1poorlady has set me with a new task. Supply drips to her pots. The ones below 3’ (most of them) are easy. But she has some hanging basket plants that are about 5’+ above ground. I’ve had drip heads pop, and an unfettered stream** goes about that high. Does anyone have a system that can assure enough pressure to actually put water on her elevated plants? The zone probably feeds 20 drips already. Maybe more. I think 6’ is going to be a challenge (her highest one is just above my eye level).
Any ideas?
**I regulate to 25 psi, to avoid popping all the nozzles.
I’ve got a Rachio drip system set up, separate valves for front, back yards, porch pot, roses, and the 3 hanging pots out front so I can adjust the times as needed over the year.. I ran a 1/4" line overhead under the overhang, to get to the porch pots, another for the hanging pots, dropping with T’s to each pot, used clear tubing for the drop and just tywrped them to the hanging chains, in the pot I have circles of porous 1/4" tubes, so it’s evenly distributed… And surplus just runs out the bottom onto some shrubs in pots below.. But additional valves and runs might be needed… This pic is from back in '23, but showing the valve manifold on the side of the house, behind the fence…
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So you don’t have a pressure regulator that I can see. Does that mean you have regulated emitters at the plants? And you pipe city water pressure up to the roof, and then route it to the patio?
That would work, though the hanging pots aren’t on a patio. They’re on a small tree about 15’ away from the patio. I have free zones on my second timer, but that would be a long run from a new valve (probably 100’…second timer is in the back corner of the back yard). First timer is full (12 zones).
Interesting you have yours above ground. Mine are all in valve boxes in the ground. It must not freeze ever where you are. It doesn’t freeze often here (not at all this year, and I think maybe 1 night last year). A few years ago I had one valve crack, I’m assuming from a freeze. Only time it ever happened in 20 years.
No, never had a need for a pressure regulator, city water system is pretty stable, I guess…
Yes, Im 30 mile inland from the coast, about 50 miles N of San Francisco, we do occasionally get freezing temps, but never has bothered the drippers… I have one, around back, in a box, but move ground, just covering stuff on the back lot line… Some of my connections are in underground boxes, but for access to the connections…
You’d likely have to trench, maybe bury a conduit out near the tree avoid the freeze…
Valvs are weird, odd fails, so I’ve replaced a few along the way… Att he moment I have some drip line leaks messing up my rose feed, the other day I found a 1/2" feeder in the back had split, chopped n spliced it, better!
Patch & keep on goin’!
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You have a 25 psi system that will push water well over 30 feet up in the air. For sure the dripers/emiters will be somewhat restrictive - I don’t know how much. I suspect there will be a bit of trial and error to get the desired flow rate. I would start with ¼ inch black tubing. You could put inline emiters, slit the tubing, etc. to create the desired water flow.
Long ago I made the rookie mistake of not putting a regulator on my drip lines. It was popping emitters frequently. The guys at the irrigation store said “oh, you have to put a regulator on it or that will happen”. So I did, and no more emitters launching themselves.
I’m sure it’s a function of how many emitters are present on a single zone, but the water only shoots about 5’ in the air (give or take) when a goof plug pops, or an emitter fails. Definitely not 30’. Though it will drill a hole/trench if I don’t notice that I have an open 1/4" spaghetti tube. Which is most common after the landscapers have been here trimming and weeding.
Yes, I get splits in the 1/2" poly lines. As I do, I have been replacing segments with PVC. Usually 10’ at a time, since that’s how big the PVC tubes are. I got tired of fixing a leak only to have another one occur on the same line a couple months later. So now I just dig up about 10’ around the leak and put in PVC.
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Water shooting in the air from a nozzle or leak is very different from getting water to a plant that far up.
Atmospheric pressure is considered to be 14.7 psi. It is atmospheric pressure is what pushes water from the “bottom” of a water well to those old-time hand pumps that as a kid in northern Michigan were on some city corners. This like this.
If there is no or darn little air leakage in pumps like this they routinely bring water up about 30 feet. When the water level in a well is often more than 30 feet down, the options are pushing the water up with a pump in the well or pulling it up a bucket full at a time.
If you want a proof positive of this you can get proof with a garden hose. Find a house with more than one story and look for a sink/toilet on the second floor. There will be water to the fixture(s). Now go out side and point the garden hose straight up - it likely won’t reach the level of the second story unless you use a nozzle. A nozzle does not increase the water pressure available to get water up say 20 feet. - it restricts the flow rate which indeed does raise the pressure a few inches from the end of the garden hose.
