r/Irrigation

Hey all! Hoping one of you wonderful people can help me understand if this is a call to a professional or if I can do something quick to fix this.

Randomly the unit started shooting water out the side. No stations were on at the time or before this (by like 6 hours).

I initially googled and YouTubed to figure out to turn the top with a screwdriver to see if that would help and sure enough it did but I am still dealing with a pretty steady stream of water. (2nd video of this in the comments)

Any tips? Is something cracked or do I need to keep tightening? Seems odd to be shooting out randomly.

Thanks a million!

I bought a house about 5 years ago that has what I assume is an old deep well jet system in the crawlspace. The house was built in the early 50s and has since been converted to municipal water and sewer. The well has exclusively been used for irrigation and the spigot on the exterior of the home.

The past few years I have started to take lawn care seriously and have come to realize the underground irrigation system was a DIY special and has some obvious flaws. 4 zones ranging from 5-7 heads per zone and had 3-5gpm nozzles in the rotors. When activating my system this spring the tech mentioned that I would likely benefit from a newer, higher flow/pressure pump. So I started to look into it. I asked the landscape company for a quote and I crawled under the house to take a look for myself. The old pump is a Water Ace RC5 Tank Mounted Jet System with a 7 gallon diaphragm pressure tank. I was quoted roughly $1300 dollars and the pump they included in the quote appears to be a flotec thermoplastic 1hp sprinkler pump (model #: WBB2225035). After some more research I shared concerns with the company about that pumps compatibility with my current well system and was assured by the manager of the irrigation team that it would work perfectly. The manager has personally been out here to perform work on the existing system. After some more pushback about the compatibility I was told if it was not compatible I would not be charged for it, as he was certain it would work.

I did some more digging and found out I was getting 10gpm at roughly 25psi from the spigot right off the pump. I decided to hold off on the replacement and instead replaced every single cheap orbit sprinkler head with hunter pgp ultras and 1.5gpm nozzles. That alone seemed to improve the performance of the system pretty well and I figure if I needed a new pump down the road at least I have quality sprinkler heads.

Fast forward to today and I have hit that crossroad. I noticed the irrigation would not turn on, and the spigot would not produce any water. I crawled under the house to find the pump not making any noise and is at 0psi. I believe it is cooked.

I want to improve to system to run at least 12gpm and 45 psi. Do I go ahead with the flotec replacement from the landscape company since I am not out any money if it doesn’t work? I have not been able to find any well records for my property. I checked with the township, the county, the health department, and the state. There are numerous well records from properties within a 1-2 block radius that have the static water level between 7-15 feet, and total well depth from 20-36ft. If this is truly a deep well jet system with the ejector in place can I cap the smaller drive line and use the larger suction line to run to the flotec pump if the static water level is indeed that shallow? If it is indeed being ran as a deep well jet system to I replace the pump with the same make and hp and keep the ejector assembly since it would be almost impossible to pull up from the crawlspace? The last thing I want is to convert my irrigation to municipal water and get bent over every summer on my bill. I’d almost rather drill a new well if that would make more sense. Any thoughts, comments or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Also looking for advice on how to connect a pressure regulator and a filter. In what order should they be installed? Thanks!

I’ve had nothing but problems with the battery operated timer for this zone so for the last year I’ve been turning the solenoid by hand. It’s become very difficult to do this with a wet hand and I need a solution. Tried replacing with a 1/4 turn valve but it’s about 1” too long. I’d like to keep the manifold in case I ever find a way to run power for a real timer.

What options do I have?
Thank you in advance!

Is this due to low pressure or just cheap sprinklers?I’m trying to setup some sprinklers around my house as I’m surrounded by fires right now in Colorado. These run great for about 15 minutes then get stuck in one position.

My well is 36’ deep and I’m about 150 yards from the river. I’ve never had issues with pressure since I replaced the pressure tank in my well house, worried I’m using more water than I’ve got? I’m at 28psi in the well house, looking at buying an above ground pump I can run off of the river if need be.

Any suggestions are very much appreciated!

New install, live in a smaller community with looser regulations.

I have a 4 zone system controlled by a b-hyve. It will make this sound for 1-3 of the zones (sprinklers for lawn) but not on zone 4 (drip lines). If I run the zone manually turning the solenoid it will still make sound. If I turn on another water source like the hose the sound stops. I tried to test the ohms and they seem stable at 0.04 (not sure if I did this correctly).

We have one of these Woodford 32s on a house we just bought. Would anyone have pictures of how/what typically connects to one of these? Also, we're wanting to run 100' or so of buried line for a yard hydrant for a garden...could I just tie into this instead of digging up the water main or punching a hole through the crawlspace to tie into the house?

Let the fun begin…..

I’ve had nothing but problems with the battery operated timer for this zone so for the last year I’ve been turning the solenoid by hand. It’s become very difficult to do this with a wet hand and I need a solution. Tried replacing with a 1/4 turn valve but it’s about a 1” too long. I’d like to keep the manifold in case I ever find a way to run power for a real timer.

What options do I have?
Thank you in advance!

A zone that had been working well for a while suddenly started failing at one of the sprinkler heads. I was able to temporarily partially correct the issue by changing the nozzles to lower flow. It has stopped working again. I put a pressure gauge at the first sprinkler, and only got 20 psi. It doesn't change much if downstream sprinklers are capped or not. My first guess is a valve issue since there's low pressure at the first head, but that is purely a guess. A picture of the valve for the zone is attached. Suggestions on further troubleshooting (or ID of the valve for further research)?

The system is anywhere from 6-30 years old, and I'd lean towards older based on the heads clearly being placed before trees grew much.

I have a zone (I think) of sprinklers in my front yard that will not shut off. Googling has told me that this may have something to do with a solenoid valve.

Attached pictures are the only things in my ground box and these look nothing like what I am seeing on Google.

Please help.

Are they capped somewhere underground?

“Hey boss! Where do you want me to install this drain pipe?”

“Right on top of that irrigation control box”

Whoever did this deserves punishment.