I need to irrigate most of almost 2.5 acres, roughly 320 ft square that I am just beginning to plant. 600 ft horizontal and 30 ft vertical up hill from the south end of the orchard, I will have a well in a couple of months. As of now, I'm hauling in 1500 gallons in six 275 gallon totes (food grade from a honey processor) on a trailer every couple of days. That is fine for the plantings on firm ground outside the orchard, but impossible on the recently disced, deeply composted orchard soil. So I figured I could go ahead and install a main trunk line down the center of the orchard, which will eventually connect to the well.
Here's my idea, please tear it apart before I go spending time and money doing it wrong.
Till the well is done, use the totes to supply the trunk at a high point just outside the orchard where the drive is well packed and drivable.
Use 20 ft sections of ?1.5? or ?2"? PVC sched 40. Bury it 2 ft deep, which is easy to accomplish with the backhoe. Run the pipe right beside the existing road.
At the junction of each 20 ft pipe section, I can install a riser with a valve. That would be 15 risers.
I've laid out the orchard/garden in mostly 20 ft wide, 100 ft long blocks, so it is 3 blocks wide. The risers will rise in between the east and center block so that at most I'll have 100 ft to run drip or spray lines as appropriate to the crop in that section. Once I expand enough, I'll have to run a lateral trunk to supply the western most block.
Where I'm planting apples tmr, I can temp connect garden hoses to risers with 4 way splitters so that I can irrigate the 16 trees in a total of about one hour given the flow rate I've calculated.
I'm not eager to spend a lot of time and money building out the complete irrigation system as of now but would rather expand it as each area gets planted over the next couple of years. But what I do put into it, at least the more expensive parts, I would like to be part of a permanent solution without requiring significant rework later.
I should do a write up about the underground irrigation I am slowly installing, but I probably won't. I will give advice though.
For your trunk line, definitely use 2" pipe, I used 2" poly tubing, it come in 100' and 300' lengths if bought from a water supply house and not a big box store. Plastic valves are more expensive than brass, and don't work as well. I put a few valves in the system at key places, so if part of the system fails (leaks) I can still run other parts.
At your risers, DON'T use hose bibs, use full port ball vales, you will get way more flow. 1" x 300' poly tubing was about $75 and will flow twice as much water. From my 1" line... OK I will do a write-up.
Are you going to use automatic valves to flow to sprinklers? If so use a dirty water valves. With this flow rate is more important for sprinklers.
Or is it going to be a drip/flood? Flow/pressure is not really important. Plus if you do this and have good flow and pressure you will be able to water a lot more things at once than you think.
Don't use PVC ball valves if everything is going to be manual. If you have to use PVE ones put a threaded quick coupler next to it for easy future replacement because you will be replacing them every 5 years or so. Brass gate valve always work good and are affordable. Brass ball valves are great but they are more expensive and depending on your design of things you can open/close them too fast and break stuff.
But the main thing to make sure you do right from the start will be your main line. Make sure you size it right. Once you know your flow rate and pressure from the well plus the distance you need to send the water you can figure out your pipe size. I would suggest getting your flow rate, pressure, distance, how and how much you want to water at one time. Take this info to a local sprinkler/irrigation place to figure out the friction loss you will have. You might be good with 2" line the whole way? Or you might want to go the first third at 4" then 2nd third at 3" and the last third at 2"? It all depends on your flow and distance. Or if you have poor flow it could be 4" the whole way. Just remember the larger the pipe the more expensive the fittings are. 4" t's are spendy compared to a 2" t. And compare the prices on PVC and poly but don't forget to check fitting cost also. That could out way a savings in the pipe cost? They also have some nice new HDPE pipe with no glue fittings for the smaller stuff.
I just remembered. My new place I am moving to it has a 20 HP pump that supplies to a 4" (could be 6"?) main line that goes across the property for a 1/4 mile. At every 80 or so feet it laterals off on 2" lines. Those run from 300 feet to 1500 feet. Then come up on risers every 80 feet or so on 1' lines. For a total of something like 260 heads.
My work in progress irrigation system. It is the last day of February and it is buried under 2 feet of snow so the pictures are what ever I can scrape of from last summer. I pump water from the lake on the other side of the tar road. There are two bores under the road with 2" poly. One is for electric the other is the main (trunk) line. My measurement will all be estimates and simplification, 'cuss it is 10 below outside right now and dark.
