Garsfontein sits on Silverton shale in the valley below the Bronberg, ground that drills quickly but holds water only where it is fractured.
The targets here are dyke contacts and fracture zones, which is a siting problem rather than a depth problem.
What Is Under Garsfontein
| Formation | Where it sits | What it means for drilling |
|---|---|---|
| Silverton Formation shale | The broad valley ground between the northern and eastern quartzite ridges | Fast drilling and a poor aquifer on its own. Water is confined to fractures and bedding partings, so the rock between them contributes almost nothing. |
| Diabase dykes and sills | Cutting across the shale throughout the Pretoria valley | Usually the productive structure here. The fractured margin where an intrusion meets the shale is where water accumulates; the intrusion itself does not. |
| Weathered shale and residual clay | The upper section on most stands | Clay-rich and unstable. Casing through to sound rock is a requirement, not a refinement. |
Send your street and what the water is for, and get an itemised quote for Garsfontein.
Get a Garsfontein Borehole QuoteWhat That Means for Your Borehole
- Siting is about finding structure, not depth because the shale itself carries little water between fractures.
- Drilling is comparatively quick so the per-metre rate tends to sit at the lower end of the range.
- Yields here are usually modest but workable which is well suited to irrigation with storage rather than to high continuous draw.
Where We Work Around Garsfontein
- Garsfontein and Garsfontein Extension
- Moreleta Spruit corridor
- Faerie Glen boundary
- Menlo Park and Lynnwood approaches
- Constantia Park side
- Complexes and cluster developments
- Schools and community grounds
What to Watch For Here
The Moreleta Spruit runs through this ground. Watercourses through the eastern suburbs often follow structural weaknesses in the shale, which makes their alignment worth attention at siting stage. It is also worth keeping a borehole and its headworks a sensible distance from a stream channel and any floodline.
Fast drilling does not mean cheap yields. Shale is soft going, so the per-metre rate is usually at the lower end. But a hole in unfractured shale produces very little regardless of how deep it goes, which is why the money is better spent on siting than on extra metres.
What the Water Is Used For
- Garden irrigation through the dry Highveld winter
- Keeping water on the property through supply outages
- Estate common property and verge irrigation
- Reducing a municipal water account that has climbed steeply
- Pool filling where the water quality allows it
Wellpoint or Borehole?
Ruled out. Shale is consolidated rock and the clay above it is the wrong material entirely for a driven point. Even where water is relatively shallow, it is deeper than a surface pump can lift.
Registration and Abstraction
A completed borehole here should be registered with the City of Tshwane, and the responsibility for that sits with the property owner rather than with the driller. Separately, the National Water Act governs how much you may abstract: reasonable domestic use and small-scale gardening generally fall under Schedule 1, while larger, agricultural or commercial abstraction may require registration or a water use authorisation from the Department of Water and Sanitation. The position on domestic registration was being actively revised during 2026, so confirm your obligations before drilling rather than afterwards.
Related Services
For the drilling process itself, the geology across the wider metro and how a quote is put together, see Borehole Drilling Pretoria.
Borehole Prices in This Area
Drilling is charged per metre, so depth drives the total. The ranges below are framed for local ground conditions and access.
| Item | Indicative range | What moves it locally |
|---|---|---|
| Drilling, per metre | R450 - R1,000 /m | This is the quickest ground in the city to drill, and the per-metre rate reflects that relative to the ridges and the dolomite belt. |
| uPVC casing, installed, per metre | R400 - R700 /m | Set by diameter and class, with the quantity determined by the depth of the clay-rich weathered zone above the shale. |
| Mobilisation and site establishment | R2,500 - R9,000 | Access and site conditions move this; a site visit settles it before quoting. |
| Water survey | R5,000 - R12,000 | Targets structure rather than depth. Worth most where yield is fracture-dependent. |
| Yield testing | R3,500 - R15,000 | Establishes the sustainable rate that pump selection depends on. |
| Pump, supplied and installed | R15,000 - R45,000 | Greater depth means more head, which means a larger pump and heavier cable. |
| Storage and booster | R12,000 - R35,000 | Needed wherever peak demand exceeds the borehole's sustainable rate. |
| Typical complete project | R70,000 - R200,000+ | Everything above, excluding treatment, which depends entirely on the water analysis. |
These are indicative ranges, not a quotation. They are compiled from published South African supplier and contractor pricing to give you a starting point for budgeting. They are not our rate card, and no figure here is a commitment.
Treat them as a broad guide only. Published borehole pricing in South Africa varies enormously - 2026 guides quote per-metre drilling rates for Gauteng ranging from under R300/m to R1,500/m, a spread of more than five to one - because depth, geology, access, specification, distance and fuel costs all move the number. Depth in particular is not known until the hole is finished. Figures generally exclude VAT unless noted, and change over time. Only an itemised written quote against your actual site means anything.
Garsfontein Borehole FAQs
Does drilling deeper find more water in Garsfontein?
Not reliably. On shale ground the water sits in fractures and along dyke contacts, and if a hole has not intersected one, another twenty metres of unfractured shale rarely changes that.
Knowing when to stop is part of the job, and a contractor who keeps drilling on a per-metre rate without a target is charging for metres rather than for water.
Is Garsfontein cheap to drill?
The per-metre rate tends to sit lower than on the ridge or on dolomite, because shale is comparatively fast going.
The total still depends on depth and casing, and a survey is often the better place to spend money here than on additional metres.
How close to the spruit can a borehole be?
Keeping clear of the channel and any floodline is sensible, both for the integrity of the installation and to reduce the risk of surface water reaching the hole.
Shallow groundwater near a watercourse is also more easily influenced by whatever is upstream, which is worth reflecting in the water testing.
What will a borehole in Garsfontein realistically supply?
Typically enough for garden irrigation and household standby use, once storage is sized to cover the peaks.
It is less commonly enough for continuous high-volume demand, and the pumping test is what tells you which category your hole falls into.
DRILLING IN GARSFONTEIN?
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