Re: Entropy
Posted: Sat Mar 16, 2019 9:59 am
I have lots of progress to report about my rain drain/trench drama...
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Now months later, the rain ditches have not stopped flowing. I was disappointed that my new improved two-pipe drain was not draining very fast, and my yard immediately around the ditch was wetter than before.
When I buried pipe 13 or 14 years ago, after Katrina, I apparently guessed correctly and used slitted pipe. This time even though I buried two courses of pipe I used solid pipe... Bzzzt fail. The slitted pipe helps drain subsurface water, which my yard has in volume.
There is always time to do something over when you do it wrong, so I just finished digging up the puny solid pipe and laying down a single run of 6" diameter slitted pipe... My yard is noticeably drier already and the 1x6" pipe drains faster than 2x 4". I also bought a 100' long sock to pull over the pipe to keep dirt from coming in through the slits.
It turns out the larger 12" drain box I already had will accept 6" pipe, so thats all good. I just had to remove the 4" adapter plates.
I widened and deepened the silt pool by the drain inlet. The water looks still in that picture but water is still flowing.
I have also refined my silt trapping/collection. I repurposed some old 4" pipe to steer runoff from my mid side ditch into a silt bucket first. So the silty water flows into the bucket then reverses direction twice to finally reach the drain box.
Again it doesn't look like much going on, because it hasn't rained for several days but there is still a steady stream of water coming down from uphill of me. I will add another section of pipe and bucket to capture silt coming from far back ditch.
I expect my silt collection buckets and shorty pipes to fill up with silt/sand every few months but they will be relatively easy to clean out.
Speaking of cleaning out my pipes, this is called a "sewer jetter" nozzle... Connected to my pressure washer, one water jet sprays forward and the rest back, so it centers itself and helps pull itself into/through a pipe. I already used it to flush out my front yard french drain that is only 50' long and doesn't get much silt in it because it drains water from on top of my grass... Between the relatively stiff pressure washer hose and water jet assist I had no trouble reaching 50' into that buried front drain.
If I had found this jetter nozzle before I dug up my first clogged drain, I might have been able to just clean it, instead of replacing it... but that is life.. always giving you the answers for next time, not for this time.
JR
---
Now months later, the rain ditches have not stopped flowing. I was disappointed that my new improved two-pipe drain was not draining very fast, and my yard immediately around the ditch was wetter than before.
When I buried pipe 13 or 14 years ago, after Katrina, I apparently guessed correctly and used slitted pipe. This time even though I buried two courses of pipe I used solid pipe... Bzzzt fail. The slitted pipe helps drain subsurface water, which my yard has in volume.
There is always time to do something over when you do it wrong, so I just finished digging up the puny solid pipe and laying down a single run of 6" diameter slitted pipe... My yard is noticeably drier already and the 1x6" pipe drains faster than 2x 4". I also bought a 100' long sock to pull over the pipe to keep dirt from coming in through the slits.
It turns out the larger 12" drain box I already had will accept 6" pipe, so thats all good. I just had to remove the 4" adapter plates.
I widened and deepened the silt pool by the drain inlet. The water looks still in that picture but water is still flowing.
I have also refined my silt trapping/collection. I repurposed some old 4" pipe to steer runoff from my mid side ditch into a silt bucket first. So the silty water flows into the bucket then reverses direction twice to finally reach the drain box.
Again it doesn't look like much going on, because it hasn't rained for several days but there is still a steady stream of water coming down from uphill of me. I will add another section of pipe and bucket to capture silt coming from far back ditch.
I expect my silt collection buckets and shorty pipes to fill up with silt/sand every few months but they will be relatively easy to clean out.
Speaking of cleaning out my pipes, this is called a "sewer jetter" nozzle... Connected to my pressure washer, one water jet sprays forward and the rest back, so it centers itself and helps pull itself into/through a pipe. I already used it to flush out my front yard french drain that is only 50' long and doesn't get much silt in it because it drains water from on top of my grass... Between the relatively stiff pressure washer hose and water jet assist I had no trouble reaching 50' into that buried front drain.
If I had found this jetter nozzle before I dug up my first clogged drain, I might have been able to just clean it, instead of replacing it... but that is life.. always giving you the answers for next time, not for this time.
JR