Replace outdoor faucet with ball valve for max. flow?

sunlight33

I need to get as much flow from my outdoor faucet as possible in order to save time in watering my lawn. I think I should be able to get more flow if I replace the current spigot with a full port ball valve, but to use the valve I would need to add a hose thread adapter and more importantly, something to prevent backflow. Any thoughts?

Edit: freezing is not an issue, I can drain the pipe from inside the house.

Alan (California Radiant) Forbes

A commercial grade hose bibb with a vacuum breaker is probably overkill, but it will satisfy your flow requirements; Chicago faucet below. I never liked those backflow preventers that you screw onto the hose threads.

sunlight33

Basically anything that has anti-siphon feature with flow close to a ball valve.

mattmia2

Woodford might make some with larger seats if you dig through their catalog.

Or you could install 2 next to each other and run 2 hoses since the loss in the hose is probably more of a loss than in the sillcock.

sunlight33

Does screw-on vacuum breaker limit flow? Woodford makes one called "high flow double check backflow preventer" but from the picture it seems the flow is still restricted:
https://www.woodfordmfg.com/woodford/Vacuum_Breaker_Pages/Model-50.html

sunlight33

Would this one work? https://www.sprinklerwarehouse.com/brass-atmospheric-vacuum-breaker-3-4-in-fpt-avb-075
I need something for the 3/4'' pipe.

mattmia2

the designs that have the vacuum breaker as part of the body will restrict flow less than the screw on vacuum breakers. The ones on the body let in air if there is a vacuum and aren't in the path of water flow.

sunlight33

I also found another one: https://www.sprinklerwarehouse.com/febco-avb-atmospheric-vacuum-breaker-3-4-in-fpt-fe715d-007

it's seven times more expensive than the previous one I found but the design looks the same, in the manual it says install minimum 6" above the highest point of water and it also has a pressure drop graph. The cheaper one doesn't show any of that, but one should assume it behaves the same, right?

Zman

I like these. https://www.supplyhouse.com/Webstone-40313W-3-4-Female-x-Hose-Full-Port-Ball-Valve-Lead-Free

You could either install an RPZ backflow preventer upstream or one of those thread on vacuum breakers.

mattmia2

if the body is 3/4" all the way through and it has a vacuum breaker added on it will be the same as a tight pipe ell. there are also vacuum breakers that can connect to a tee although i'm not sure if they are code for backflow prevention or only to prevent a vacuum from damaging plumbing components like hot water tanks.

Alan (California Radiant) Forbes

One of these can save you a lot of time for much less cost and effort.

TAG

What are you trying to feed .... pressure and gallons per min?

What's the feed coming into the house?

As the flow increase the pressure drops ...... I have a direct line from my service 5/8 out to a 3/4 line -- to a 1" line to my pool. It takes all the pressure out of the house. The gpm to the pool coudl never be matched if I needed to get the water to flow into a watering system.

Why not just install a typical backflow for a sprinkler system -- do it correctly.

sunlight33

If I install that vacuum breaker in the cold water supply line, it will work for both the outdoor faucet and my hot water tank, right?

hot_rod

Jomar, probably others have these full port ball valve with harden hose connection, add a BFD. I used these for water heaters and boiler drains. I think they have sweat versions also.

ethicalpaul

You definitely didn't ask for this feedback so my apologies up front, but soil can only absorb so much water over whatever time so you risk runoff and water not actually going where you want it. A sprinkler as above doesn't charge by the hour

sunlight33

I have another question regarding pipe size and flow. City water supply to my house is 3/4'', would there be any difference in flow rate if I run 25 feet of pipe of 3/4'' vs same length of 1'' to the outdoor faucet with a reducer coupling？

ethicalpaul

Surely there would be some kind of sprayer on the hose that would limit the flow rate to less than 3/4" pipe and full-port valve could supply, no? I mean, you aren't going to water with a 3/4" stream directly onto the yard, right?

hot_rod

The gpm you actually flow will have to do with the pressure available and the piping pressure drop.
Do you have a pressure reducing valve installed,? A backflow device? Check pressure down stream with nothing flowing, then open that 3/4 line to see what pressure "dynamic" you have. Is there a certain gpm you are trying to obtain?

sunlight33

For 25 feet of copper, pressure drop difference between 3/4'' and 1'' at 10 gpm is roughly 2.5 psi. I have city water supply coming at 50 psi.

sunlight33

ethicalpaul said:

Surely there would be some kind of sprayer on the hose that would limit the flow rate to less than 3/4" pipe and full-port valve could supply, no? I mean, you aren't going to water with a 3/4" stream directly onto the yard, right?

You are right, hose and sprinkler will be the limiting factor more so than the piping inside the house, but I want to squeeze as much flow as possible from the existing supply. With the existing 1/2'' pipe going to my outdoor faucet I got 3 to 3.5 gpm, so for a fun project I am going to redo this piping with 1'' pex and also bypass my water filter to eliminate those pressure drop points.

Alan (California Radiant) Forbes

A 1" water line on a 5/8" or 3/4" meter will have better flow than a 3/4" line. There is less friction loss on larger pipe.

sunlight33

Is type M ok for domestic or should I go with type L?

sunlight33

Ok, lastly I am deciding whether to go with press fittings or sharkbite. (no soldering for me)
I found a place to rent a propress machine for a decent price. Sharkbite fittings are even easier to work with but I am concerned if they have more head loss compared to press fittings.

