How to Join PVC Pipes in Very Tight Spaces

Posted on 18th April 2013 in Repairs

Occasionally I pick up a job where I need to remove a solenoid and replace with another, but once the ground is excavated we discover a series of closely joined PVC fittings with nowhere to cut into. A tight series of elbows and tees can be a challenge to remove and refit.

A recent job saw solenoids lined up against a concrete driveway on one side and then dense roots on the other and this morning I needed to replace 5 solenoids all in a very tight confined space.

So if you need to do this what are you looking for?

The biggest thing to remember is that you want to plan what you do before you start.

- Solenoids that have an outlet onto black poly will be the easiest to work with because of the flex in the pipe.

- If there isn’t room to use a slip fix (telescopic fitting) to join pipes then you need to rely on there being some lateral movement in the pipes themselves. Always join the least movable parts first and save the moveable ones until you need to make a final join.

- Cut precisely and check your measurements. Sometimes – when you need to join PVC fittings side by side if you don’t get it perfectly right you can end up having to disassemble everything and starting over.

At the end of the day the goal is to get things joined up and working so if you need to get creative and run some pipe and fittings around a bit to get a join then that is better than not being able to make it work.

I don’t have any pics, but this is one of those jobs where it almost always pays to get someone in to do it. It will probably save you a lot of headaches!

 

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Only One Station Comes on?

Posted on 5th April 2013 in What's Going on There?

 

x core

 

This week I went to a property where there were 5 retic stations wired up, but only station 3 would come on.

As with all these problems it is important to begin at the controller and follow wiring and piping from there. I put the controller on station 1 and tested for voltage. There were no volts coming from terminal 1, but one station was definitely on as I was getting wet.

I did the same for station 2 – no volts, but the same station was stuck on.

Station 3 had volts and water from the same sprinklers

Station 4 & 5 had the same watering pattern but no volts.

My conclusion was that something had gone awry in the control box and it wasn’t sending power to the other stations to enable them to open. For some reason it was only powering up station 3.

So I switched the boxes over, ran a test and all was good as new.

Had we begun by chasing solenoids we would have spent a lot of time and gained nothing as the problem was located in the controller itself.

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There is Always a Way

Posted on 5th April 2013 in Never Seen That One Before

deep

 

This week I went to do a job that involved connecting the rear retic (running off a tap) to the main system at the front. In doing the quote I noticed a thin 70ml channel down the side of the house where liquid limestone ended and the fence began.

I figured that with a thin trenching shovel we could get enough dirt out to lay pipe and wire…

That all made sense but I forgot to take into account the fence post right smack bang in the middle of that 70ml channel. I was about to go and see the client and apologise for an embarrassing mistake on my part, when I had another thought…

I learnt a while back that you can dig under anything if you are prepared to dig for long enough so I thought this looked like a chance to test that theory. Surely 600-700ml down the concrete for the fence post would end and I would be able to get under it?…

Sure enough after some careful digging with a shovel that only just fitted I was able to poke a piece of PVC thru and make a connection. Saved my butt and saved my client having to run her retic off the tap any longer.

 

 

 

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Water Water Water

Posted on 11th March 2013 in Controllers, General, Installations, Turf

Any time lay lawn we will set your retic control box for you, but after that its up to you to make sure it is actually working.

Different controllers respond differently to power outages and occasionally controllers can ‘die’, leaving you with no water. A recent turf installation we did in Brighton came close to tragedy.

The house was uninhabited and the person responsible for it lived in the country. After laying the turf we set the control box and left, only to discover two weeks later that the control box had faulted and the lawn hadn’t been watered as needed. It was close to dead and was going to need some intense watering to bring it back to life.

At last inspection it seemed that the lawn had a chance of making it, which is very fortunate. A dead lawn doesn’t just cost money to replace. It costs to remove and tip, so in the end the exercise costs even more than double.

So please please please – check that your lawn is getting watered as it should be. And if its not then call us straight away so we can help you sort it out!

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The Hottest Summer on Record

Posted on 11th March 2013 in General

Its been a busy summer and a hot one too – in fact the hottest one Perth has ever known which would explain why by this time of year we are a little weary!

If you are considering installing some turf then now is a fantastic time to do it, but I’d move quick before winter hits and we enter the season where lawn goes dormant.

We are still busy but have definitely noticed the slow down with the cooling weather.

Look forward to hearing from you

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How Many Volts Does My Retic Need?

Posted on 5th March 2013 in General, Never Seen That One Before, What's Going on There?, wiring

Wire Roll (1)

I was working on a friend’s place recently with a strange fault that was proving difficult to track down.

