Lawn Sprinkler Tips

There are two main types of automatic lawn sprinkler systems widely used today. The first and considered ‘simpler’ method is the use of a dial-type timer and an indexing valve that distributes water from the mainline to separate zones. The second and slightly more complex is the use of a digital timer and electric valves (this is the type that we install brand new). Both types of systems require some electrical wiring that may involve high voltage and low voltage connections.

An index valve is typically a green or round or circular shaped, black or green colored device that can be either metal or plastic. The index valve has a side inlet where the main water is connected from the water source such as a pump and then often has either 4, 6, or 8 pipes coming out vertically out the bottom and in the ground to the sprinkler zones.

The most popular brands of index valves that I see are Hydrotech’s and Fimco. The Hydrotech 4000 has 4 outlets and can be modified with a cam to run on 2, 3, or 4 zones. There are also other models which have 6 & 8 outlets and can be adjusted to run the proper amount of zones.

The timer for an index valve is normally the “dial type” timer like a Hydrotech 2120 or equivalent. This type of timer has a built-in pump start relay which sends power to the sprinkler pump, which in turn delivers water to the index valve. Water flows through one of the pipes coming out of the index valve and to the sprinkler heads on that zone. When the power to the pump stops, the stem & disc in the index valve switches to the next zone and when the pump receives power again, then water will come out of the next zone.

As I mentioned, the index valve type system is much simpler. The timer has power in from the circuit breaker and power out to the pump. A Hydrotech 2120 has approximately 220 volts in and 220 volts out to the pump. A Hydrotech 2110 has 110 volts in and 110 volts out to the pump. There are also a few other models such as a 2114 that takes 110 volts in a sends out 24 volts to a low voltage electric valve like the one used in digital timer/electric valve systems.

An electric valve system with a digital timer uses a 110/120 volt timer with a transformer which reduces the voltage so that the timer/controller can send out approximately 24 volts to the electric valves on the sprinkler system. Each zone will have its’ own electric valve. The valves will normally be installed in either their own 6″ round valve box with a green or black lid, or you may find a set of multiple valves, such as 4 or 6 valves, sharing a larger 12″ rectangular box with a green or black lid. Reclaim water (recycled waste water) systems should have purple colored valve box lids.

The digital timer will send out about 24 volts to a particular zone when the timer is programmed to do so. The electric valve has a solenoid which helps a little device become magnetized and in turn, lifts a plunger in the valve, which then opens the diaphragm and then allows water to flow through. When the electricity stops, it becomes de-magnetized and the diaphragm closes, which stops the flow of water to that zone. The solenoid has two individual wires coming out of the top of it.

In most residential and some commercial sprinkler systems, a multi-strand type wire is used to connect the timer to each valve. The outside will be a black insulation and sort of resembles a cable or phone line from the outside. Inside the black insulation there will be multiple, single strand 18 gauge wires. Sprinkler system multi-strand wire typically comes in 3, 5, 6, 7, 9, and 13 strands. You will at least need one more strand than the number of valves that your system has. To clarify; For example if your sprinkler system has 5 valves, then the system will need at least 6 separate strands. This is one unique “hot” wire for each valve and one “common” wire that all the valves share. Most irrigation contractors use either white or green for the common (I’ve always used white).

The common wire is sort of like the negative and is shared between all the solenoids on the valves. To run independently, each valve will need to have it’s own unique wire connected to the other lead or wire on the valve’s solenoid. At your digital timer you will see something like “station” or “zones”…or maybe even numbers like 1,2,3, etc… These are where the “hot” or unique wires for each zone will be connected. You’ll see another terminal labeled “com” or “common”. This is of course where your shared, common wire will be connected.

If you see “MV” labeled on one of the leads on the timer, this stands for “master valve” and is mostly used to power pump-start-relays on systems with wells & pumps. Many city water or pressure tank system’s don’t use the “MV” terminal, but there are those that still do because of an actual master valve is being used. If a master valve is used on a city or pressurized water system, this valve will have to be functioning correctly at all times, or it will not allow water to pressurize the mainline so that any of the other valves can get water.

OK, that’s enough for now. Hopefully I shed some light and gave you a little bit of insight on sprinkler system wiring. As always, feel free to contact me with any questions!

Scott Young
http://www.autolawnsprinklers.com
http://www.advancedirrigationsystems.net

I wrote a short blog post in 2007 about how to clean a pvc well (Clean PVC Well), but I just re-read it and I want to add a few more points.The process that I’m referring to is for cleaning out irrigation wells that supply water to a lawn and landscape sprinkler system, not for drinking water wells. Drinking water wells have specific types of cleaner and you must also test that water to make sure it is safe. I’m only referring to irrigation wells in this and the previous blog posts.Next I wanted to describe to you another step that we’ve added from years of experience in cleaning irrigation wells. After you let the cleaner sit for a day or so, and have already tried to spin or move the 2″ well casing, there is another process that I’d like to tell you about that has worked wonders.

