DIY Well Drilling Using a Hand Drill.

How to drill a water well yourself using a power drill.
The method demonstrated in this video is called rotary jetting, it is suitable for sand and clay but not for hard rock formations.

Technical drawings of the 'rotary swivel' can be found as publication on our website:

Or you can use this direct PDF link:

We also have a lot of information on other interesting technology on water supply, wind energy and a lot more. So check it out if you are interested.

[WOT_utwente]

Technical drawings of the swivel are published on our website (link in description). If you want to build this setup yourself you can use these drawings. If things are unclear, you can contact us via our website. If everything is clear and you managed to make your own setup, well done! Please consider sharing this with us as well, we really like to get some feedback and insight in whether the setup is used and how and where etc..

[The_Ineffable_Meanderer]

Pretty slick . I love watching people do considerably tough to complete tasks with intelligently designed equipment that most people would say couldn't be done . My favorite quote " Those who say it can't be done should not stand in the way of those who are doing it." Good job my friend

[nick.schneider]

Almost 3 decades working inside the water filtration & treatment industries, I will say I am highly impressed with how this was done. Thank you, wonderful video

[wademckinney]

Brother, you are a rockstar! Ive been trying to think of a way to drill a well cheaply for over 2 years now and you just educated me for free. I am thankful for you. I will keep my eyes open for anything you put out. My name is Wade and I live in Florida.

[tudoralexandruienulescu]

I have experience as a well site geologist and operations geologist in the oil and gas industry. You basically present all the basics in drilling, mud logging, and muf fluids engineering.
Great video and thank you for doing it!
I would want to see if there are any other videos regarding wind or solar powered pumping for homesteads.
All the best!

[selfsufficientgardenmedic]

i worked on an oil rig as a support worker for years never really paying attention to what was happening just doing my part and letting the drill workers do their part. This explains everything to me in a way that everything just came together for me. you just blew my mind.

[mccryan]

This is the cutest single drill rig I've seen by far. Really cool how you have covered all the bases of drilling on a smaller scale.

[Skippy]

Lazy and and smart are two different things. you did it the smart way. if you were lazy, you'd have cut 1/4 the cuts and probably never did this project. Thanks for the great demonstration, although I don't plan on using this knowledge right away, you're one of the better videos I've seen on the subject, without all the fluff that usually goes with them.
cheers!

[aboversite]

Reminds me of my former life in the Alberta oilfield. All the elements are there: rigging the derrick (a topdrive rig, very modern), digging the rathole, running in, adding a single, using the slips, tripping the bit, managing the mud, running surface casing, cementing off.
Great stuff. The downside would be hitting a shallow aquifer that is pressured up and having a blowout!

[Electraglide]

I am not an engineer of any kind ... just a simple man always wanting to go off the grid. Drilling a well has always been a dream. You have made this video in a way that anyone can understand and see how it works. Well done man.

[nigeltechnz]

Well done, you have captured the fine points of drilling very well. I have drilled many dozens of sample bores to over 700ft, these techniques and devices are exactly what we use, all but on a heavier scale. We use bentonite in the mud to clear the cuttings and use two pits to help remove the cuttings from the mud. Stop with the bentonite for the last 2 or 3 meters, change the drilling mud out for water, so as to not plug the wall of the bore. Risky, the bore may collapse, but worth it for yield. Only used the gell a couple of times, works well and maybe doesn't clog the bore as much as bentonite. Nice vid.

[attemptedunkindness]

That bike brake trigger system for some reason warms my heart. Great video!

[chipwright]

Wow! This is the best DIY well drilling rig I've seen on youtube so far.

[bluemonk]

Top job! My neighbor asked me, yesterday, about drilling a well in his garden. I thought that there might be a way to use hydraulic pressure, as I have previously used to create channels for conduit under a concrete slab. So, YouTube was my first stop. A simple (and lucky) search yielded this video. I am very impressed with the elegance of this method and offer my highest praise to "WOT!" This technique will be perfect for the geology we need to drill. The project lands high on my to-do list. Thanks for the great video!

[aarontassin]

That was fascinating. I’m on a drilling rig at the moment about to set casing at 12, 300’, and your set up is much like our set up. Just a little smaller. Now I want to try and drill my own water well at home using your technique. I may try to utilize s screen to keep the cuttings out of the mud pit though.

[cyphersworld]

I have been watching DIY well drilling videos over the last two days (doing some research to do our own one), and this is hands down the best one I've watched thus far. Well done dude, well done.

[aquaticspirits]

If you're lazy, the rest of us are in a lot of trouble. Making a shallow well isn't difficult if one uses the right method. This one was pretty smart. Thanks

[britannia-foundry]

Thank you for a brilliant video and for sharing, you have taken a very heavy industrial process and reduced it down to its basic components but at the same time making it simple and efficient, you have put a lot of thought into this, congratulations.

[calvinnalei]

Wow. Bore hole drilling is not affordable where I come from and its a specialist work of course. Your ingenious idea and design using everyday tools and materials just opened up the possibility for our rural people to drill bore holes and have access to clean water. Your video explains the process very well for the layman too. Well done and thank you for sharing 👍👍👍👍👍👍

[onesadtech]

This was such an awesome overview of the whole process in just 15 minutes! I really liked the jigs you made to hold the drill rods and pipes as you worked on the next piece. Genius! 👌