Ancient sprinkler system maintenance

[Gogar]

Today I did some sprinkler troubleshooting,

My Greenlawn valves for each zone were manufactured sometime in the 1700s and I have never cleaned them.

So, bust out the gear and open up each valve manually,
clean the bladder,
The solenoid,
check the seals,
Put back together. Be careful, don't lose a nut in the mud. They're not captive nuts.

Turns out they are actually pretty sturdy, and cleaned up well. Great!

Now they work SO well that some tube further up the line decided to let go. So now I have the pleasure of digging that thing up and learning something new.

[motion]

Weekend sprinkler repair is the main reason I do not missing owning a large home on a large lot. &*&*& THAT!!!!

[john70t]

As soon as you touch it the juju goes out.

[Baz]

8 zones?

Much respect to you for rolling up your sleeves and "digging in" to service what you can.

What I run into here is the dang boxes fill up so you have to start with an archeology expedition before you can even start anything else...lol.

At least they are all in one place.

I have a locator device for use in finding them when the boxes get covered up and no one knows where they are.

Your pipe is poly as well? That is old school!

Keep charging, sir......

[Baz]

The other comment I was going to make is it looks like those valves have their inlets on the bottom so to set up a manifold you just run a series of tees on the service line that already have the valves screwed on and then angle the outlet in the desired position and plumb the line out. That is very cool and a great idea.

I found the Greenlawn website which is where i got to see a better pic of the valves. Nice the company is still in business. I/we don't use poly here but I may see about purchasing some of those valves...especially since your post conveys the endurance aspect of them!

Looks like they run around $30 ea. which is about 3-4 times what I usually pay for a 1' solenoid valve. Might be cool to have a few though for a novelty.

[Gogar]

Yes I wish I knew where the manifold tees were! I imagine I’ll find out someday. The hard way.

It is really great all the parts are still available. I really like that the solenoid plunger pops roeght out and you can just clean it and stick it back in.

[Baz]

Originally Posted by Gogar

Yes I wish I knew where the manifold tees were! I imagine I’ll find out someday. The hard way.

It is really great all the parts are still available. I really like that the solenoid plunger pops roeght out and you can just clean it and stick it back in.

When I said "manifold tee"....I meant something like this......located directly under each valve:



And at the last valve it should just be a "90" aka "ELL".

[Gogar]

Ohhhh yeah never mind! My tiny mind went to The PEX zone when you said manifold.