A precipitous drop in the house water pressure sent me to check the pressure on the bladder tank - only 20 psi on system with a pressure switch set for 30-50 psi.   I clamped an ammeter on one of the pump wires at the breaker and its running continuously @ 7A, like it should since it hasn't reached cut-out at 50 psid, but it's not producing any pressure greater than 20psi with no load on the system.

I turned the 240V pump breaker off and the water pressure dropped to zero over 3-5 minutes, so the water's draining back through the pump.

Clearly the 30+ year old submersible well pump is on its last legs.

My question:  Any opinions about US residential submersible pumps?  Brands to use or brands not to use?
Given the costs of replacing, I'm not looking for cheap.  I'm looking for quality that'll last and I'm willing to pay a premium for a better product.

The major brands on the market in my area are sta-rite, goulds, and grundfos.  Each of then have different product levels.  I would would recomend one that has stainless end bells not plastic.  

The situation that you discribed could also be a hole in the pipe between the well and the house, however based on the age I think a hole is the pipe in the well is likely.

You also may want to consider going with a constant pressure system (VFD) Both Goulds and Grundfos (I prefer Grundfos) have this systems on the market.  We have installed many of them and have had good reports.  Mostly people like the fact that there is only a small tank and that the pressure doesn't flucuate. 

The pumps in question are a CRIE 15-2.  The reason I went with them is that my boss seems to think the 10 states says you can't use a back pressure regulator (because of a restriction on having cross connections). When I read the reg I didn't interpret it that way, but he is the boss, so I used a VFD drive and will program it for constant pressure.  I'm pushing well water through a 1 absolute micron filter, and it can have as much as 30psi difference across the filter.  So as the filter clogs the pump will ramp the pressure up to keep the outlet of the filter at a constant pressure.  I am really hoping we are not replacing a drive/motor every couple years!  We have other grundfos pumps that are going on 8 years old with no problems other than seal leakage.

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