Saturday, September 24, 2011

PVC Sprinkler


I really wanted to get one of these, but at $200, I just couldn't justify the cost. So I started looking at other options to keep cool in the heat and humidity.

I found this one, but you really need a sidewalk to ride your trike under the sprinkler, and we don't have a sidewalk. I wanted something a bit simpler than this one, but it gave me a good starting point.

A quick trip to Lowe's, some PVC pipe, connectors, and a ratcheting pipe cutter (definitely worth the $23!) later we were loaded in the car and heading home. I followed the tutorial here, but changed some of the pieces since I wasn't putting a gate on it. 15 minutes after I started, the PVC pipe was cut and I was ready to drill some holes.
 The pipes and connectors.
The ratcheting PVC cutter.

I put it all together in the house, then took off the cross pieces and hauled it outside. I then put it back together and hooked up the hose.

The unfortunate thing is that we don't have great water pressure- we have a well and I guess the pump isn't a super charged one. As a result, the water wasn't coming out all the holes.

I adjusted it several times, moved pieces around, and even removed some pieces.  

The water pressure through the sprinkler improved, but still wasn't what I was looking for.

After removing a few more pieces, this is what it looks like:
The side the hose is connected to does have more pressure, but the water is at least coming out all the holes.

Little Miss Sunshine liked it and couldn't wait to have friends over to play with it.

I'm glad I didn't glue any of the joints in place- it was easy to adjust everything to get the best water flow, and it'll be easy to take apart and store in the winter.

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