(Head Sucker Mucker Pictured)
Have you mucked your suction hose lately? (I love things that sound maybe naughty, but aren’t.) If you are drawing water from a lake or river for your irrigation system, as many do in the Myrtle Beach area, the intake should be cleaned at least annually.
Usually these suction hoses are a PVC or other plastic pipe with perforations or a solid pipe with a foot valve. Junk grows on these and will cause them to clog, either by simply growing over the whole unit or by growing inside and causing the valve mechanism to not operate freely. This causes wear on your pump and can quickly cause it to fail. There are a couple of ways to clean the suction hose. One, wait for warm weather and water temps and get in there and scrub it with a brush. In early spring it is not uncommon to see us in chest waders. Two, if this is not feasible, cut the PVC pipe and bring it on land for cleaning, then repair the pipe with a coupling.
One mistake we often see homeowners make is to lay the pipe or foot directly on the bottom of the lake or river. This causes a couple of issues. One, it causes bottom material to be sucked in, which slowly damages all components of your sprinkler system. And two, it allows algae growing on the bottom to easily move onto the suction unit. We have a variety of solutions for this depending on the situations. We have built PVC legs or tripod stands, used a mound of large stones, a floats, or simple a cinder block to raise the suction hose. Whatever your choice, do it.
We are available to muck your hose. Give us a call. 843-779-2832