The solenoid would come on and off intermitently. It would work 10 times in a row and then fail. There was power (27V) coming from the control box but at the solenoid the power varied between 22-26v according to my multimeter.

The power wire to the solenoid had been joined several times before it reached the solenoid and after eliminating any other possibilities (faulty coil/controller) I could only conclude that there was a problem with the wire run.

I ran a fresh wire to the solenoid and tested it around 20 times with no failure. It seemed that the wire was flawed somewhere between the controller and the solenoid. There were numerous connections and it wasn’t easy to find where the problem was so I simply ended up running a new wire.

So far so good…

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My Retic Won’t Come On

Posted on 18th January 2013 in What's Going on There?, wiring

Broken wires

 

This week I went back to a job I first looked at a couple of months back.

I stopped in on my way home to see why this particular system wasn’t working. It was late in the afternoon and more than I had time for so I declined to take the job on right then.

So when we got back yesterday I knew what we were doing.

I had already tested for power at the Master Valve and there was nothing there. However what was really odd was that there was intermittent power. I know because I brushed the fleshy side of my forearm across the wires and got a small boot. The power wouldn’t register on the multi-meter, although it did shoot up to 28v on one occasion before dying again and making me wonder if i was dreaming…

So the logical conclusion was that a common wire had been broken somewhere. Even when the master valve was turned on manually there was still no water going thru the system. We began at the controller and traced the wires thru a series of 4 different joins and eventually discovered a sliced cable about 30ml underground alongside the driveway. It looked like the edger had given it a beating.

The wire were joining occasionally hence the odd readings, but once it was all tidied up and rejoined the system was working perfectly again.

 

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Why Are My Sprinklers Just Dribbling?

Posted on 18th January 2013 in solenoids, What's Going on There?

wiring a solenoid perth reticulation

I went to look at a job this week where the sprinklers were working, but barely so.

Each station would dribble a small amount of water, but there was nowhere near enough to run the system. What was going on?…

I guess the logical cause had to be the master solenoid being stuck and thereby reducing pressure all round. However I have changed these over before only to see no change in the performance so I was cautious, even moreso because the master was buried 600ml deep, encased in bricks and covered in rocks and rubble. Not fun to get to!

The first check is always to make sure the water meter is fully on and operating properly – which it was. Then to begin digging…

When I finally uncovered the MV I discovered it was a jar top Richdel, and that was encouraging because often you can just screw the stop off, replace the guts and be done.

So I unscrewed the top section and removed it. The diaphragm was stuck to the lower section of the solenoid body and as I peeled it away the centre spindle came with it.

That hasn’t happened before and I didn’t like where this was going…

My hunch was that the diaphragm was no longer opening sufficiently to let water thru and with the spindle now removed it was never going to work properly.

I screwed it all back together with a new diaphragm to see what would happen. Nothing changed.

So I cut the main pipe just after the MV to see what kind of water flow was coming thru. It was lousy, obviously restricted, so the only option was to dig it all up and replace it. A little while later a new master valve proved to be the answer and one very happy homeowner had his sprinklers operating again.

Most retic is a logical process of elimination, as well as the occasional bit of trial and error!

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My Retic Won’t Stop – What Causes That?

Posted on 12th January 2013 in Controllers

If you have set your retic to come on automatically but find that it doesn’t switch off then chances are you have set it incorrectly.

The most common cause of this issue is setting an identical start time for each station.

When you set your retic you generally only need one start time to get it rolling. Let’s assume that is 6.00am. Set start no 1 to 6.00 am and do not set any more start times!

What I have seen people do is set several start times (all 6.00am) and this seems to confuse the old retic box… If you have 3 stations or 10 stations you only need one start time, so if you are having this problem first check and see if you have set a number of start times all for the same time.

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My Lawn is Dying! What Do I Do?…

Posted on 12th January 2013 in General, Local Knowledge

bayer-confidor-insecticide-ready-to-use

After the recent run of crazy hot weather all around Australia there is a fair chance your lawn will be looking the worse for wear.

I have seen a number of browning, ‘crunchy’ lawns lately and it seems that the weather is simply getting the better of the two day/week watering regime. When the temperatures are as hot as they have been and we are only allowed to apply 10ml of water twice a week then your lawn just won’t like it.

The good news is that you can handwater to keep it going – which obviously isn’t ideal, but occasionally it is what’s needed.

The other thing to consider is that your lawn may have a disease. Black beetle is common at this time of year so you may have an infestation and will need to treat it for this.

As a general rule if the area in question is getting wet from sprinklers then the issue is not going to be one of water. It is going to be something else. So go to Bunnings and get some Confidor and get spraying!

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