Warning: That rusty sprinkler valve I ignored popped off at 6am yesterday flooding half my yard in Houston

Water was gushing for 20 minutes before I found the shutoff valve buried under some ivy, now I'm digging up the whole zone to replace the manifold instead of just that one part, has anyone dealt with a pvc pipe that keeps splitting after a freeze?

3 comments

3 Comments

sandra_moore3011d ago

Bet you that pvc was already weakened from some old damage before the freeze hit, and then the ice just finished it off. When you dig up that manifold, go ahead and replace all the joints in that zone with schedule 80 fittings, those handle the cold way better around here and you won't have to guess which one cracks next winter.

wesley63911d ago

That 20 minute gusher hit close to home, I once had a similar blowout at my place and spent a solid 45 minutes running around like a headless chicken before I found my shutoff behind a rogue azalea bush (gardening, am I right?). For the splitting after a freeze problem, yeah schedule 80 is the way to go, I learned that after the third time I replaced the same damn joint with standard pvc and it just split again like clockwork the next winter. On the bright side, at least the ivy kept your shutoff from growing legs and walking off, mine just hid it like a buried treasure I didn't want to find.

theacooper11d ago

Dig up the whole thing and swap in schedule 80 like Sandra said, it's the only fix that actually sticks.