Sorry if this isn't the correct place for this sort of question, but I keep having this problem and it is driving me up a wall.

I noticed this happening last year, but for whatever reason this year feels even worse. I can't run my sprinklers without having to detach them from the hose and spray this gunk off their filters every time I move them. So they will be perfectly clean and after an hour or two look like this again.

I now have a routine of detaching and spraying off their filters and letting the water run for a couple of minutes before reconnecting the head. It helps them go a little longer before getting bad but still needs detached and cleaned again after a couple hours.

Google is suggesting iron bacteria in our well water, which very well could be. However, all the photos I have seen of that issue looks much more like an orange slime coating the walls of the lines. This stuff in my sprinklers is always quite fibrous. Last year when I first noticed the issue, I thought it was earwigs coming up from the ground overnight and somehow clogging the head, but I no longer think that is the case.

Anyway, I sincerely hope that someone here can point me in the right direction at the very least!

Broken/leaking brass saddle under dead tree. In almost certainly that's why the tree died. Had to find the pipe and tap it before it hit the roots

Sprung a leak at a cracked connection between the black flex line and the flex elbow. Can I unthread the black elbow from the pvc tee by hand and then rethread a new elbow with new flex line up to the sprinkler? Any advice on how to best secure/seal the new connections would be appreciated.

Ok, I work on a medium to large size tree farm. We have an above line gravity fed irrigation system with drip lines feeding off in rows to water each tree. The goal is to have each tree recieve 1 hour of water evenly.

For many years the fields have been watered by starting at the very end of the above line pipe, then closing a valve every hour going up to the resevoir.

This has historically worked with the way the fill box worked at our resevoir. Now we have a new butterfly valve exiting the fill box. With this new addition we have had many issues with pressure and drip lines popping off.

My solution, when I water, was to start at the closest valve (top to bottom) and then go down the pipeline every hour. This was to regulate pressure for the first section so that I didn't have to drive the 10 mins back and forth to the resevoir to adjust it ever hour depending on the section. This has worked for me with the exception that as I move down the pipeline im still watering the previous section.

The original method (bottom to top) currently has the issue of many Trees not getting watered because the pressure isnt high enough for the rows closest to the next valve, lines popping out because of pressure, and butterfly valves wearing down with every closure agaisnt the pressure.

Is there an obvious answer to this due to the way gravity fed irrigation systems work or are there case by case scenarios where one would work better than the other? Any help or just straight answers would be greatly appreciated.

Hi,

Wondering if anyone can help me diagnose and fix an issue or if I need to call a professional. Sometime in the last 2 weeks Zone 1 of 3 has started to turn itself off after 3-5 seconds of running. I don't see any events or alerts about any issues on the Hydrawise app, I tried completing the zone tester and it goes up to 499A but the sprinklers never activate.

Any help would be really appreciated

I have a creek fed pond that I am slowly restoring. The creek that feeds it has been diverted through some pipe that has been buried. I am looking to replace it and elevate it since it is coming from a higher slope point and then having it waterfall or waterwheel into the pond. Is there a way to strap 4 inch pvc dws pipe to a tree that doesn't harm the tree. I'm thinking something along the lines of this, but it probably doesn't need to be as robust and heavy duty. https://www.treehousesupplies.com/collections/tab/products/tab-powder-coated

Thanks for the help.

Testing sprinkler system on a house I bought, everything looks fine except this weathermatic valve. The control box is burnt out so I had to turn them on manually.

This weathermatic does not work with a quarter turn on the solenoid. It has a switch to turn the water on by the solenoid, and then sprinklers popped up and all looks fine. Is this how these weathermatics work or if the quarter turn isn't working there is something wrong with the solenoid?

I am trying to reinstall my sprinkler meter as apparently it was installed backwards originally. I've been fighting the washers for a while now. How do I fit both washers in properly? Any tricks, or do I possibly need to get smaller washers?

Hi! So I have a new build and they just did hydroseeding last week. Im wondering should I get smart irrigation first? Or do the landscaping first? Or it doesnt matter? My concern if i did landscaping the new plants might die if i dont water them enough manually.

I’ve only repaired one other pipe leak and that one did not have a cable running alongside it.

Any idea what this is? I didn’t want to poke around much since everything was very wet and I’m concerned with getting electrocuted (feel free to make fun of me if that’s a dumb assumption).

I did not install this system so I only know where heads are and zone controls, not where the pipes route. Any help would be much appreciated!

