Now, after winter has ended and frosts are no longer severe enough to endanger my outdoor water system, time to restart the pumping system. For garden watering and general outdoor water needs I operate a small well, including an automatic pump, but during winter time, this is shut down and the pipes all emptied to protect the pipework and pump from freezing.

Normally, just a task of a few minutes to start the pump after filling it with water, but this time, no success. No water, no suction. Checked the well – plenty of water there. Also the pipework is all good and sound.

After some searching hear and there, I decided to open to pump and found a very unexpected defect – one of the critical inner parts, the so-called ejector which is needed to prime the pump (by removing air from the system) had a crack. Probably because of fatigue of the plastic material.

This part uses the water circulating inside the pump to essentially pump air out of the suction pipe going to the well. With the crack, it can’t effectively evacuate the suction pipe, thus, no water can be pumped.

The plastic material is good, a special form-stable and durable hard plastic, reinforced with glass fiber. Maybe a low-quality material batch, or some design flaw?

The pump, purchased in late-2020, is of the brand “Stahlwerk”. It was not expensive at the time, just about 100 EUR at the time of purchase, stainless version, including a small buffer tank and pressure control system. Anyway, the price is good, but the quality of the “Stahlwerk” goods, you judge yourself! Shouldn’t a garden pump last more than just three summers?

To check if the crack really is the root cause, I sealed it with some hot glue, and despite the deviating geometry of the ejector nozzle, the pump worked right away.

But such temporary repair is no good solution for my garden water system, which requires automatic, unattended and reliable operation all through summer. So I checked “kleinanzeigen”=classifieds and found an almost new, barely used pump close-by, for a very reasonable price.

It is called “Neptun”, after the Roman god of the rivers and seas, hope he will be able to ensure the water flow to my garden for years to come.

The pump, easily capable of 4.5 bars of pressure, stainless construction, and a solid 1 kW motor delivers very nice quantities of water, good pressure, and was easily installed on the existing buffer tank.

For the “Stahlwerk” pump, at least spare parts are available and the customer service was responsive. The spare part was reasonably prices, so I decided on a permanent repair – and after a few days got a new ejector insert delivered in a package.

Still made of the same polymer, but looks a bit heavier and the color has changed from black to white.

It matched nicely the dimensions of the old part. Cleaned all the old O-rings, and re-used these with no problem at all. Just take care when installing not to twist and of the O-rings, keep all nicely aligned and avoid undue force.

Now, while the Neptun will do the job, there is a spare “Stahlwerk” pump in the basement, just in case!

May the well never run dry!