The pump is so old, the data plate is completely sun faded so I don't really know what HP it is, but it has a 2" inlet and outlet. I am guessing 1.5 or 2 hp. I do know that is is 220v. I put quick cam-lock disconnects on the inlet and outlet of the pump. In the spring, when I put the pump in (bolted it to the dock) it is hard to get the inlet side (vacuum) to seal. Once it is sealed it is usually good for all year. I might switch back to the screw on style coupling for the inlet side. No issues with the cam-lock coupling on the outlet side. I also have a semi-trash gas powered pump with the same size cam-lock coupling, so it is all interchangeable.
The main line, 2" black poly tubing:
75' to the 2"x2"x.75" tee with a hose bib (HB), I found some full port brass ball valve hose bibs when I installed this part of the line, but can no longer find them locally.
75' more to the next 2"x2"x.75" tee. From this tee I used flexible .75" hose to a 6X6 post the phone company put at the edge of my yard. I mounted a hose bib and a 15" rim from my old Ford truck to hang garden hose from. On this hose bib I put a large bore plastic garden hose splitter. I normally run two traveling sprinkler tractor from this location.
75' more to a 2"x2"x2" tee. The mail line alway goes straight through, the branch line gets to make a 90 degree corner. The branch line as a cam-lock disconnect, to a flex hose, to a custom made (not by me, but bought at a yard sale) steel box with four, yes count them, four hose bibs. I change two of them to full port. I can run six sprinkler from this location. Two on each of the hoses with full port ball vales and one from each of the regular hose bibs. Up to 150 feet of hose on each line.
1' to the next 2"x2"x2" tee. This is really a split in the main line. The line that turns 90 I shall call the G&O line for garden and (future) orchard. The straight through line I shall call hummm… The NEL - never ending line, because I could expand it, to go to the back of my 10 acres.
The G&O line; runs a 100' to a 2"x2"x 1.5" tee. This tee is for the garden. It has a 1.5" header that feeds two 1" branch lines, someday I might add a third branch line to this header. The first branch line has a plastic ball valve, yuk, this turns on four sprinkler mounted on steel T posts. The sprinkler are Rain Bird commercial units with interchangeable spigot sizes, the kind that go rat-a-tat-tat-tat. OK my terminology is not correct but you get the idea. Right? What I need to do next summer, is put in a valve just before each of the sprinkler to shot off them off independently. Sometimes one will get some lake weeds or algae plugging the spigot, or sometime one corner of the garden doesn't need water. The second branch line goes to the far end of the garden to a plastic, yuk, ball vale with a garden hose adapter (gha) screwed into it. This branch line is for watering the grass by the play ground. I hook up a .75" garden hose 100 feet long then split it to two regular garden hoses.
Continuing down the G&O line, after the 2"x2"x1.5" tee the line gets reduced to 1.5" because I was out of 2" and had some 1.5" laying around. 75' later it gets a 1.5"x1.5"x.75" tee. The branch gets a .75" brass ball valve with a garden hose adapter. The G&O line gets reduced again to 1" This line is cheap, $75 for 300'. This 300 feet is the "O" portion of the G&O line, it will cover my future orchard. Either it does or it will have, I can't remember right now, three more brass ball valves with garden hose adapters.
Right now I got two sets of four-way garden hose splitters that I use for tree watering. I planted some evergreen and hardwood trees that need watering until they get established. I know, I shouldn't have evergreens and hard woods near a orchard, but this is how it is going to be. SOOO… from the the 1' line I can supply enough water to the two sets of 4-way splitter. The 4-ways have .5" garden hose about 40 long to cheap little stationary sprinklers. That is eight small sprinklers supplied by the 1" line. I could set up one more 4-way to the 1.5"x1.5"x.57" tee.
This is the end of what I have installed. From pump to the last ball valve w/ GHA it is 700'. This system has had up to 16 sprinklers of various sizes running at one time. I have not run any main line YET for the NEL. The flow rate at the main line tee is 57 gallons per minute. I forget the GPM at the last GHA, I will edit this later this spring to include that flow rate. It should be slowed down to under 50 gpm before I install automatic valves for lawn watering. Closing a valve to fast creates a surge pressure that is hard on every part of the system, when the flow rate is above 50 FPM, if I am remembering correctly.
The plan for the NEL is 200' of 2" to a loafing shed that is not used for animal but for storage of stuff and junk, but it makes a good place to branch out from for some fruit and perennials vegetable garden I wish to establish. From the loafing shed I might run a 300 foot roll of 1.5" to another out building I have. From there I may run 300' of the cheap 1" line back into the sugar bush.
