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An irrigation system for your own garden can be implemented on your own without any major problems. The planning and materials used are the decisive components for the construction of a garden irrigation system. Only through this you can use the irrigation indefinitely and provide your plants with the necessary moisture. After planning, you can use instructions that make it easier to build your own irrigation and explain the necessary steps in detail.
Planning an irrigation system for the garden
In order to enable efficient garden irrigation, the individual pipe routes must be able to reach the relevant parts of the garden and the water pressure must be powerful enough. To find out how many liters per hour are available and whether the line has enough pressure, do the following:
- Place 10 l bucket under the tap
- switch on at the highest level
- Measure the time until the bucket is full
- Calculate seconds
- Divide seconds by 36,000
At the same time, you should look to see if the faucet is slow flowing or has a lot of power. If the stream of water is weak, you should use a different faucet or switch to a cistern or well if they are available. The corresponding pump requires one Pressure of 3-4 barto take care of your garden. The liters per hour are important because each sprinkler can only distribute a certain amount of water per hour. This allows you to see how many sprinklers you need to use or whether the resulting water costs would ultimately be too high. You must also plan the cable routes:
- make a sketch
- Sketch scale: 1 m = 1 cm
- Draw in elements such as plants/paths
- Choose path for the lines
- If necessary, draw several junctions
Here it is important to record the radius of the corresponding sprinklers in the sketch. Obstacles such as plants and walls can obstruct the water and reduce the spray radius. If you have a combination of lawn and individual beds in the garden, you should build an irrigation system specifically with these individual sections in mind. A lawn, for example, requires more water than beds or planters. A collection of planters, on the other hand, needs water more often than lawns, which would make the use of an automated system advisable.
notice: When planning, do not forget the rain shadow areas where rainwater does not reach due to obstacles such as a dense tree canopy. So that these do not dry out, they must also be reached by the irrigation system.
materials and utensils
To build an effective garden watering system, you need the right materials and tools. With these, it is important that the dimensions are correct in order to be able to transport enough water so that it can be made available to the plants or the lawn. The following list shows you the necessary equipment:
- PVC or drainage pipes (diameter min. 100 mm) or irrigation hoses
- pipe connector
- sprinkler
- hacksaw
- vice
- cutter or secateurs
- level
- matching faucet connections
- optional: adapter for connections
- spade
- shovel
- wheelbarrow
- garden gloves
- Ruler or tape measure
- line
When choosing the pipes, make sure that you always buy a little more than what you plan for. If you are not yet familiar with shortening pipes, damage can quickly occur. A damaged pipe should not be laid in the ground as this can cause flooding. Likewise, they should never be too short. When choosing the pipe connectors, you must of course consider the diameter of the selected pipes. Small garden areas or individual beds are preferably supplied with watering hoses.
sprinkler selection
When it comes to choosing a sprinkler, you have three different options to choose from. These must be selected depending on the relevant project:
1. Pop-up sprinkler: Pop-up sprinklers are good for large areas, especially lawns. Since they are retracted after use, the lawn can be mowed without any problems, for example. They cover a fairly large area and, depending on the version, are not as cheap to buy as the other two sprinkler types.
2. Square sprinkler: Square sprinklers are particularly recommended for smaller areas, individual beds or accumulations of buckets. They are available in different lengths that cater for the width of the corresponding area. Depending on the model, they either sit on the floor or are embedded in it. They are much easier to replace or move to a different location than pop-up sprinklers.
3. Large area sprinkler: When you need to water an area with a complicated shape, using a multi-area sprinkler is recommended. These can be adjusted using contour vertices that determine the shape of the water jet. For example, the sprinkler can aim directly into a rain shadow corner and water it. Depending on the model selected, larger or smaller areas can be irrigated with this device.
