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water Drip Irrigation

Ring-of-Fire

Ring-of-Fire

Does anybody here have any experience with drip irrigation? I have converted my garden this year to all containers and I have installed a drip irrigation system but due to my water source near the garden being straight off the main line to my house I havent been able to properly test it. I have a pressure reducing valve on order but it hasnt arrived yet. I have a pressure regulator that goes inline with the garden hose but upon further reading it does not reduce the incoming pressure, it only maintains an even 25psi. I adapted the hose end of my 15 gallon ATV sprayer to feed the drip system and it worked, but did not have enough flow to get all of the drippers working. I would love to hear about anyones experiences and any advice.

Thanks, Chris
 
I planted my tomatoes in grow bags set beneath cattle panels. I have 5 rows of 20 plants, each plant has a 2 gph dripper. I plant my peppers in empty mineral tubs with 3 plants per tub and a micro sprinkler centered in the tub.
 
Ring-of-Fire said:
 I have a pressure reducing valve on order but it hasnt arrived yet. I have a pressure regulator that goes inline with the garden hose but upon further reading it does not reduce the incoming pressure, it only maintains an even 25psi.

Thanks, Chris
Click to expand...
 
 
I'm confused... The inline pressure regulator is supposed to reduce the output pressure. They come in different psi so you can control the pressure accordingly.
 
Why isn't it working with the 25 psi regulator? Is it because you don't have enough pressure? You may have to do more than 1 mainline for all those emitters or add shutoff valves to water in sections.
 
Not familiar with cattle panels and mineral tubs, but you are saying you cannot get all the emitters to work?
 
If I am reading correctly, you have 100 @ 2gph drippers and how many (gph) micro sprinklers?
 
If everything was flowing at full capacity, what would the total gph be?
 
I have 21 @ 15 gph micro sprinklers, and I need to use shutoff valves to cut the flow in order to keep the sprinklers from spraying outside the raised bed. I also have 25PSI hose end regulators.
 
I was confused too. I had a new hydrant installed near my garden and it is coming right off the line that runs to my house. Apparently according to the place I got the regulator it is not a reducer, only a regulator. This is from their help section...

Drip irrigation pressure regulators will not reduce the incoming pressure of your water source, they only regulate or maintain the stated pressure within your irrigation system. Pressure regulators need outflow and back pressure to regulate the pressure. If you connect your gauge to the end of the regulator then you are only measuring the static pressure of the water source. If you want to verify the pressure maintained in your system, then you would need to place the pressure gauge at the end of one of zones, turn the zone on, let it pressurize and once the lines have filled and emitters begin to flow then take the reading. This will give you your working pressure not your static pressure of the water source.

Luckily, my hydrant has 3/4 pipe thread at the spigot with a 3/4 garden hose thread adapter screwed onto it. Im going to put an actual pressure reducing valve like is used inside your home to reduce that 120 psi down to a more appropriate pressure. I am still kinda confused about the purpose of the item that my drip irrigation system says to use.

Chris
 
I cant say for sure if the entire system will work because I havent hooked it up to the garden hose because Im afraid I have too much pressure and the thing I thought was a pressure reducer, isnt a reducer. I attached the drip system to the small spot sprayer I had and it worked about half the system but Im sure it doesnt have near the flow of a garden hose.

Cattle panels are 4 foot by 16 foot heavy wire fence panels that I use as a trellis. Mineral tubs are large plastic tubs that come filled with a mineral lick for cattle. Not sure of the exact volume but its more than a 2 cu foot bag of soil.
 
Pics before I had it all finished
 

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Thanks for the pics, nice setup you have there.
 
Anyway, you may have too many emitters hooked up to the pressure regulator.
 
Was there any documentation saying how many emitters you could use?
 
According to the place I bought all the stuff, I should be able to run 100 of the 2 gph emitters, which is what I have. I have a valve between the 100 tomatoes and the pepper tubs. The peppers dont need watered as often as the tomatoes anyway.
The way I understand it, the 25psi hose end regulator just maintains a constant 25 psi in the system regardless of the pressure measures at the end of the garden hose. Im tempted to hook it up and see what happens but Im afraid of a catastrophic failure. I guess I will wait until I get the pressure reducing valve and play it safe.
 
MAN, hook it up. The 25 psi cuts the city water pressure down so you don't over water but you have so many emitters I don't think it matters. 
 
What are you scared of? It's not gonna blow up the neighborhood.
 
Hook it up and turn it on, that's how you find out if it works. Try it with the 25psi reducers and it it doesn't work then take it off and try it out.
 
 
You really are making more of this than it is. It's water so turn on the water and "Let it Flow, Let it Flow, Let it Flow!!!!
 
Then go check each emitter to make sure it's watering enough.
 
Apparently, I misunderstood.
 
I thought you were saying you had hooked everything up, but it was not getting water to all of the emitters.
 
Finally got it all hooked up and everything works as I had hoped. Its been raining lately so I haven't been able to work out exactly how often and for how long I will need to run the system. I have a fertilizer injector made by EZFLO that I haven't hooked up yet, but am curious if its better to fertilize with it once every week or two and give the plants a full dose of fertilizer, or run it at a slow feeding rate and fertilize every time it waters?
 
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