4 ms·

I want to landscape my yard and switch from sprayers to drip. I have an old system, and honestly am completely overwhelmed by setting up irrigation. Am I overc

I want to landscape my yard and switch from sprayers to drip. I have an old system, and honestly am completely overwhelmed by setting up irrigation. Am I overcomplicating things? Or is it really that hard to get it set up properly with correct pressure such that I'd be better off just hiring someone to install it?

jcrawfordor 9y ago
It should be reasonably easy if you follow the guidelines in this document and google around a bit more. One of the real upsides of drip is that it's really pretty tolerant to pressure issues - just use large enough tubing/short enough runs to keep your pressure loss under control and do some rough mental-math estimates of the zone pressure and flow rate. The one area where I feel like irrigation goes beyond my comfort zone (as someone who has only laid out irrigation like twice) is if you're working off of a well, since irrigation with a flow rate that matches the well poorly can cause the pump to cycle excessively and burn it out faster. But if you're on city water that's really a zero concern.
- TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
  Accumulators work well to reduce pump cycling. Have you looked in to whether a hydraulic accumulator would suit this purpose?
  - jcrawfordor 9y ago
    Wells are always equipped with a pressure tank (which is an accumulator), but the capacity is pretty small. To prevent excessive pump cycling with irrigation you would need a rather large tank since you'd want it to run irrigation for at least minutes at a time - I think this is beyond what's practical with a pressure tank, so that you'd have to go to a small water tower. I'm not sure though, it's an interesting idea.
Jedd 9y ago
Are you coming off city pressure water supply? It shouldn't be too hard to experiment and set up yourself, and if you've got an existing system you've got the convenience of being able to experiment slowly as you roll out new equipment. The pressure-compensating drippers, as mentioned in TFA, may be useful for you, depending on your run lengths, and contours. Bit more expensive, but the sound of lots of emitters going 'click' at the same time can be quite cool. For most systems I use a dribbler, rather than a dripper, device. I use 25mm (well, 1") LDPE almost everywhere so I can easily puncture and insert an adjustable barbed dribbler. Do not go for the cheap ones - they won't last one summer. Dribblers let you compensate for distance from the tap and contour changes. You should have a go designing and implementing something - it can actually be a whole lot of fun.
- shostack 9y ago
  Thanks for the insight. Yes, coming off city water. My problem is that my life is full of lots of other priorities and free time is at a steep premium. So yes, I could probably slog my way through getting educated on this, plan things out, experiment, etc., but I'm trying to figure out how crazy it really gets for a basic setup to inform whether I have the time to invest vs. paying someone as part of other landscaping work I'd like to do.
mmmBacon 9y ago
Slow down, take a deep breath it's not hard! It should not be hard particularly if you are on a city water supply. If the system is old you'll want to check that there are appropriate backflow preventors on the system and that they are installed correctly and that they work . Once you have that you install an inline pressure regulator to get the pressure down and simple inline filter on the line at the manifold where your valves are. This helps keep the drip lines from clogging. If you have pop up sprinkler heads you can easily retrofit them with drip. If you have the old style fixed spray heads you can still retrofit them to drip but it may be more work if you want to hide the drip lines. The whole conversion is very easy because your main lines have already been trenched. Trust me I've trenched my own lines and this was hard tiring work even with a trenching machine. Some good info here: http://www.urbanfarmerstore.com/converting-sprinkler-to-drip-at-the-spray-head/ http://www.urbanfarmerstore.com/converting-sprinkler-to-drip...
- shostack 9y ago
  Thanks for the info. TBH, it seems like describing the process at a high-level is very easy, but each of those steps you listed probably has some education that is needed to set them up properly, know what to look for, research into brands, etc. Or am I overthinking that part of it?

jcrawfordor 9y ago

It should be reasonably easy if you follow the guidelines in this document and google around a bit more. One of the real upsides of drip is that it's really pretty tolerant to pressure issues - just use large enough tubing/short enough runs to keep your pressure loss under control and do some rough mental-math estimates of the zone pressure and flow rate. The one area where I feel like irrigation goes beyond my comfort zone (as someone who has only laid out irrigation like twice) is if you're working off of a well, since irrigation with a flow rate that matches the well poorly can cause the pump to cycle excessively and burn it out faster. But if you're on city water that's really a zero concern.

TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
Accumulators work well to reduce pump cycling. Have you looked in to whether a hydraulic accumulator would suit this purpose?
- jcrawfordor 9y ago
  Wells are always equipped with a pressure tank (which is an accumulator), but the capacity is pretty small. To prevent excessive pump cycling with irrigation you would need a rather large tank since you'd want it to run irrigation for at least minutes at a time - I think this is beyond what's practical with a pressure tank, so that you'd have to go to a small water tower. I'm not sure though, it's an interesting idea.

Jedd 9y ago

Are you coming off city pressure water supply? It shouldn't be too hard to experiment and set up yourself, and if you've got an existing system you've got the convenience of being able to experiment slowly as you roll out new equipment. The pressure-compensating drippers, as mentioned in TFA, may be useful for you, depending on your run lengths, and contours. Bit more expensive, but the sound of lots of emitters going 'click' at the same time can be quite cool. For most systems I use a dribbler, rather than a dripper, device. I use 25mm (well, 1") LDPE almost everywhere so I can easily puncture and insert an adjustable barbed dribbler. Do not go for the cheap ones - they won't last one summer. Dribblers let you compensate for distance from the tap and contour changes. You should have a go designing and implementing something - it can actually be a whole lot of fun.

shostack 9y ago
Thanks for the insight. Yes, coming off city water. My problem is that my life is full of lots of other priorities and free time is at a steep premium. So yes, I could probably slog my way through getting educated on this, plan things out, experiment, etc., but I'm trying to figure out how crazy it really gets for a basic setup to inform whether I have the time to invest vs. paying someone as part of other landscaping work I'd like to do.

mmmBacon 9y ago

Slow down, take a deep breath it's not hard! It should not be hard particularly if you are on a city water supply. If the system is old you'll want to check that there are appropriate backflow preventors on the system and that they are installed correctly and that they work . Once you have that you install an inline pressure regulator to get the pressure down and simple inline filter on the line at the manifold where your valves are. This helps keep the drip lines from clogging. If you have pop up sprinkler heads you can easily retrofit them with drip. If you have the old style fixed spray heads you can still retrofit them to drip but it may be more work if you want to hide the drip lines. The whole conversion is very easy because your main lines have already been trenched. Trust me I've trenched my own lines and this was hard tiring work even with a trenching machine. Some good info here: http://www.urbanfarmerstore.com/converting-sprinkler-to-drip-at-the-spray-head/ http://www.urbanfarmerstore.com/converting-sprinkler-to-drip...

shostack 9y ago
Thanks for the info. TBH, it seems like describing the process at a high-level is very easy, but each of those steps you listed probably has some education that is needed to set them up properly, know what to look for, research into brands, etc. Or am I overthinking that part of it?