Does it matter if you have drip line. My concern would be damaging it. Thanks for the video

Michael Brown drip line should have a part that limits the pressures coming to the drip line section, may be underground. You just have to blow out somewhere before that part.

Thanks for the feedback, and thanks for watching!

Thank you!

Thanks 👍

Thanks for the kind words, Tim!

Wow, thanks Brad!

Thanks, Chris!

Glad you liked it!

Glad you liked it!

Thanks!

Good tip. Thanks for watching!

Yeah I'm not sure why anyone would run anywhere close to 80 psi!

Great tip 😊ty

@@jayryan7473 TIME

you could try sucking it out of the ball valve

You should have just replaced the cold water in the lines with hot water. Problem solved

eehhh...what?

Yes definitely one of those water heater videos. Definitely. I think... Unless you have some car maintenance videos.

Yup. I have water heater stuff, car maintenance stuff, a whole series on building a shed, etc. :) Glad you have enjoyed some of them. Thanks for watching!

Great advice David, thanks!

Heya NoMercy - greetings from a fellow Treasure Valley resident!

Great question! All you need to do with the controller is turn it off for the season. Consult your owners manual to see how to enable and disable or turn on or off the entire unit. Good luck!

You have a good eye... :-)

@@AmplifyDIY lol thanks I'm in Idaho. 🥔👍🏼😎💯🏞️

I think it’s just there for convenience. It’s really simple to turn off the ball valve in the box in order to clean the filter or do maintenance on a failed valve, etc. would be annoying to have to reach down to the main shut off for any small work like that. Great question, and thanks for watching!

I've used compressors smaller than this one and have blown out my system for years. You just have to do it zone by zone. Some can get away with doing the whole system with a big compressor

Depending on the tank size on your compressor and the length of irrigation pipe and # of heads in each zone, you may have to blow out a zone in multiple passes; that is, when you see the pressure coming out of your heads drop significantly, close the valve to your irrigation system, let the compressor recharge, then repeat until you get all the water out.

Hi Roger - I don't think it's necessary to close them. When you blow out each station, you clear all the water out of the valves for each station. I always just leave them alone (in fact, I never have to open the other boxes in my yard where the valves are unless there is an actual problem with a valve (stuck open or closed, etc). Thanks for watching!

I've done this with several different sizes of compressors over the years. A really small compressor (say, 2.5 gallon or so) *will* do this job, but it takes a lot longer, as you'll have to keep refilling the compressor over and over on each station. The larger the tank, the less you'll have to refill it and the faster the job will go. 20+ gallon compressors make this job a piece of cake. Good luck!

@@AmplifyDIY thank you, appreciate your response.

LOL yes! Those little suckers are mean!

You won’t be able to blow out all the lines if you only attach a blowout thing to a head on each station. That won’t clear the lines from your water supply to the valves, and depending on how deep your frost line is those lines can freeze and burst. It would be better to install a blowout access point as close to the water supply as possible.

@@AmplifyDIY Is it best to install a blowout access point in your valve box like you have done? My system doesn't have a blowout access point.

I like to blow out each station repeatedly until air is blowing out of every single head on the station. As long as no sprinkler head is still spraying water, you are good to go. Thanks for watching!

Good eye... :)

Hi Carol, Yes, cycling the compressor is the exact way to do it. As for how much water do you need to get out? If your last head is gurgling and bubbling, then that station has been cleaned out enough. As long as you don’t have a steady stream of water coming out of any head, then the station has been cleared. Good luck!

Actually this is because your air compressor doesn’t make enough air volume to do this job properly.

Hey Actual Person - yes, a 6 gal compressor will likely be up to the task, though it may just take longer as you'll have to wait to re-fill the compressor a bunch more times. Good luck!

Hi Martha - I'm sure if you google for "sprinkler blow-out near me" you'll find some local companies who can do the job. Good luck!

Hi NyChris - there is really not much to do to turn your sprinklers on in the spring: Open the main shutoff valve, then open each of the stations in turn to purge the air out of the lines. Then clean out the filter, and turn the controller on for the season. Easy peasy. Good luck!

I wait until after the HOA water has been shut off. Yes, shut the valve that goes out to the HOA supply - that *should* be buried quite far down (mine is around 4-5 feet underground) where there is no danger at all of it freezing, so blowing it out is not really necessary. Good luck!

Generally I don't worry too much about it. When the irrigation system is winterized for my neighborhood, they drain the entire thing. After I've received notice that the system has been completely drained, I'll make sure the ball valve is open halfway. This accomplishes 2 things: 1) it allows any water that was trapped in that section of pipe to drain back down below the frost line, and 2) it prevents any small amount of water trapped in the ball valve itself from freezing and expanding and breaking the ball valve. Good question, and thanks for watching!

