TPendagast
07-04-2008, 06:51 PM
I have a job that was installed last year by an "irrigation expert" that is nicked named 'Homey the clown' around here.
Needless to say he's not exactly and expert, but he likes to write newspaper articles about himself saying just that.
Anyway he was not invited back to the property, I have taken over his mess.
I had a zone with a valve that is firing but there is no water comming out of the heads, I did all the usual troubleshooting to find that finally I left the zoneon long enough Some water started bubbling up....aha! a leak.. so I dug it up only to find 1" poly connector not quite connected, I added a foot of pipe and recoupled...... worked for a week (sorta) and then quit.
SoI figured there was some debris in the pipe from it having been loose so I did the usual trying to blow out the heads....hmmm nothing no water.
So I decided to dig up the first T to the funny pipe thinking there was a rock stuck in the T.
Well the heads are on like 12 feet of funny pipe and the lateral is yea 12 feet away from the heads (lotta digging to find this)
so finally yesterday at 8pm I found the junction of funny and lateral at a saddle....OH ok! yea definaately understand how that could catch a rock and clog the whole pipe.
So I dug it up only to find the pipe double kinked immediately before the saddle.... hmmm no wonder it always "kinda worked".
Ok cleared everything blew out the pipe etc etc etc. reconnected everything....water works fine for HALF the zone.... Crap the only thing I can think of is another rock farther down the pipe that some how passed 5 other saddles and got clogged here? There is only three more heads left but noneof them have zip for pressure/flow. How would that litle rock have passed the other saddles (that clearly do a good job of blocking the line) only to get that wedged in that saddle?
My first thought was to find the far end of the lateral and blow it out backwards, but whatever junk is in there would have to pass all theose other saddles again, likely getting caught again.
IF this was just T's I'd pop the nozzels off and clear the pipe easy.
These saddles are making it difficult because of the typeotiny little "chit" rock that is in there.
Anyone have any idea how to clear this without digging up the whole fudgin lawn?
Needless to say he's not exactly and expert, but he likes to write newspaper articles about himself saying just that.
Anyway he was not invited back to the property, I have taken over his mess.
I had a zone with a valve that is firing but there is no water comming out of the heads, I did all the usual troubleshooting to find that finally I left the zoneon long enough Some water started bubbling up....aha! a leak.. so I dug it up only to find 1" poly connector not quite connected, I added a foot of pipe and recoupled...... worked for a week (sorta) and then quit.
SoI figured there was some debris in the pipe from it having been loose so I did the usual trying to blow out the heads....hmmm nothing no water.
So I decided to dig up the first T to the funny pipe thinking there was a rock stuck in the T.
Well the heads are on like 12 feet of funny pipe and the lateral is yea 12 feet away from the heads (lotta digging to find this)
so finally yesterday at 8pm I found the junction of funny and lateral at a saddle....OH ok! yea definaately understand how that could catch a rock and clog the whole pipe.
So I dug it up only to find the pipe double kinked immediately before the saddle.... hmmm no wonder it always "kinda worked".
Ok cleared everything blew out the pipe etc etc etc. reconnected everything....water works fine for HALF the zone.... Crap the only thing I can think of is another rock farther down the pipe that some how passed 5 other saddles and got clogged here? There is only three more heads left but noneof them have zip for pressure/flow. How would that litle rock have passed the other saddles (that clearly do a good job of blocking the line) only to get that wedged in that saddle?
My first thought was to find the far end of the lateral and blow it out backwards, but whatever junk is in there would have to pass all theose other saddles again, likely getting caught again.
IF this was just T's I'd pop the nozzels off and clear the pipe easy.
These saddles are making it difficult because of the typeotiny little "chit" rock that is in there.
Anyone have any idea how to clear this without digging up the whole fudgin lawn?