Water Well Drilling

Licensed Water Well Drilling

O’Keefe Drilling is currently licensed to drill various types of wells in Montana, Idaho, Washington, Wyoming, Utah and Nevada, with Montana being the only state we drill domestic wells. Through years of servicing the drilling industry, O’Keefe Drilling has solid expertise in determining the most optimal solution to meet your domestic, irrigation, stock, large diameter, or public water supply well specifications.

Drilling Requirements

Various conditions make it impossible to guarantee an adequate supply of groundwater at your location but O’Keefe Drilling has the knowledge and resources to provide you with the most accurate guess.

For example, the geology in an area may be such that groundwater is not available at your site even though a neighbor’s well is a good producer. It is not advisable to build your home until you know you have an adequate water supply on your building site. Depending on the location, this may mean drilling and testing a well prior to initiating construction of the house.

Before you have your well drilled, there are online sites that can help you find out information about your property along with the surrounding area such as:

• The Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation (DNRC)
• The Montana Bureau of Mines and Geology (MBMG)

Check for information on how much water can be produced from the aquifers in your area, the chemical quality of that water, and the depth to the water supply.

You can also examine logs of the wells drilled in your local area or talk with people in the vicinity about their wells. Well log information is available electronically through MBMG’s Ground Water Information Center (GWIC) website. If you do not have internet access, you can contact GWIC directly at (406) 496-4336.

Rotary Water Well Drilling

Water wells in Montana are commonly drilled by one of two methods. The first method is rotary drilling. While there are many variations of this method (direct, reverse circulation, dual rotary, etc), the basic principles remain the same. In rotary drilling, a drill bit is attached to a hollow drill pipe.

While the bit and pipe are rotated, drilling fluid or air is forced inside the drill hole and returns the surface, carrying the drill cuttings.

In direct rotary, the drilling fluid is forced inside the drilled pipe, and up to the surface through the annulus (the space between the outside of the drill pipe and the drill hole).

In reverse circulation, the drilling fluid enters the drill hole through the annulus, and exits via the drill pipe.

Our Drilling Equipment

Through years of servicing the drilling industry, O’Keefe Drilling has solid expertise in determining the most optimal solution to meet your domestic, irrigation, stock, large diameter or public water supply well specifications.

At the forefront of our fleet are our two Dual Air Rotary rigs (DR-24 & DR-24 HD). The DR-24 was designed to do two things; drill large diameter boreholes through tough unconsolidated formations (sand, gravel, cobbles, and boulders) up to 30 inches and to simultaneously case and drill in overburden formations.

This design is accomplished through the use of an upper and lower drive. The upper drive works like a traditional drill rig and is used to turn the down-hole tooling. The lower drive is used to advance the casing. Both drives work independently of each other, enabling the rig to case the borehole while the drill string is being advanced, utilizing conventional Air Rotary or Reverse Circulation. This makes the installation of casing faster and more accurate, while eliminating the need for under reaming or Mud Rotary.

We also have two Reichdrill T-690 and a Geoprobe 8150LS in our fleet available for domestic wells depending on the formation conditions.

Our Process

When you are ready to drill for a well, contact your licensed water well drilling company to submit a bid request. We will assess the preferred well location to ensure that it is ideal. We will then create a bid and handle everything from there.