I only have one picture and it is of my neglected garden, but shows one of the T-post with a sprinkler head on it. Last year was my first year of having a garden; it was a learning experience.
Below is a "rather lame drawing to help with the layout."
Studhauler, I hate to criticize your gardening, but I think you harvested that boy too soon and he appears to be infected with a cat. It appears your irrigation is a total failure because cat infections are easily removed with a blast of water.
You cant run 15 risers from a 2 inch pipe. I would have trouble with a 3 inch. How big of a well do you have. I used a 4 inch well to run that load.
Why can't I run 15 risers from 2 inch pipe? Friction loss?
What I failed to say previously is that this will be a gravity fed system with a low GPM. So maybe I don't understand hydraulics, but I don't think friction loss is much of an issue is low pressure, low flow systems. The water source will be a solar well, into a 1200 gal tank until I can find a larger tank. There is no intention to water all 2+ acres at once, so I realize I'll have to have a bunch of zones.
If I do decide I have to have sprinklers, I realize I'll need a larger tank and probably have to power it with a PTO pump or a small gas engine. I'm leaning against sprinklers since it is a cost issue, a design issue, and the Israelis seem to be able to make the desert bloom with drip irrigation so I should be able to make it work with the 50 inches of rain we get here.
Stud, what lessons learned to you have? What would you do different if you had to redo the system? Where do you think you didn't get the most effective bang for the buck?
Are you going to use automatic valves to flow to sprinklers? If so use a dirty water valves. With this flow rate is more important for sprinklers.
Or is it going to be a drip/flood? Flow/pressure is not really important. Plus if you do this and have good flow and pressure you will be able to water a lot more things at once than you think.
Don't use PVC ball valves if everything is going to be manual. If you have to use PVE ones put a threaded quick coupler next to it for easy future replacement because you will be replacing them every 5 years or so. Brass gate valve always work good and are affordable. Brass ball valves are great but they are more expensive and depending on your design of things you can open/close them too fast and break stuff.
But the main thing to make sure you do right from the start will be your main line. Make sure you size it right. Once you know your flow rate and pressure from the well plus the distance you need to send the water you can figure out your pipe size. I would suggest getting your flow rate, pressure, distance, how and how much you want to water at one time. Take this info to a local sprinkler/irrigation place to figure out the friction loss you will have. You might be good with 2" line the whole way? Or you might want to go the first third at 4" then 2nd third at 3" and the last third at 2"? It all depends on your flow and distance. Or if you have poor flow it could be 4" the whole way. Just remember the larger the pipe the more expensive the fittings are. 4" t's are spendy compared to a 2" t. And compare the prices on PVC and poly but don't forget to check fitting cost also. That could out way a savings in the pipe cost? They also have some nice new HDPE pipe with no glue fittings for the smaller stuff.
I just remembered. My new place I am moving to it has a 20 HP pump that supplies to a 4" (could be 6"?) main line that goes across the property for a 1/4 mile. At every 80 or so feet it laterals off on 2" lines. Those run from 300 feet to 1500 feet. Then come up on risers every 80 feet or so on 1' lines. For a total of something like 260 heads.
Thanks, LSR. Unfortunately, without the solar well functioning as of yet, I can only guess as to flow. Pressure will be gravity as I don't really want to find a way to bring additional power to pressurize the system. So based on a half pound of pressure for each vertical foot of head, I'll have 15 - 23 PSI.
The water source is a 1200 gal tank, 600 ft from and 30 ft higher than the front of the orchard, 900 ft from and 45 higher than the rear. Some zones will have real drip lines, some soaker hoses, some just free running hoses because once the tress get established, they shouldn't need frequent watering.
There is an irrigation supply house I'm going to on Monday to see what the options are for hose/pipe.
Yesterday I put in 22 apple trees and watered them from a 275 gal tote sitting in my truck up the hill, so I had all of 3 - 4 PSI. It worked fine, but tried my patience because of the time needed to water in each tree. That provided plenty of motivation to go ahead and get a main line installed.
In the spring, when I put the pump in (bolted it to the dock) it is hard to get the inlet side (vacuum) to seal. Once it is sealed it is usually good for all year. check out this sealant. http://www.hylomarsealant.com/
I found some full port brass ball valve hose bibs when I installed this part of the line, but can no longer find them locally. Nice I have never seen these before. I really like the looks of them. I am a function before form guy. Here is a link for you http://www.lowes.com/pd_16104-33599-...rchQueryType=1
The sprinkler are Rain Bird commercial units with interchangeable spigot sizes, the kind that go rat-a-tat-tat-tat. OK my terminology is not correct but you get the idea. Right? Those are called impact sprinklers
Sometimes one will get some lake weeds or algae plugging the spigot, Do you have a filter? The right one can really help and if you do it right you will not have to clean it very often.
