm hand tight. Tightened 1 full turn more.
Waited one hour for the silicone to cure a bit, then fired up and inspected.
Two of the three are leak free. The last one has a TINY leak, one drop every 2-3 minutes. I believe the solids in the well water will plug this in a few days.
Thanks again to all. Lessons learned - you get what you pay for, you can pay me now or pay me a lot more later.

Silicone seal is like duct tape- many uses! Getting the threads cleaned up probably helped a lot. Good that you're (very nearly) leak free

I replaced my pressure tank in 2019 and this year I noticed the tee that connected it to the line from the jet pump was leaking increasingly badly. Decided to get the plumber in and it tutned out the brass tee had cracked. Made you-know-where and probably just defective.

@chief38 Didn't know about the Italian-made fittings. My plumber is Italian so I'll ask him about them.

 

[WR Moore]

I had to replace the oil pressure sender on a piece of farm equipment recently (boy, was that fun and now have a metric socket I'll hopefully never use again). The factory manual said to use silicone sealant on the threads AND WAIT 24 HOURS FOR IT TO FULLY CURE.

I can understand that wait being a problem with a well only too well, but if you have to do it over, you might want to get a bunch of bottled water and wait the whole 24 hours.