Actually: you are on the right track with simply capping the heads. Remove the sprinkler head and body, and cap the pipe where it was installed. You will only need to deal with capped heads when blowing out the system if you cap the last head on a line. If you do, blow out the line as I demonstrated, then remove only the cap at the end and blow it out more until no water comes out the uncapped pipe. Replace the cap and you are done. Good luck!

Dang! Perhaps ask some neighbors if they know where theirs are located? Maybe yours are in a similar location... Good luck!

pay for a professional. one time AND WATCH what they do .. good luck

Do the lines actually drain? The only reason to blow out a system is to remove the water in the lines so it does not freeze, expand, and break any pipes, heads, or valves.

I picked it up at either my local Lowe’s or Home Depot. Yes you really should turn it off each season. Thanks for watching!

Probably not necessary, no.

Hi Philip - It sounds like you have thought through your upcoming build pretty well. I do not have a pressure regulator on the irrigation lines, and just rely on whatever the system in my neighborhood provides. The builder that built out this neighborhood set up all the homes this way, as we are on our own irrigation pump for the community. So far it's been fine. My only other thought is that rather than just digging down to 18", you should find out what the freeze depth (usually called the "frost line") is where you'll be building, and bury below that. It may only be 12", it may be much, much deeper. You can learn more about frost lines here: www.familyhandyman.com/article/frost-lines/ Good luck!

Hey thebc - yes, if you don't need to winterize your system because nothing ever freezes, then you just turn off the farthest upstream valve you have in your system. In my area these are very deep underground, but depending on if you have a frost line this may be shallow, or may even be above ground. Good luck!

@@AmplifyDIY One more question. If I turned off the irrigation valve, what happens to the water that is already in the irrigation pipe? I assume there are some leftover water in the pipes. Will it be ok it leave as is? Also, I happen to notice, after I turned off the irrigation valve, the water pressure for my home system has increased. I think it makes sense as it used to have two pipes for water, and now just one to the house. Is this normal? Or I should have the water pressure checked and adjusted if necessary? And also, since I didn't touch the remote control valve (where I suppose is the control of irrigation schedule), will it still turn on using the leftover (if any) in the irrigation pipes? Do I need to turn off the irrigation scheduler? Thank you.

@@thebcl1547 I'll try to answer everything: If you simply shut off the irrigation valve, then yes, the water still in your irrigation pipes will just stay there. This is not really a problem unless the water freezes, in which case it will burst your pipes - this is the whole reason why systems are blown out with air in the first place. I can't really speak to differences in water pressure between home and irrigation system.... there are lots of variables and so many different ways that these can be plumbed. Yes, you should turn off the timer so it does not keep needlessly opening and closing the valves while the system is not pressurized. Good luck!

And a filter, if you don't already have one. Good luck!

Hi James - in my case, the irrigation water is on a separate system that is turned on and off seasonally. I wait to blow out my system until after the irrigation water has been turned off in my neighborhood. Then I can crack open my underground valve (the one that is about 5 feet underground, well below the frost line) and blow a short burst of air through it. This evacuates the section between my shut off valve to the irrigation system and the shut off valve in my sprinkler box. Then I close both of those shutoffs and proceed with the rest of the blow out. Your system will vary, of course, but I would not worry about any shutoff valve that is below the frost line. Good luck!

I’ve never had a drain valve on a sprinkler system, and never had any issues with burst pipes or broken heads in the spring.

YUP!

HI Gis - In my specific case the water is supplied from local irrigation canals. At the end of the summer the water flow to these canals is turned off, and the pump that feeds our system is shut down for the winter. Once this happens, all I need to do is remove my filter fitting with my above-ground shut off still open, and gravity will pull the water back down past the under-ground shut-off back towards the pump. This is, of course, unique to my setup. The particulars of your installation may vary, but in general just a couple of inches of exposed length above the freeze line won't be a problem, even if it remains full of water. Thanks for watching!

Hi Don - in my system, the only thing upstream of the blowout tee is the water filter, which has its own drain. The only pressure regulator I'm aware of in my system is on one specific station that feeds drip hoses. If you have a pressure regulator *upstream* of your blow out tee, I'm not sure I can offer any great advice for how to make sure it is blown out...

Turning your system back on in the spring is really simple. You should not need to hire anyone to do it. If you watch my video, you’ll see that there are two valves closed when I winterize the system. All you need to do in the spring is open those two valves back up, and then test each of the stations to get all the air back out of the lines and filled up with water again. Good luck!

