Installing Lawn Sprinklers
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Installing your own lawn sprinklers is easy if you make a plan first. Automated lawn sprinklers greatly enhances the convenience of watering and keeps your lawn and garden thriving even if you go away for awhile.
Step one for installing lawn sprinklers is to make a scale drawing of your yard that includes all areas that need watering. You need to include key features such as the house, driveway and paths. You also need to include trees, shrubs, planting areas and the lawn itself.
Step two for installing lawn sprinklers is to sketch out, with dimensions, all of the areas that will need their own watering schedule. This needs to include whether they are best served by spray or drip. Things that might need drip watering include the vegetable garden, drought-tolerant shrubs in full sun and drought-tolerant shrubs in shade. The spray lawn sprinklers are primarily used for lawn areas or ground covers.
Step three for installing lawn sprinklers is to assess how much water pressure and flow is available on a sustained basis from your main water supply. You can test a spigot near the supply line that you'll be using and measure the pressure with a pressure gauge. You can measure the flow by counting how many seconds it takes the wide-open spigot to fill a 5-gallon bucket and then divide 60
by the number of seconds, then multiply by 5, the size of the bucket.
Step four for installing lawn sprinklers is to figure out how many lawn sprinklers are needed for each area and how much water each of the lawn sprinklers needs to operate correctly. You will need to add up the amount of water required for each area on your drawing and compare that with the total amount available. If the water supply is sufficient, each area with similar water requirements becomes one circuit and each circuit is controlled by one valve.
Step five for installing lawn sprinklers is to choose between electric valves, which are operated by a timer, or manual valves, which you turn on and off yourself. Inline valves are installed below grade, but require an upstream pressure vacuum breaker to protect household water from backwash. Valves that include an integral anti-siphon device must be installed 12 inches above grade.
Step six for installing lawn sprinklers is to connect to the water supply via an exterior hose bib. You could also tap into your water line as it emerges from the meter.
Step seven for installing lawn sprinklers is to lay out pipes or tubing, dig trenches and working downstream from a valve, assemble them. You can use PVC pipe where the soil doesn't freeze and polyethylene pipe where it does freeze. You will need to insert T connectors and flexible riser pipes where you want the lawn sprinklers to be located.
Step eight for installing lawn sprinklers is to flush all of the dirt from all circuits and to cut the riser pipes to length and attach the lawn sprinklers. You should try to operate the circuit so that you can check for leaks or other problems. If there are no problems, then refill the trenches. If there are problems, correct them and then refill the trenches.
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