Use a 20 foot stick of thin-wall 3/4″ pipe and add a hose connection piece to one end. This is so that you can hook up a standard water hose to the pipe. Then at the oppisite end of the 20 foot stick of pipe, you will add a ‘boring’ tip or ‘jet’ tip. Both the pvc to hose connection and boring tip can be found at Ace hardware or most any hardware stores.

Actually you may need to add another 10 to 20 feet of 3/4″ pipe prior to installing the jet tip, depending on the depth of your well. The main thing you want to do here is to reach the bottom of your well and then clean the bottom 5 to 10 feet of well casing. The reason for doing this is because the bottom 5 to 10 feet is going to be where the well screen is installed.

The screen is where the water is pulled through and sand and other debris is kept out. Over the years different minerals and just plain old ‘gunk’ build up on the screen. Using running water and pressure for the jet tip head, you can rub the pipe against the edge of the screen and use the water to clean off the screen! This has proved out to be a very valuable technique for unclogging well screens and improving the overall yield of the well.

We have seen improvements such as going from 12 gallons per minute before cleaned, to producing over 30 gallons per minute after being cleaned! It is amazing. My old partner actually didn’t want me sharing this info with anyone, especially possible competition or other businesses, but if you’re lucky enough to find my website, then I’m not scared to share the information. They’ll still be plenty of business to go around and if I can help you save money or teach others how to do this so they can make money, then that makes me feel good to share.

Always make sure to measure the flow of your well & pump before and after so that you accurately know what kind of improvement you’ve made. The process described works best for shallow wells with horizontal, centrifugal pumps. Vertical jet pumps with deeper wells can also be cleaned this way, but you must remove the drop pipe and foot valve first. Actually with Jet pumps it is very common for the jet and the end of the drop pipe, right before the foot valve, to get clogged with debris. This is one of the main causes for limited flow on a jet pump setup. The other major cause of reduced flow with a jet pump is the actual pump itself.

As always, good luck and feel free to contact me with questions!

Scott
Automatic Lawn Sprinklers
Advanced Irrigation Florida

Last month I wrote about getting your landscape irrigation system ready for the system by doing your annual spring maintenance or tuneup. Check it out here:
Spring Irrigation TuneupI’ve written similar blog posts in previous years outlining many of the details that go into this type of ‘checkup’. Here’s another article I wrote several years ago for you to refer to: Summer Sprinkler TipsWith the exception of a few cold nights and slightly chilly days the past few weeks, Spring has started to show as we’ve experienced some days with high temperatures in the low to mid 60s! The current 10 day outlook forecast is looking good for North Florida as next week we’ll be hitting 65 and 66 degrees with clear & sunny skies!Pretty soon the grass will be greening up and the brown, dormant lawns and landscapes will be fading away and back to our typical 9 months or so of beautiful green plants, lush lawns, and colorful flowers.

It’s not too early and never too late to get your lawn sprinkler system prepared and fully functional to help provide adequate and uniform water to your yard’s landscape. If you are like many people, you are probably planning out new home and yard projects which may include modifications or improvements to your yard.

It’s typical this time of year for people to re-sod or lay new grass. This is a great time of year to do that, but please don’t make the mistake that many people often do: Not thoroughly checking your lawn sprinklers before laying new grass or planting new shrubs! I experience many frantic calls from people freaking out because they just spent hundreds or even thousands of dollars on new grass and/or landscape material and then find out that their sprinkler system is not working properly!

Mistakes happen, so I am understanding to those who make this mistake and I do my best to accommodate them and provide service as quickly as possible, but there are times where we get so busy that we do have a waiting list and that’s the last thing you want to hear when you have 10 pallets of St. Augustine grass laying in your yard and there is no rain in the foreseeable forecast!

If you are reading this before you’ve planned or started this year’s landscape projects, then great! Please check-up and repair your irrigation system prior to ordering and installing new grass, plants, or shrubs. Either do it yourself or call a professional company, like Advanced Irrigation Systems, to inspect and get your system up to par. Make sure to let your irrigation tech know exactly what type of landscape material you’ll be using and where it will be. You want to make sure that you have proper coverage over the entire area.

The warm weather is coming. Alright everybody…it’s time to get to work with our Spring cleaning, Spring Tune-ups, and home projects. I’ve got a lot of work to do on my home landscape this year myself and I’m actual excited about it! I’ve just been waiting for this cold weather to go away. Get your sprinkler system updated today. If you live or have a home inside Northwest Florida located in Niceville, Valparaiso, Bluewater Bay, Fort Walton Beach, Destin, Crestview, or Navarre then give me a call!

Scott Young
Advanced Irrigation Systems
850-729-7110
Residential Irrigation System Design

On your automatic lawn sprinkler system you have a separate valve for each section or zone. If your system is a digital timer and electric valve system, then you will sooner or later have to deal with one or more different maintenance issues that arise.

When any of these issues happen, you’ll need to replace the valve entirely or replace parts of it. To do this, you’ll obviously need to know where your valves or at. The valves are normally placed in valve boxes. On residential systems you’ll see one of two types of setups. You may have a manifold system where all the valves are placed into one or two rectangular boxes about 18″ in length.