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I’ve been using low pressure drip irrigation for 40 years at 4 different houses. The problem you describe is not frequent, but also not solvable, in my experience. I’ve used master pressure reducers, individual pressure reducers, sticks that come with their own pressure reducers, etc.
I happen to like the one reducer you can screw onto the hose bib and be done with it, $10 at Walmart or $20 at an RV store. But inevitably at some point the tubing will get hot in the sun, or be stretched out from the winter, or whatever and it will “pop” off. Assuming I have a bit to spare I just cut off the stretched out part and jam it back on and go on my way. Occasionally I have to add a connector and a bit of tube, but so what?
I use these: https://www.ewingoutdoorsupply.com/12000030-3-4-in-025-15-gallon-at-25-psi-drip-pressure-regulator?categoryId=112
The zones that are drips, I attach these directly to the valves (with an adapter since the valves are 1", but these are 3/4"). Then PVC from there (I think I’ve replaced all the poly pipe coming out of the valve boxes at this point).
The standard 1/2" poly is kinda flimsy. The HD stuff, usually with a blue stripe, will last 5-10 years before splitting. The irrigation store has some heavy gauge tubing. It’s almost like a flexible PVC. By the time that fails, I’ll be in the ground. I use a bit when rigid PVC would be tricky.
Back to the topic, I think it is solvable, but impractical (in my specific situation). From the input so far, I would need to run an unregulated pipe (zone) to an elevated position, then put the pressure regulator on there (to prevent emitters acting like pop-bottle rockets), and then running drip tubing from there into the hanging baskets. In our case, that would involve ~100 ft trench with PVC, wiring up a new zone/valve, and taking the PVC above ground** into the tree. Unsightly, and impractical for our application.
1poorlady isn’t going to be happy. But sometimes a thing just isn’t really feasible. 
Thanks for the inputs.
**Which you can’t do in AZ. Exposed PVC in the Arizona sun will fail in a few years. Which is why plumbers never run PVC above ground here. All the pipes involved in running an irrigation system are copper above ground to about 6" below the ground, and then they switch to PVC.
Yep, that AZ sun is unforgiving, for sure… I’ve been able to underground at least out front when we did new pavers all over, but I did forget one spot, naturally it was for the lines to the porch pots and hanging pots… Hmm, also int the back yard when they poured all the sidewalks! Should have done a couple runs there, too, so I’ve had to go overhead or along the foundation to make it happen, as well as across the deck, had to go up under the eaves and back down, so a limited 1/4" supply there for the deck pots… We had more shade, but in the last couple years lost some big shady trees, so maybe why my 1/2" split… Otherwise I let it be on top so I can see the problems… At my senior age, however, getting down and back up to work on them is no fun at all… Time marches on…
Trenching is always a pain, maybe hire it out? Or go with fake plants! 
Probably too late for you, but we had the paver installers put in sleeves. Not enough, as it turns out. But we’ve made use of a few of them. Made use of one last winter, near the patio. Found the sleeve, ran PVC to a planter area (the poly pipe had ruptured). There are a few places I wish they had put sleeves. Some of the ones we have have proven very handy.
Were I to do it again, I would insist on sleeves underneath every paver walkway and driveway, in multiple spots.
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I have ‘sleves’ under the pavers, well a variety of on hand conduits, pies, used up a lot od leftovers, and most important, took pictures of all of them so I can find them later. It was too late for the pound concrete, there I had added a sewer line in the side yard for the R trail dump, as well as piping for the rain gutter downspouts, what I forgot was the drip system at the time, it wasn’t as fully developed. And I did miss the vital one under the porch pavers. Original porch supports were just on top of floating slabs, so I had the guys dig, pour a new stemware to support the porch, with all that forgot that access… But now the porch is solid, level, with new roof, gutters, leaf guards and all… I see the same home floorpans in the area, where you gan see the sag, so unfixed, so far… We’ve been here since '74, so about everything has been redone, at least once, some more…Much by myself, but more by contractors in the last few years…
Hindsight is great, insight, tougher… I have a list of all the contractors, keepers most, a couple will never be back here… Some were like herding cats, frustrating…
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We just put in a paver driveway and sidewalks. And yes, I put several jumps of conduit under the sidewalk, and another under the driveway to reach a far garden on the other side.
Before we did that I was forced to thread 4 1/4” tubes into the expansion crack of the driveway by putting a manifold on one side to separate them and another on the other side to recombine them into a 1/2’’ hose I could use to travel uphill to the garden.
Yes, it was a MacGyver solution (Gyro Gearloose for an earlier generation, Doc Brown for a more recent one) but it worked!
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