Personal Consumer Issues • blowing out sprinklers

Hi all,
A question about trying to improve my setup for blowing out my sprinklers.
Some background info:

• I have an ancient 11 gallon air compressor that auto shuts off at 80psi, and no regulator

• we have a small lot - 0.1 acres - with three sprinkler zones that were installed in the summer of 2023

• last year I used the air-compressor to blow out the system, but the compressor was continuously switching on/off as the tank pressure dropped below 80 then reached 80, dropped below 80, etc.

• despite the compressor being taxed, my system was mostly successful - there was one frost-break that I discovered in the spring that our landscape company fixed for $200.

My two goals are to 1) obviously do a more thorough job this year and get the water out of the portion that froze and 2) improve my system so as to not tax my air compressor so much. My brief research is telling my that I'm not limited by pressure, rather I'm limited by volume of air available. So I'm thinking of getting an auxiliary 11 gallon tank from Harbor Freight for $60.

Some questions:

• any other advice that you think would help?

• is 80 psi generally too much for a sprinkler system? should I get an in-line regulator downstream of the external tank?

• is adding an external tank a reasonable way to 'buffer' the system so that the compressor itself isn't turning on/off so frequently? could that provide that cfm needed?

Thanks in advance - I appreciate your collective advice.

Statistics: Posted by adr314159 — Sun Sep 15, 2024 2:37 pm — Replies 4 — Views 304

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