The flow rate at the main line tee is 57 gallons per minute. I forget the GPM at the last GHA, I will edit this later this spring to include that flow rate. It should be slowed down to under 50 gpm before I install automatic valves for lawn watering. Closing a valve to fast creates a surge pressure that is hard on every part of the system, when the flow rate is above 50 FPM, if I am remembering correctly. That is only half of the equation for the valves. The main thing is to first get dirty water valves. They do cost a little more but are worth it. Second is to make sure you get a good quality valve. They are all a little different. For instance the rainbird DVF is terrible for water hammer. The reason is they shut too fast. But the rain bird PGA is great for lower pressure systems and the rain bird PEB is great for higher pressure systems. Lately I have been using the hunter valves. For two reasons. Hunter uses the same electric solenoid on ALL their valves. And there are only 4 bolts holding it together and they to do not fall out of the lid when you take it apart. But if it was for my own personal system I might go with the rainbird PGA
Why can't I run 15 risers from 2 inch pipe? Friction loss?
What I failed to say previously is that this will be a gravity fed system with a low GPM. So maybe I don't understand hydraulics, but I don't think friction loss is much of an issue is low pressure, low flow systems. The water source will be a solar well, into a 1200 gal tank until I can find a larger tank. There is no intention to water all 2+ acres at once, so I realize I'll have to have a bunch of zones.
If I do decide I have to have sprinklers, I realize I'll need a larger tank and probably have to power it with a PTO pump or a small gas engine. I'm leaning against sprinklers since it is a cost issue, a design issue, and the Israelis seem to be able to make the desert bloom with drip irrigation so I should be able to make it work with the 50 inches of rain we get here.
You can put as many risers as you want on a 2' line as you want. But it kind of depends on what you are doing with them. If they are going to hose spigots that is fine. If you are going to expect them all to run sprinklers whenever the line is pressurized then no. Keep your line as straight as possible and use as little 90's and 45's to reduce friction loss and you can run it a long ways.
If is is a gravity system with no spray heads and you have enough elevation drop you will not need a pump. No matter the size of the line the elevation drop can create a LOT of pressure. And to run most sprinklers depending on the type you only need 30-40 psi of pressure. And for drip only 10-20.
Thanks, LSR. Unfortunately, without the solar well functioning as of yet, I can only guess as to flow. Pressure will be gravity as I don't really want to find a way to bring additional power to pressurize the system. So based on a half pound of pressure for each vertical foot of head, I'll have 15 - 23 PSI.
The water source is a 1200 gal tank, 600 ft from and 30 ft higher than the front of the orchard, 900 ft from and 45 higher than the rear.
As long as you know the height of the elevation drop you can figure out the PSI and with the pipe diameter the FLOW. The lower the PSI/FLOW the larger the pipe you want for your main line.
Hey thats the hose bib I got, never thought to look for it online.
Those are called impact sprinklers That's the word I was looking for.
Sometimes one will get some lake weeds or algae plugging the spigot, Do you have a filter? The right one can really help and if you do it right you will not have to clean it very often.
A homemade filter that is a box with 3 side covered with window screen. About 3 sq ft of screen total. It has been time to upgrade that for some time now.
That is only half of the equation for the valves. The main thing is to first get dirty water valves. They do cost a little more but are worth it. Second is to make sure you get a good quality valve. They are all a little different. For instance the rainbird DVF is terrible for water hammer. The reason is they shut too fast. But the rain bird PGA is great for lower pressure systems and the rain bird PEB is great for higher pressure systems. Lately I have been using the hunter valves. For two reasons. Hunter uses the same electric solenoid on ALL their valves. And there are only 4 bolts holding it together and they to do not fall out of the lid when you take it apart. But if it was for my own personal system I might go with the rainbird PGA[/QUOTE]
Right now all my valve are manual. Thanks for the info about the auto valve, I hope to install two zone on auto valves this summer.
Stud, what lessons learned to you have? What would you do different if you had to redo the system? Where do you think you didn't get the most effective bang for the buck?
I used to small of mainline to start. Originally I had 1.5" after the road. Actually when I first started I ran garden hoses all the way from the lake.
I also need to put one more impact sprinkler one each of the long sides of the garden.
