Recent content by JimLS

Have see a few things on sand "trap" filters that work by slowing down the water enough that the sand sinks to the bottom of the pipe and into chambers. I have some sand in my supply and have a filter screen but it clogs frequently. Hoping to put together a sand trap to keep things running...

Were the sand traps effective? I have some sand in my irrigation water (pump from a small stream) and have a small screen filter but it has to be cleaned often. Have been looking at sand traps but without going to bigger pipe (haven't found much on it but what little I found used 3 or 4") the...

yes, deck mounted faucet on roman tub. No shutoffs except tub valves. Have a mop sink in the basement with no shutoffs also. House was plumbed by a plumber not me. Sounds like you always put in shutoffs. Hoping others might post... Still seems like putting in a valve to shut off half the...

I have access to the pipes in unfinished parts of the basement so access to the added valves is not an issue. The integrated stops is an interesting thing. In talking to the valve manufacturer they said something about stops so I may have those in my valve. I need to remove the cover plate to...

Have a house the we had built and had a plumber do the plumbing. We have plumbing (bathrooms/kitchen/laundry/etc) grouped at each end of the house. We have shutoffs for the sinks, toilets, etc but not for the showers/tubs - this seems pretty standard. If I have an issue with a shower valve...

Noticed the cold water in the bathroom was lukewarm and checked things out. The water heater is in the basement below. Hot water line out of the heater is hot with no fixtures turned on and it is normally cool a short distance from the tank. The cold water line is slightly warm. I checked...

Have an in ground sprinkler system fed by a pump. Have a fine screen filter but the water sometimes has a bit of fine sediment that makes it through. The system has been in over 10 years and has been fairly trouble free. I have a few zone valves that feed hose connections. Recently I set up...

That's interesting! Since the existing stops aren't leaking that could be added to restore the ability to shut off.

Not sure how you thought they were gate valves - they aren't. Some are 1/4 turn ball valves. Some are the common type with washer (not sure what they are called but they were standard before ball valves and cartridge faucet valves became common). Many of them are the individual fixture shut...

I agree it is unregulated so the voltage will vary a few volts. But 16VAC under load is way too low unless something is wrong. I measure about 27V unloaded and about 25 with one or two valves on. It was 16V because the valve was shorted and low resistance. Probably would have blown a fuse...

We have hard water and a softener but still have some stuck shutoff valves. I have heard that cycling them 2 or 3 times a year is recommended to avoid this and have done that on some but others in remote locations have been missed. What's the recommended frequency? I have read of adding a...

One zone went bad and I have some extras so I moved it to another zone that was then damaged. What seems to be happening is that the coil is good when cold but shorts out after it has been on a while. It was loading down the 24VAC supply and only 16VAC at the zone output. But when I got to...

It isn't hand built or ancient. It's a open source (code and schematic is published) raspberry pi add on circuit board. Don't have a picture handy but here is a link. Sounds like I need to add a current limit to the outputs - that's something I can design pretty easily and put together and...

I have a diy sprinkler controller (opensprinkler) that is networked and has some nice features. One of the reasons for it is I have a lot of zones and this is easily expandable. My question is about protection from shorted valves. This controller is weak in this area and I have several zone...

It's only eaten through for a couple inches at the end and then tapers out. Most of the pipe looks good. I think the water spread out over the pipe so the corrosion is spread out to where it isn't an issue (yet). What's the best way to patch this? I am thinking I will separate the shower...