I've had my well run dry when I rented my cabin last Dec. 30. There were like 13 days where 8 people stayed in my cabin. I guess they were holed up and didn't go out. I didn't know if it was my pump or my well recharge rate.

I called a plumber and he said my pump was running but was not pumping well. I said 'Go ahead and replaced it'. My well is 305 ft. deep and rated at 10GPM (installed Dec. 27, 2006). When he pulled my pump sitting at 260 ft below, he said there was only 3 feet of water above it. He lowered to 280 ft (so at the time of installation I had 23 ft. of water sitting above the pump; and the pump was 25 feet to the bottom of the well). He said I should have at least 200 ft. of static water instead of only 23 ft. Question is - how fast should it go back to 200 ft.? Has my 10GPM well slowed down ? Because 30-40 minutes after he installed the new pump, the renters started to use it and it went dry again. If it was pumpin 10GPM, I should have had 300 gallons after 30 minutes, right?

The plumber also asked me if I wanted to have an 8GPM pump installed instead of a 10GPM pump. He said my Well output is 10GMP, so by using an 8GPM pump, I should never 'Go Dry'. So I said "yes'. But that didn't seem to have helped.

Anyway, my renters left because there was no water. After 48 hours, I went back to my cabin, and there was a lot of water. My wife and I took a shower (may 60 gallons there), did the dishwasher (another 18 gal), and probably flushed the toilet 5 times (25 gal). I guess after 48 hours, I know there was 100 gallons or about 68 ft. of water above my pump.

My dilemna now is if have 8 people using my cabin, should I dig deeper? Or should the replacement of my 10GPM pump to an 8GPM pump in a well outputing 10GPM be enough to create a buffer? Will I have more static water if I make my well 300 ft. deeper or not necessarily so?

By the way, the plumber gave me a new pump called "Red Jacket". My old pump was a "Berkeley". Did I get sacrifice quality?

Thanks for any advice.