The latest project that I’ve gotten to undertake recently is installing sprinklers around the house. Several months ago I measured the area around the house for my dad. Last week I was able to use those measurements to plan out the placement of a sprinkler system. It’s been a long time desire of mine to get a sprinkler system installed so we would be able to keep grass alive in the midst of these Texas summers.
After getting the plans laid out and getting the green light from mom and dad it was time to start with the water supply.
Here’s the old water supply line into the house. I was rather glad to find it. Originally I was going to tap into the supply inside the house, but then I noticed a strange little water meter box just to the side of the house… completely full of dirt. Some minor digging revealed that it was the cutoff valve shown above. The extremely beat up looking cutoff valve shown above.
The plan was simple, cut off the old pipe, solder on a new pipe with a T leading to the sprinkler system. Then McCormick's law kicked in. (I made McCormick’s law, it states: The easier a project should be the longer it will take). The first problem I encountered was the beat up pipe. I tried to use pipe cutters on it, but all they did was crush the pipe (it was REALLY cheap/old piping) so I had to dig out a larger area to allow the use of a hack saw on the pipe. Once I finally got the pipe off, I realized that I had to make my cuts further back than I had originally planed due to some major pinches in the pipe I noticed. My original plan wasn’t going to work, I needed some couplers. So after my 2nd trip out to Lowe’s today (the first happened when I first got up to get some plumber’s bread), I was ready to solder it up. I had a full can of MAPP-Pro gas and plenty of flux, it should have been easy, right?
About half an hour later and some Google searches on “how to use MAPP gas” I discovered a link to the torch head I was using. Turns out the torch head was incompatible with MAPP gas. Oops. 3rd trip back to Lowe’s later and the correct torch head (which was more expensive) and I was now ready to get soldering. I had meant to take more pictures, but once I got back with the right head, everything just went FLYING. So here’s the final product. And best part, there’s no leaks!
1 comment:
As one who has just finished installing a sprinkling system, (okay, so I had a lot of help) I know this is an exciting thing to accomplish. Good luck on the rest of the project. If you get stuck, let me know, I might just have an answer for you!
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