How do I correctly replace a section of wire to a submersed well pump?

Question

In the crawl space is the pressure switch for our well pump. A previous owner did the original wiring of it and made a connection or two with wire nuts and electrical tape but without a junction box. It is just laying in the sand - which makes me uneasy.

It is a 20A 220V circuit and I THINK it is 10 gauge wire. Would it be advisable for me to replace a length of it in order to run it along the joists for most of its length with junctions in boxes? And if so, should I replace it with a sheathed wire of some description?

As one of the pictures shows, it eventually ends up buried close to the well's water line - both of which pass beneath (or though) the foundation wall.

Answer 1

Barring some abnormally lenient local code revision, the only way to "correctly" fix this is to run suitable new conduit to the wellhead, and relocate the wires (or put new wires) inside it.

I've seen some examples of code revisions that relax the rules for what's an acceptable conduit (outside the building/house) such as permitting Schedule 40 where normally 80 would be required, and permitting poly water pipe to be used as conduit (rather than properly marked for use as conduit poly conduit) but not "no conduit at all" without the cable being rated for direct burial.

Inside the well, the well casing itself serves as a conduit, and well wiring is permitted to be otherwise unjacketed wires. Outside the well, that does not apply.

You could improve the optics by retrofitting conduit (and junction boxes, or "handholes" where buried) to as far as you're willing to dig past the point where the wiring goes underground, but that's not really getting it done "correctly" as you ask.

Correctly is facing that you have inherited a code violation that should never have passed inspection (perhaps was never inspected) and it's going to be an unreasonable hassle to fix correctly. Be sure that well power is turned off at the breaker when digging, as there may be other naked buried junctions along the way. I'm also fairly sure that you need a grounding wire if trying to be "correct" - not just the two hots.