Here’s another example of what could happen if you don’t get your lines blown out.

I’ve repaired more broken fittings this year. It must have frozen pretty hard.

I have no clue what happened to this sprinkler.

It looks like it got hit with a digging tool of some sort.

The hole goes through the outer case into the body.

Any guesses?

The irrigation water is off in most of the Boise area.

That’s about a month and a half early!

Now is the time to get your Sprinklers blown out and avoid the crunch.

Here’s one of many cracked pipes that I repaired this spring.

1. Hawaiian Shirt – check

2. Camo shorts to hide the dirt – check

3. River shoes – check

4. Official Rain Bird hat – check

5. Nozzle box, marking flags and rockin’ stool – check

Would you trust this dude with your sprinks?

I have gone to 3 places in the past week where the water was off or the pressure was down.

It took me 20 minutes to figure it out the first time because I’m an idiot the pressure would build up when I had the sprinks off but when I turned them on they would start out fine then act like there was a plugged line. When I turned on the hosebib, it seemed like there was normal pressure. Looks can be deceiving, Grasshopper. Now I hook up my pressure gauge if things aren’t working normally.

The people in charge of the water in each neighborhood will turn on the water to flush out the lines and test the system. This is a normal practice. Sometimes they turn on the water and then turn it off to clean out the filters and fix leaks. This will lead homeowners to believe that “The water is on, Hallelujah!”.

I’ve done turn-ons and adjusted everything perfectly and then the homeowner will give me a call in a couple of days and say it’s not working properly. I’ll go back and it’s working again. I have learned to tell them to wait a couple of days and then call me back if it’s still not working.

I have a good customer that moved here from a warmer climate.

I told him 3 weeks ago that he should have his sprinks blown out but the weather was beautiful and he wanted to keep his water on a little bit longer.

He went out of town for a few days. While he was gone, we had 3 days in a row where the temperature dropped below 20 degrees at night. He came home to a flood.

He called me and I went over there yesterday. His manifold was all cracked and split. I was unable to get any air through the lines because there was still ice in them.
The best I could do was cut all the poly lines to his stations so that the ice might melt and run out on it’s own.

I might be able to rig up an adaptor for the individual lines but the major damage has already been done.

This has got to be one of the silliest reasons for saving money on PVC pipe, I’ve ever seen.

This bozo guy in Texas ran his Sewer Line THROUGH his pool.

There was some discussion in the comment section about using

Clear Plastic Pipe as sort of a Horizontal Lava Lamp.

In case you didn’t realize it, this is a joke.

The pool belongs to my pretend Computer Friend, Dave in Texas.

Customer called me with a problem. Couldn’t find the valves.

Here’s where we started looking.

Notice the broken PVC, victim of overenthusiastic Weed Whipping.

In my youth and inexperience, I didn’t recognize these little beauties.

They are Electro-Hydraulic valves. The solenoid opens a little valve and allows water to shoot through and open The Big Valve.

All the Valve Finder tool does is vibrate the solenoids. That doesn’t help locate the actual valves.

I told the customer that I was unable to locate them without digging up the yard.

Does anybody else know a different way?

The old PVC manifold and 2 of the valves were leaking.

I replaced it with a new manifold and Rainbird DV100 valves.

I wasn’t looking forward to digging a big hole to fix a broken main.

My friend (and Farrier), Robert, took pity on me and dug the hole.

We started digging before the sun came up.

It took about 4 hours total.

Click on His Link,. He’s an excellent Farrier and Digger.

Plus you can see my horses.