Hey Myron - great question. It's a little tricky to answer accurately without some more information: Did they cap off ALL the heads on a single station (or several stations?), or did they only cap off a portion of the heads (i.e., does the station pipe run under the concrete to another area of the yard where there are some uncapped heads? Are there uncapped heads on that station *before* the concrete? How many stations are on your system? How many are completely uncapped?

@@AmplifyDIY I'm not completely certain of the layout. The connections for blowing out the system is located in the front of my house ; nothing major is connected in the back but the irrigation control panel affixed to the house. My yard is not huge. I had over 400 square feet of cement poured to cover a sprinkler system that was used to irrigate grass in that area. It has all been capped off along that entire section and on one side of the house. I do have one small strip of glass that I did kep two sprinkler heads for. I believe that may help with blowing out the system on one side but the zone that's located in the back and on the other side will not be able to blow out. I was wondering if the concrete would protect it from freezing if there was water left in there. I do spend a great deal of time using my compressor to blow out the system as much as I can. I don't know if there is a solution like winterization for homes that I could run through the lines to keep any fluid from freezing, that also not going to do harm to the sod that I have. I just may be overthinking it but I just wanted to be sure since this is going to be my first season having this concrete through a winter. I'm not sure how you would cut off a zone completely. I may be able just to dig in the grass and cap it whereas no water should even go to that area but I don't know how to do that.

Hi Myron, Whether the portions covered with the concrete will freeze depends on a number of factors you probably don't know: how deep were the original lines buried? How deep is your frost line? When they were capped, did they just remove the heads, or did they remove the branch lines as well and cap right at the main line? In your shoes, I would probably not worry about it at all until /unless a problem appeared. Keep in mind that the only reason to avoid letting sprinklers freeze is because you don't want anything to crack and later leak. If the entire station has been capped off though, then leaks won't matter since the station won't (or should not) ever run anyway. It sounds likely that an entire station (or stations) was capped off. If that is the case, then just disable those stations and don't give it another thought. It might be a good idea to manually run each station on your system just to see if there are any which do nothing. If you find that there are stations which have only a couple of heads that likely were attached to the portions which were capped, then you may need to think about digging up and capping the station just beyond the last head currently in use... but in your shoes I'd let it ride until/unless there was a problem. Good luck!

@@AmplifyDIY thank you for being so helpful. It means a lot.

Hi Painkiller - no, that's not normal. You have a leak somewhere which should be addressed. Good luck!

Compressors come in about a gazillion shapes, sizes, and capacities. If you are looking for a good all-purpose compressor that would be capable of running air tools and blowing out a typical residential sprinkler system, I'd recommend this one from Wen: (affiliate link) amzn.to/35AUR9r - That's to the 20 gallon size, but they have a 10 gallon size that will run most air tools as well if you don't mind the sprinkler blowouts taking a little longer. Good luck!

Hi Rich - yes, a small compressor would be enough for such a small system. For the drip station, I'd keep the pressure a little lower - say, 50-60psi or so. For the other station, you may have to completely fill and empty the compressor through it 3-4 times... but as long as you get to the point that all the heads blow air instead of water, then it'll be fine. Good luck!

Hi Thomas - I set the regulator (which adjusts the pressure coming out of the compressor independently from the pressure of the tank itself) to 75 psi.

It varies a lot, of course. In my area, typically around $50-75. The more stations you have, the more it costs. Thanks for watching!

I like to have them as close to the supply as possible, so I'd go upstream of any other components in the system.

Re-starting them in the spring amounts to opening the valves you closed at the end of the year and running through each of the stations to make sure all the heads still work and no new leaks have appeared over the winter. It's incredibly simple to do. Good luck!

That's super annoying. Now you know how to do it yourself so you know it is done correctly!

Western US.

Depends on the size of your irrigation system. The larger the compressor, the faster you'll be able to do the job. I used to have a little 2 gallon compressor, and while I could do it, it took several hours. I'd recommend a 20+ gallon compressor for most homeowners. Something that size gets the job done quickly.

@@AmplifyDIY Well I thinking about getting a 6gal compressor instead of paying some one each year, but if I need to have such a large compressor hanging around it might not be worth it. Not that much extra room.

@@fuckthisksksjjksdfjd A 6 gal will certainly do the job - you'll just have to spend a bit more time waiting for the compressor to re-charge between blasts of air, since you'll have less air per full tank. Good luck!

LOL!

Yes, in general it's a good idea to crack open any valve that may freeze, or where any last drops of water may be able to drain out once you are done. Great tip - and thanks for watching!

