Frozen Sprinkler Manifold
Posted by Retired Geezer on November 4, 2006
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.
Sprinkler Doc 
Steve said
PVC is just evil. Here in Colorado you go poly or go home.
Retired Geezer said
Do they use PVC for manifolds?
Grunion said
Yikes! Had a similar problem with my grandma’s garden sprinkler system in CO. Used this stuff called plast-aid to repair the cracked pvc. Couldn’t believe how well it worked. Don’t know if it would save you time, but it basically saved us from cutting out the whole thing. Cheers…
Retired Geezer said
Thanks, Grunion. I’ll try to find some for my toolbox. If it works, I can probably save some little old lady on a fixed income a lot of bucks.
Steve said
Do they use PVC for manifolds?
Yeah, there aren’t a lot of good choices. It’s either that or make the manifold out of copper pipe, which is a pain. I use quick-disconnect PVC fittings for the manifold and make sure that it drains well and is adequately purged at the end of the year. If it freezes and cracks the quick disconnects make repair or replacement much easier.
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