Water Distribution, may sound complex, but its really just a term for the components that are used to bring water from your Water Source connection to the areas that need water in your farm or garden.
Drip Irrigation Tubing, Poly Tubing, Poly Pipe, Supply Line, Trunk Line (Common term for Polyethylene pipe), Is a flexible black irrigation tubing hose which is used for both main and lateral drip irrigation water lines. Drip tubing is designed as a thin walled product to allow for easy connection to either Compression Fittings or Direct Lock Tubing Fittings. Because of its thinness, drip tubing can be punctured with a hole punch and connected to smaller micro drip tubing lines to act as lateral feeders to plants, flowers and trees.
Designing and Planning Your Drip Irrigation
Before rolling out your drip tubing, its best to lay it out in the sun for at least 30 minutes or more. This helps to soften the tubing and makes unrolling it much easier. When laying drip tubing, its best to roll it out in the same way you would roll a tire. This helps prevents rock particles in the tubing. Begin unrolling the drip tubing by weighting down the end of the tubing with a heavy object or tubing hold down stake to keep it in place. Roll out the tubing in the desired areas according to your design. Install tubing hold down stakes every 5 to 10 feet to hold the tubing in place.
The above illustration shows an example of how the solid drip irrigation tubing supply line can be run from the water source out to the area to be watered.
By design, drip irrigation tubing is flexible in its application. Adding to or changing your drip tubing layout is easy. Removable Direct-Loc drip fittings make it easy to reconfigure your drip system if your needs or landscape designs change. Use compression or Direct Loc drip tubing fittings to make the necessary connections in drip irrigation tubing. Couplings allow for two ends of tubing to be joined together. Elbows are used when drip tubing needs to make a sharp turn. Tees allow for new branches to be run from exiting drip tubing lines. End Caps are used to terminate the ends of drip tubing lines.
In general, We recommend using mulch, bark or wood chips to hide the drip tubing if desired. Doing so can actually extend the life of the drip tubing by shielding it from direct sunlight. If you need to bury your drip tubing, its best to sleeve the tubing in solid PVC pipe.
Happy Farming.
