The winter sprinkler switch-off is the best time of year to give your reticulation a proper once-over. With the system off and the pressure's off too, you can find and fix the little faults that turn into big dry patches — and big water bills — come summer.
Here are the five problems we see most often on Perth retic systems, and how to pick them.
1. Blocked or broken sprinkler nozzles
Our sandy soils and bore water are tough on sprinklers. Nozzles clog with sand and minerals, pop-ups get whipper-snippered, and risers snap off when someone reverses over the verge. The result is uneven coverage and those tell-tale brown patches.
How to check: run each station manually and watch every sprinkler. Look for ones that don't pop up, spray in the wrong direction, or mist instead of throwing a proper stream.
2. Leaking or stuck solenoids
The solenoid valves are the workhorses that turn each station on and off. When they stick open, a station keeps running (hello, soggy lawn and a nasty bill). When they fail shut, that zone gets nothing.
How to check: after a watering cycle finishes, look for an area that stays wet or a valve box that's holding water. A station that won't shut off is almost always a solenoid.
3. A controller that's lost the plot
Controllers cop a hard life in the shed or on a sunny wall. Flat backup batteries wipe the programming, and an old timer might not even let you set the two rostered days Perth requires.
How to check: confirm your start times are before 9am or after 6pm, your watering days match your roster, and run times suit each zone. While you're there, fit a rain sensor so it skips a cycle after rain.
4. Poor coverage and pressure problems
If sprinklers aren't overlapping properly — "head to head" — you'll always get dry gaps. Low pressure (often from too many sprinklers on one station, or a partly closed valve) leaves heads weakly misting and watering the footpath instead of the lawn.
How to check: look for dry rings between sprinklers and heads that aren't throwing as far as they should. It often means re-zoning or upgrading nozzles.
5. Thirsty garden beds on spray
Spray sprinklers in garden beds throw water onto leaves and paths where it evaporates fast. Converting beds to inline drip delivers water straight to the roots, uses far less, and keeps foliage dry and healthy.
Get ahead of summer
A pre-summer reticulation service catches all five of these in one visit — and a well-tuned system is the single biggest thing you can do to keep a green garden on Perth's water roster.
If you'd rather not crawl around valve boxes yourself, our retic technicians service, repair and upgrade systems right across Perth. Book a retic service before the heat arrives and head into summer sorted.