Most of my system is still above ground, but when it gets buried I am going to spend the time to make sure that it will drain using gravity, to a few low spots, because it needs to get drained for the winter.
Dragging garden hose is ...well a drag! The time spent dragging hose around for just one summer, I could almost install underground for that area. Were the planned orchard is, I planted some evergreen as a privacy screen before I came up with the idea to plant an orchard. I used to drag 8 − 10 sections of 5/8 garden hose just to get there. I would put one 4-way splitter on the end. The pump would just barely trickle water out of the four open hoses. Now I can use two 4-way splitters back in the orchard and still use some sprinkler for lawn watering up by the house.
Since my main line cascade down in size, I obviously can't run 14 sprinkles from the last section of 1" line, but if I spread out he load over the whole main line I can run 14 sprinkles. So, DEKE01 if it is important to water the far end of your orchard, all at once, you will need a large main line all the way to the end. You have the benefit of a down hill run, I have an up hill run. It is not important to me to water all the trees at once. I am pleased with everything in my system so far except the pvc, yuk, ball valves.
If I am not pressurizing the system, can I use sewer drain pipe for my main line? It is about 1/3rd the cost.
To be honest I am not sure? But remember head pressure can create a high psi if have a lot of elevation change. But if you had less than 20' total head I don't see why not.
But just look on the side of the pipe and it will tell you the pressure rating at what temperature.
But at some point you would need to convert to sch 40 pvc so make sure you check if there are any converters from sewer to sch 40 pvc.
But I think the main thing to remember if you try to cut corners on something like the main line it is not just an easy fix. Like going with a pvc ball valve. That you can just unscrew and replace no big deal. Main line screw up? Well....trash the whole system.
On my way to long of a drive to work the other day I was thinking about this thread; if I had to put a main line in as DEKE described I would use three mainlines of 2" polly.
From the storage tank, split the line into three mainlines, all buried in one trench until they reach to top of the orchard. Maybe even use three storage tanks. Then run one mainline down the middle of each 100' wide rows. Put risers in-between every-other of the 20' blocks. So that would be 8 risers on each mainline, or a riser every 40'. Put a 2"x2"x1" tee for your risers, then come up to another tee except it will be 1"x3/4"x3/4" and put a full flow ball valve hose bib on each side of the tee.
On my irrigation system, the 1" line, can use two hose bibs at a time, each with a 75' length of ⅝" garden hose to a 4-way with, four ˝" hoses 25' long each. What I did coming off the 4-way is used ˝" garden hose 25' long and each of the small hoses are a different color. The different colors really help when trying to figure-out which valve to adjust on the 4-way. .
Now one length of garden hose attached to the hose bib will reach the corners of both the two section, but you will have two hose bibs between every-other each section, so that will be one hose per section. Then put a 4-way splitter on the end of each section of garden hose. Now obviously you can't run all eight risers on each mainline at the same time, but I bet you could run 3 or 4 each with two garden hoses each to a 4-way splitter. So that MIGHT be 32 trees per section at one time.
From the "eHOW" website "The Charlotte Pipe Co., a large manufacturer of PVC pipes, strongly cautions never to test DWV pipe and fittings with pressurized air or water. Testing with compressed air or water could burst DWV pipe." Read more: http://www.ehow.com/info_8696936_pvc...#ixzz2vKo8tS6L
30' of head from the top of the orchard to the bottom of the storage tanks will be 13 psi, more if the tanks are elevated, and more yet if the tanks are nearly full vs nearly empty.
45' of head from the bottom of your orchard to the bottom of the tank will be19.5 psi regardless of what size mainline is used.
Assuming 32 gallons a minute per 100' row or 96 gpm total. That is one gallon per minute from 32 colored ˝" garden hoses per row. Using The Engineering Toolbox. http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/ha...ter-d_797.html
4" pipe has a cross-section of 12.56 sq in. With a pressure drop of 2.1 psi and a velocity loss of 2.5 ft/sec at the end of the mainline.
3" pipe has a cross-section of 7.06 sq in. With a pressure drop of 8.6 psi and velocity loss of 4.4 ft/s at the end of the main line.
2" pipe has a cross-section of 3.14 sq in. each. With a pressure drop of 8.1 psi and velocity loss of 3.3 ft/s at the end of the mainline.
I am guessing that three runs of 2" will be cheaper than one run of 4" which will also have to have branchlines. If money is an issue, use just one 2" mainline to start with, then add the others latter, at least it would get the water flowing. That's what I would do anyways.
5Likes
That's the word I was looking for.
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