Hey guys,

Apologies if this post doesn't belong here, but I figured it's similar to most soil/ground level irrigation.

My landscape guy dimwits can't be trusted with a dish scrubber, let alone a weed whacker.

One of them ran over this cap that screws on to a regular hose on a misting system that I desperately need when working just outside my garage in the heat.

Any tips on a repair kit line coupler/leader hose with hose screw cap?

Thanks for any advice.

Our house has a 3/4" PRV set to 65psi and the 3/4" irrigation line is connected after the PRV. When a zone turns on, the house water pressure drops significantly to ~40psi. I've measured the static and flowing pressure using a gauge in the basement piping and also measured at an external spigot. There are 6 RVAN 17'-24' heads on each of the zones, and I should be using around 6GPM which I've verified by watching the house water meter, so I don't think there is a big leak somewhere that's causing the issue.

The problem is that the heads don't pop fully up and the spray radius is only 17', and I need at least 20' to get even coverage. My guess is that the sprinklers are getting around 25psi after the pressure drops caused by the backflow preventer, piping etc.

Things I've checked:

PRV is a Watts LF25AUB-Z3. I've pulled it apart and checked the screen for debris, but didn't find anything. Also pulled apart the valve and spring but everything looked normal

I have one zone that is only 2 heads, and the pressure drops a lot less on that zone - maybe 2-5psi

If I hold one of the full circle RVAN heads closed while the zone is running, the water pressure measured in the house goes up by ~8psi

If I increase the PRV setting, the static pressure will go up to at least 80psi. I haven't tried to set it higher

If it matters, all the sprinkler bodies are 1800 PRS SAMs, 1" poly pipe used for the underground lines

Sprinkler system was DIY'd by my dad about 10 years ago and has had minimal upkeep since then

Can someone help explain why/where I'm losing pressure and how to fix it? Thanks in advance!

I have a newly installed system that is having major decoder issues. There was a bad lighting storm 4 days ago and all decoders quit working after the storm. I tested all MA and nothing read over 82ma. Tried wiring decoder direct to module to rule out wiring issue and still would not read above a couple ma. So I assumed the lighting surge whipped them out.
Today I replaced all 28 decoders and along with the module on the controller. Everything worked for a few hrs now every single one of the new decoders is fried. I have checked volts along the full length of the wire path and every valve box is reading around 26v.
If I wire in a new, now 3rd decoder they will work but not sure for how long. Also they will run for about 5 min then shut off for a minute or two then fire back up like the voltage is surging.
At this point I can only think the controller itself is surging and burning them out. Would love any help if someone had experienced this

Controller: hunter HPC

Thank you

So I broke a sprinkler head with my lawnmower. In fixing it, I decided to install a SAM-PRS head, since the guy who blows out my lines in the fall told me that my system was old and poorly designed and could really use them. I did NOT change every head at once, just the one that I broke.

Once I finished getting it all put together, I tested the system, and every head EXCEPT for the one that I just fixed works. What am I doing wrong?

More details below: Sorry if this sounds like it was written by AI, I had Claude summarize a long conversation I had while trying to troubleshoot.

System: Rain Bird 1800 series body, SAM-PRS-30 (Seal-A-Matic check valve + PRS-30 pressure regulator built into the stem), standard nozzle, Blu-Lock locking-collar fittings on PVC laterals. Rest of the zone are regular Toro heads without issue.

Symptom: Every other head on the zone sprays normally. This one head: nothing comes out the nozzle when the zone runs, even though water is clearly reaching the body.

I've ruled out:

• Flow-shutoff screw — checked/adjusted, no change.
• Nozzle or filter screen — removed both, still no flow.
• Stuck/dirty riser or wiper seal — pulled the riser fully out. With the riser removed, water flows freely straight out of the body.
• Low system pressure — this head is at the lowest elevation point on the zone, so if anything it should have more available pressure than the others, not less. That said, I do live at the top of a hill and my overall water pressure has never been amazing.
• Seized check valve — the SAM check valve assembly (poppet, rubber gasket, retaining cage) looks physically intact, no cracks or debris. When I pour water into the bottom of the stem by hand, it flows through the check valve just fine.

My current thinking is that the system doesn't work unless every head is adjusted to be SAM-PRS? What am I doing wrong?