Or you may see a setup where each valve is in its’ own round or circle shaped valve box. The common size valve box for 1″ valves is a 6″ diameter box. 1&1/2″ valves are normally placed in 10″ diameter round boxes. These boxes are normally green or black, with a green or black lid.

If you know where your valves are then great! If not, your first mission is to locate the problem valve or all the valves for that matter so that you know where they are at! A very common thing that happens, is for grass to grow over the lids and cover or hide the boxes. Or the valves end up in a shrub or flower bed and get covered up with mulch.

You can find your valves in a couple of different ways. The first and most obvious thing to do is to walk around your yard to see if you can spot them. If this doesn’t work, then it is time to get to work. You can poke around with a shovel, but this could take hours or days…literally. A big timer saver is a machine called a “valve location machine” or “valve locater” I like to call them.

These types of devices cost from $600 – $1,000, so it probably doesn’t make sense for you to buy one if you don’t do irrigation for a living. The next best thing you can do is to rent one. An average price to rent a valve locater is about $50 – $75 per day. This machine will send a tone or signal through the sprinkler wire and then you trace the tone to the valve with a separate ‘wand’. The wand is kind of like a metal detector in a way. I’ve had people observe me searching for valves before and thought I was using a metal detector to look for rings or loose change!

This machine is great, but it does take patience and skill in order to use efficiently. You could get lucky and find your valves pretty quick, or you could find your self walking circles around the yard getting very frustrated! The machine is only as good as its’ user. Also it is not perfect as it does tend to pick up interference from phone, electrical, and cable lines in the ground.

If you are the type of person that likes a good challenge, then go for it! If you would rather not spend your entire weekend (or longer) hunting or searching for lost valves, then you may just want to pick up the phone and call your local irrigation professional. I’ve been doing this job for over ten years, and I still run into challenges and difficult searches that take longer than I anticipate. As a matter of fact I’m in the middle of a job that I didn’t finish today at a town-home complex where I’m searching for valves. I’ve found 6 out of 10 electric valves. But I still have two more bad valves and guess what…of course they are part of the four that I haven’t found yet!

Scott
Do It Yourself Lawn Sprinklers
Florida Irrigation Company

When lightning strikes at or near your house there are many potential things that can happen that can directly affect your automatic irrigation system. I have seen the aftermath of many lightning strikes and the amazing power and damage that it brings. I’ve seen irrigation timers/controllers blown off the side of a house and thrown 30 feet away. I’ve seen timers completely burnt, circuit boards fried, and wires completely melted.

The lightning doesn’t even have to directly strike your house to cause damage. Many times it strikes a tree near your house and the electricity travels down the roots and then finds the sprinkler wire and makes its’ way through it, causing damage. It can also split or break the PVC pipes.

Other times the lightning damage is not that obvious. Everything could appear fine on the outside, but when you go to operate your timer all of a sudden you discover the things aren’t working properly or even working at all. Often a lightning strike can damage the internal components of the timer without any visible damage.

The timer may get stuck in the on position and not shut off the valves even when the dial is turned to “off”. In this case you need to shut down the main breaker and the main water source if connected to city water. The timer could also appear to be fine at first, but it will no longer activate or turn on any of the zones on the system. This could be because the timer is “toast” or it could be a problem with the sprinkler wire leading to the electric valves.

I’ve also seen where the timer and wire is fine, but the solenoids on the electric valves get damaged and have to be replaced. When troubleshooting a sprinkler system after a lightning strike, power surge, or any electrical problem I have a certain process or protocol that I follow to discover and properly diagnose what is wrong with the system. I do this with the use of a digital multi-meter, a valve locater/wire tracer, and also another electrical diagnostic tool which allows me to test individual wires and pairs of wires in the multi-strand for shorts or open circuits.

Other problems may not be identified as quick or upfront. A good example of what I’m talking about here is when a lightning strike has occurred where a new timer must be installed, new wire run though the yard to each valve, and possibly even the solenoids on the valves replaced first prior to being able to inspect the system further. Once all that is done, then you may end up finding broken PVC pipes once you can turn the system on. This usually happens on systems with a well & pump setup that uses a pump-start relay or pressure tank. With irrigation systems on city water you should be able to activate the valves manually (as long as you know where all the valves or located in the yard) to identify any broken lines.

I pretty much described the worst case scenario with a lighting strike above. Typically a system will only experience one or two things wrong such as a bad timer and maybe a couple of solenoids. Still there are those cases where everything from the main circuit breaker, to the timer, the relay, the multi-strand sprinkler wire, and the valves all get damages with broken pipes to top it off! Home Owner’s insurance will normally cover damages like this, but there’s always that damn deductible that must be met first.

If you live in my service area and think your system may have experienced damage from a lightning storm, I’m the person to call. I have extensive knowledge and experience in cases like these and I actually enjoy the challenge that some of these situations can bring. Almost anybody can replace a broken sprinkler head or glue some pipe together, but it takes a professional to properly diagnose and repair sprinkler system wiring problems.

Also if you just have a few questions and would like to ask me, please feel free to email me or call and I will be happy to help you out.

Scott Young
Advanced Irrigation Systems, Inc.
850-729-7110

My Sprinkler System Design Book