# Need help decoding old irrigation system



## brandontw (Apr 25, 2019)

Howdy guys! Thanks in advance for any help you can provide on this.

Our house is from 1990. The irrigation system isn't much newer. We just moved in a couple years ago. I thought I had the irrigation system figured out enough to use it, but I had a ball valve break last year, presumably due to improper winterization.

On top of that, my confidence level is not high on knowing what each valve does, and which ones should be turned off when.

I threw together this diagram of what I know about the valve/turnoff system. Its attached to this post.

The three circles on the left side are what you see when looking down at the ground. The valves are down in the pipes 3 feet or so. I don't know why there are three valves. The one at the top seems to be the main, the second one controls the flow to the system, and the third one is a mystery.

The rest is pretty a pretty standard backflow preventer/valve box setup, but I could use advice on spring/summer procedures for that part. Ball valve 4 is broken right now, but it still works in the open position, and only leaks when closed.

The attachment came in pretty low res, so here's another link to it:


http://imgur.com/CzHUmk7


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## JRS 9572 (May 28, 2018)

At the city meter box from the street. I would assume that 2 and 3 are where one line feeds your home and the other feeds the irrigation system. In other words from the meter, at some point, the pipe has to split to feed both the home and irrigation. It's rare to see it done that way. Usually the city water line splits to the home right before the irrigation back flow preventer.

You could cut 3 off and check if there's water in the house, and no water to irrigation. That would be a way to find out.

7 is probably for use in testing the back flow preventer, and a way to blow air through your zones, purging water, and winterizing the system.

5a and 5b are also test ports when someone comes to do the annual test on the back flow preventer.

To winterize so to speak I would turn off 4, and open 7. Also turn off your irrigation controller. You might want to invest in a "fake rock" cover for the back flow preventer. I've seen numerous occasions where a backflow preventer purged of water but uncovered still has freezing issues.

These are all educated guesses. I'm only looking at a drawing. Good luck.


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## brandontw (Apr 25, 2019)

Thanks for the reply!

I might have misled you a bit with my diagram... 1, 2, and 3 are NOT out at the street, they are by the house a few feet away from the valve box.

I keep 2 and 3 off during winter, and open them during the summer, although now I'm realizing that I've been opening 3 for essentially no reason... i don't know what it does. It certainly doesn't turn off water to the entire house.

I do use 7 to drain the system during winter. I did not know that 5a and 5b were test ports. good to know.

I have a cover for the backflow preventer assembly, but it still froze at some point apparently


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## Delmarva Keith (May 12, 2018)

Post photos. Might make more sense if we could see pictures of what you have there.


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## brandontw (Apr 25, 2019)

https://imgur.com/a/OdpgUjq

That's a picture of the vacuum breaker setup.

I'll try to take a pic of the valves this evening, but really not much to those. just three vertical pipes with caps with valves in the bottom, just like is drawn on the diagram.


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## SCGrassMan (Dec 17, 2017)

I think 7 is for compressed air to blow out the system.


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## Delmarva Keith (May 12, 2018)

What I'm curious about is your mystery valve - I think labeled 3 in your diagram. Can you get a good photo of that setup?

And I agree with @SCGrassMan - 7 is for blowout.


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## SCGrassMan (Dec 17, 2017)

I'm going to take a random guess that 3 is a valve to something that's been cut out and replaced with 2.


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