Hi Shane - I'm confused: You are supposed to let your compressor build pressure in the tank (until the motor shuts off - on this compressor, that's around 170psi) with all your sprinkler valves closed, and once the tank is pressurized, then open your stations one at a time for 10 or so seconds at a time. You'll be able to get a dozen or so bursts like this, then you'll need to let the tank re-fill. Did you connect your compressor while it was empty, open a station valve, and then turn on the compressor? Cause that's the only way I can think of that you'd not be able to build pressure...

@@AmplifyDIY I did, but as soon as I turn on the valve that goes to the sprinkler system the 170psi pressure drops to 25psi. All sprinkler valves are still closed. I don't see any leaks.

Hmm... something is not adding up quite right. That 170 psi in the tank represents a LARGE volume of air. It's got to be going somewhere... How do you know all your valves are closed? Did you physically close them all (not with the control box, but by turning the top of the valve itself?) Do you have any soaker stations? That much air does not just disappear. Any chance you left the upstream valve underground open? Maybe the air is going out to the water supply rather than to any of your stations?

@@AmplifyDIY before I shut the water supply there was no water running anywhere. So I assume there is no leak anywhere.

I mean I haven't open any valve yet.

Hi Drea - Turning the system back on is VERY easy. If you followed the steps in this video to turn the system off, then all you need to do to turn it back on is open both of the valves you closed when turning off the system. Specifically, there is the valve at the bottom of the underground pipe (see 2:19 of this video for the one I'm talking about). Turn that back on. You should hear water flowing through that pipe briefly when you do. Secondly, you need to open the valve located in your sprinkler controls box (see 3:21 of this video). Twist the handle of that valve so that it is in line with the pipe. Once those 2 valves are open again, all you need to do is cycle through each station using your sprinkler system controls. Each station will make hissing / air blowing noises at first, then will switch over to water shooting out of the sprinkler heads once all the air in the pipes has been cleared. Check for any broken / leaking heads, and it's also a good idea to clean the filter (if you have one) every spring when you get your system going again. Good luck, and thanks for watching!

I can help you!!!

Yeah, I never would have plumbed this system this way - but I had no say over a lot of stuff with this house. The builder subbed everything out, and many of the issues I pointed out (in the same vein as this) fell on deaf ears. This falls under the "I'll fix it properly when / if it ever becomes a problem" category for me. Thanks for watching!

Hi Common Sense - Yes, there are manual switches for each valve, but sometimes these are difficult to get to, and a homeowner may not know where they are or how to correctly operate them (some valves are different from others) - this is why I suggested using the control box to cycle through the valves, as most homeowners will be familiar with where their control box is and how to operate it. I've never heard that using the control box in this way is a bad idea - can you explain why? All the control box does is trigger each valve in turn, just as you would if you use the switches on the valves themselves...

I agree with you - but most people don't understand wire gauge, amperage, or the concept of impedance or resistance, so the safest advice to most people is to simply avoid using an extension cord, which is why I included that. Of course, if you are familiar with the right way to do it, an extension cord is perfectly fine as long as you do it correctly. Thanks for watching!

Hi Drew, The reason I recommend against using an extension cord is it increases the resistance on the circuit, which makes the motor draw more current and work harder as a result. When the motors on larger compressors like the one I'm using first start up there is a very large spike in the current draw, which can and will flip the breaker. If you go back to 0:47 of this video, you'll note that I never said you can't use an extension cord... just that it's better if you don't have to, along with an explanation why. If you care to google: "should you use an extension cord with an air compressor?" I think you'll find that I was in fact educating about how to properly do something. Thanks for watching!

Drew that’s incorrect. An extension cord does affect the power. The longer from point A (electrical panel) to point B (the device being used) the more voltage drop you’ll experience. Additionally the circuit will drop more voltage based on the smallest wire size in the run. Example let’s say you have a 20A circuit (12 gauge wire) with a 15A outlet installed, that outlet just got reduced from 20A to 15A because of the incorrect outlet. Another example would be a 20A circuit, this time 12 gauge wire with correct 20A outlet installed. But now you plug in an extension cord with 14 gauge wiring. You just lowered the capacity of that circuit and depending on how long the cord is, the voltage will reduce further and further the longer the distance. Before calling out the KZfaq creator it’s best to get your facts in order.

@@mikebaca6312 I agree completely. This is an A+ video and the person talking has superb communication skills which made the video exceptional getting across all the technical information (including his answers to all the questions about specifics) which was correct, concise and to the point. I liked the VIDEO quality, too, not attempting to film one-handed with a cell phone while trying inadequately to demonstrate with the other hand. An excellent teacher and communicator. Thanks for the effort it took to accomplish it!

Hi Strix - thank you for the feedback, and I apologize that the music was distracting. Hopefully the video was still useful to you. I'll keep your feedback in mind for future videos. Thanks for watching!

Thanks, Fred!