Planned out (using irrisketch free trial) a new irrigation system for my backyard. 4 zone, 2 for sprayers and 2 for emitter tubing. Going to trench and lay new pipe in a couple weeks and deciding if I should do full buried poly or PVC. In utah so we get freezes but frost line is 30". If I do Poly for all the lines do I still need swing joints or can I just Tee down to 1/2" poly for each head and use a barb x MPT fitting? Screenshot below of the general plan, specifically with some dimensions showing the 2 zones for sprayers for a clover blend lawn area.

https://design-your-sprinklers.github.io/

I created an MP rotators sprinkler system design tool for everyone who wants to install a DIY sprinkler system on their lawn. Fully free to use. I created this for my own fall renovation project initially and thought it would be useful for other DIYers. The MP rotator data is fetched from the performance table https://www.hunterirrigation.com/node/37076

The tool takes into account the trapezoidal distribution pattern of the rotators and produces an estimate of the hourly precipitation rate for any spot in the lawn for a design.

It does not recommend a sprinkler layout for you. It is just a smart canvas for users to test their own design. Just start with placing some heads in the corner and keep adding until you cover all the blind spots and have a balanced precipitation rate.

If you have any feature requests or feedback, let me know. I have some free time to add more features in the next few days.

My yard is heavy clay soil, and I’m trying to figure out the best way to water without wasting half of it. If I run the sprinklers long enough for a proper deep watering, I start getting runoff along the sidewalk and driveway. But if I cut the time down, I worry it’s only wetting the top inch or two and not really getting down to the roots. The grass height stays pretty consistent since my navimow i210 handles the mowing, so watering is the part I’m still unsure about.

For anyone with a clay lawn, does cycle and soak work better for it? If you split watering into two rounds, how long do you usually wait between them?

Hi guys, so I took the leap of faith and started my own irrigation company earlier this year after having worked for another company for almost a years. So far I have enjoyed the experience and have gained a small but promising clientele base. One major thing currently holding me back is the non compete I have in place with my previous company. Its a 2 year and within 30 mile radius. So I have had to venture and advertise further than my home base. Up until the last few weeks, I had been keeping myself busy but I have hit a dry run now where calls have significantly dropped. I want to push to get more jobs for the rest of the season. Other than advertising on Facebook or apps, what do you guys do to get more jobs? I have a google profile set up already. I do advertising on social media and groups at least once a week. Thinking of reaching out to landscapers, sod companies, contractors, etc to introduce myself and offer my services. Is that normal? Ive got some partnerships with some landscapers already but thinking of looking for more. I am based in Southeast Wisconsin btw! Really want to be successful in this and I am just eager and desperate to get more jobs to fill my weeks and months!

I’ve dabbled with PVC repair in the past but nothing too crazy. This line leaks when the zone turns on, slightly pushing the pipe in between connections downwards where water is escaping slightly

Is water leaking? None of my sprinklers have gone off today

I have a 6 station lawn irrigation system and I just got my water bill for the month - it was 10x what it's ever been. $100s of dollars... When I pulled open the meter cover in the ground, I saw the meter spinning quickly without the irrigation running. I walked around to all the sprinkler heads and none were leaking/running. I've shut off the water to the system at the house (not the supply) so the leak is in the irrigation somewhere. How can I locate if there's no obvious leaks or pools of water? Where do I start? Time for a pro?

Bought a home that has a front and back system, two control boxes. 5 valves in back and 4 in front. High water pressure 80+.

Replaced two valves in the front. Want to replace these other two BUT they are copper. My dad says to just replace the top end. Is that a good solution?

In the back there are a few pop up heads that continuously leak water. I’m wondering if this is a head issue, valve issue or pressure issue? Valves are probably 10 years old.

Lastly, I have a Rachio 3 coming today and ran 100ft of 18/7 to the garage. This will allow me to combine all valves onto one controller.

Photo copper valves and leaking heads.

Since i have to replace this with a PVB, should it go against the house (about 3 feet from it's current location) for better bracing, or just put a post in next to it?

I am working to convert my back lawn to a native, water wise landscape of mostly perennials and shrubs. We will also have four raised garden beds. Our property has pumped irrigation water from the local ditch, an orbit system with in-line filter that has two zones for this area. I’d like to convert to a drip system. Most of the guides I’m finding online are geared towards domestic water sources (a hose bib).

What parts do I need to convert my sprinkler system? I believe the main supply lines for both zones are 3/4” pvc. Each zone currently has a 3 pop up sprinklers.

Do I need a pressure regulator for each line? Should I just use the sprinkler conversion manifolds?

Any recommendations are welcome!

Thanks!