If there are roots or stones in the pipework, you can remove them. Only remove them if there is a risk of damage. Of course, if you want to use special items such as an automatic control unit, you must also obtain them in advance. Here you can choose which elements you can use to improve your garden irrigation.
tip: If you do not have a vice available, you can use a so-called miter position. The tube is inserted into this and then shortened to the desired length using the existing guide cuts, which minimizes the risk of injury and increases accuracy.
preparation
Before building the garden irrigation system, it is important to dig the trenches for the pipes or hoses. Nothing else is needed for the actual preparation. You must be as precise as possible with this so that you do not have to make any improvements when laying the lines. Depending on the size of the area, this can prove to be very time-consuming. If you want to make it easier on yourself, don't work on rainy days. The earth becomes heavy as a result and can only be transported and removed with great effort. The following steps address the individual points of preparation:
1. First, the individual cable routes are marked out with a cord. This is for orientation so that you don't work crookedly in one direction.
2. Then remove the turf along the line paths, if there is one there. If you are dealing with beds or plots without a lawn, this step does not have to be. Dig the spade about four inches into the ground. It should be a square with a side length of 30 centimeters. The turf is then removed intact with a shovel and stored in a protected place.
3. Dig another 15 centimeters for the cable routes so that the trenches have a depth of 25 centimeters at the end. The final width is not important. The excavated earth will be used again at the end to fill in the trenches.
After the preparation, you can see exactly how long the individual pipes have to be. You can put the pipes that have not yet been adjusted back into the trenches and see how many connectors you need or whether you need to shorten the pipes significantly. If you don't have enough pipes, you'll need to get more from this point on.
Building an irrigation system for the garden: instructions
Once the planning is in place and the pipelines have been excavated, you can build the irrigation system. The garden should be easily accessible so that you have enough space to work. The entrances to the individual trenches should also be available. Never turn on the faucet while building the irrigation system. Depending on the existing water pressure, you could flood your garden or the sensitive vegetable patch within a short time. The garden irrigation is built according to the following instructions:
Insert pipes
1. If you have not yet measured the individual pipes for the respective cable routes, you should do so now. Mark directly on the pipes where a cut needs to be made. Then fix the tube in the vise at an angle that will make it easier for you to saw accurately. The cutting surface should be as straight as possible, as this makes it easier to fix the connections.
2. After cutting, place the pipes in the trenches. If the ground in your garden is not firm enough, either tread it down a little or anchor the pipes in the ground. That way they don't move. If you use hoses, in most cases you can just lay them directly into the pits without cutting them first. Anchoring is also not so important with hoses,
3. Use the connectors and fasten the individual tubes together. The individual connectors must be tight and not loose. This is the only way they can withstand the water pressure and effectively transport the water to the intended sprinklers.
connect water
4. Connect the faucet to the irrigation system. Use an adapter for this if the lines are not compatible with each other. During this step, be careful not to bend the tubing or hose so much that it could damage it.
5. You can then place the sprinklers in the ground and connect them to the pipes. To do this, use the appropriate connectors that are usually included with the sprinklers. Use a spirit level to ensure the sprinklers sit straight in the ground. This is an excellent way to determine the orientation.
6. If all elements are installed, you should start a careful test run. It examines all connections and fixes any problems encountered during installation. If water has leaked, take care of the respective spot. Likewise, the pipes and hoses must not shift before you return the excavated soil to the irrigation system.
completion
7. Finally, add the excavated soil to the irrigation system. Don't be too rough when doing this, because sometimes pipes are damaged if the excavation comes up with too much force. After the excavation, the turf is applied again. This must not be entered for a period of at least two weeks in order to be able to grow.
8. Finally, moisten the soil around the irrigation system. This ensures that the turf recovers more quickly and the soil gets more structure. Now you are done with your own irrigation system in the garden.
If you plan carefully, you can assemble the entire irrigation system before digging the plumbing. Then you can mark out the line routes with a band, dig them out and place the entire irrigation in one piece in the trenches. This is recommended for smaller specimens that do not have as many individual tubes. The more parts the irrigation has, the more unstable it is outside of the conduit paths.
notice: Once the garden has been watered, you must not forget to prepare it for the winter. Simply drain the system completely so that no water can freeze inside the lines and damage the system.