Jamie Hall

ethicalpaul said:

Surely there would be some kind of sprayer on the hose that would limit the flow rate to less than 3/4" pipe and full-port valve could supply, no? I mean, you aren't going to water with a 3/4" stream directly onto the yard, right?

This is really a very important point. Any watering over 1 inch in a day will be wasted. A half inch in an hour is the most that most lawns, at least, can take -- although you can put more on a garden sometimes.

Irrigation -- or lawn watering -- is very much a situation where more is not always better.

hot_rod

My neighbors home froze about a month ago, pushed the grip fitting off the pex and flooded the basement. Plumber said it's the first time he has seen a gripper fitting push apart.

I suspect a crimp or expansion fitting may have held and let the pex expand for the freeze.

Given a choice, I would go with press fittings over grip. The press ells are a bit like a long sweep ell, friendlier to flow compared to the sharp turn grip style.

sunlight33

I thought press fittings are similar in price to sharkbite, then I saw how much it is for a simple viega ball valve, holy smoke!

ethicalpaul

hot_rod said:

My neighbors home froze about a month ago, pushed the grip fitting off the pex and flooded the basement. Plumber said it's the first time he has seen a gripper fitting push apart.

I suspect a crimp or expansion fitting may have held and let the pex expand for the freeze.

Given a choice, I would go with press fittings over grip. The press ells are a bit like a long sweep ell, friendlier to flow compared to the sharp turn grip style.

I wonder if it was installed correctly (all the way on)

sunlight33

Would this be good for the backflow preventer: https://www.supplyhouse.com/Viega-79045-1-Propress-Check-Valve-Lead-Free

Jamie Hall

No. It's a check valve, not a backflow preventer. Two very different critters.

ethicalpaul

I'm still curious and have to ask about this concern about the time saving aspect. Are you going to be holding onto this hose and standing there spraying it, or is it a sprinkler system? I am having trouble understanding why time matters to this extent unless you are standing there holding the hose. Is this some kind of lawn-watering race that I'm not familiar with? (I joke, but only a little!)

sunlight33

No problem, It's a sprinkler system but I have to manually move the sprinkler to six different locations on my lawn (front and back yards). Ideally lawn needs about 1 inch of water per week, 1 inch of water per 1000 sq ft is roughly 623 gallons. My lawn is about 8k sq ft, so that's 5000 gallons. At 3.3 gpm output from the faucet it will take about 25 hours to finish watering. That's why I only aim for 0.25 to 0.3 inch of water each time and hope the rest will be covered by the rain.

hot_rod

3 gpm from a 1/2 hose bib seems awlful full low? Did you check that without a hose attached? Is it a long piping run from the main water line to the faucet? Any other shutoff valves in that piping?
Increasing the valve will not make a huge difference unless that valve has some big flow restriction.

Do you have a pressure reducing valve on the main water, that could be set to 70- 80PSI max per code. If you want a lot more, like double the gpm, connect the hose bib before the pressure reducing valve, or add a small Grundfos booster pump.

sunlight33

hot_rod said:

3 gpm from a 1/2 hose bib seems awlful full low? Did you check that without a hose attached? Is it a long piping run from the main water line to the faucet? Any other shutoff valves in that piping?
Increasing the valve will not make a huge difference unless that valve has some big flow restriction.

Do you have a pressure reducing valve on the main water, that could be set to 70- 80PSI max per code. If you want a lot more, like double the gpm, connect the hose bib before the pressure reducing valve, or add a small Grundfos booster pump.

My house is at the top of the hill so city supply coming in is only 50 psi, pressure reducing valve won't help in this case. As for piping run it's not long at all. I recently replaced the main water shutoff valve as the old one didn't open fully, I didn't get a chance to test the flow from the hose bib yet but when I was cleaning my hot water tank it was filling at 6 gpm according to the water meter, so it's a promising result.

ethicalpaul

sunlight33 said:

No problem, It's a sprinkler system but I have to manually move the sprinkler to six different locations on my lawn (front and back yards). Ideally lawn needs about 1 inch of water per week, 1 inch of water per 1000 sq ft is roughly 623 gallons. My lawn is about 8k sq ft, so that's 5000 gallons. At 3.3 gpm output from the faucet it will take about 25 hours to finish watering. That's why I only aim for 0.25 to 0.3 inch of water each time and hope the rest will be covered by the rain.

Thanks I know it was none of my business

And there must be some reason you can't have a buried line sprinkler system installed?

sunlight33

Too much work to do it myself and no budget to hire a company to do it, ha! For this kind of system to be worth the money you normally go with well water that can do 10-20 gpm. I am stuck with city water and being at the top of the hill makes the pressure worse. Last time I called people at the village hall about my water situation I was told that they had to do something about their water at 80 psi whereas I got the perfect pressure at 50 psi.

Jamie Hall

sunlight33 said:

Too much work to do it myself and no budget to hire a company to do it, ha! For this kind of system to be worth the money you normally go with well water that can do 10-20 gpm. I am stuck with city water and being at the top of the hill makes the pressure worse. Last time I called people at the village hall about my water situation I was told that they had to do something about their water at 80 psi whereas I got the perfect pressure at 50 psi.

10 to 20 gpm is way beyond the capacity of most residential wells. They can reach that for perhaps half an hour, but sustained yield? 'Fraid not. As a surprising number of formerly city water folks have discovered -- to their cost -- when they moved to paradise in the country.

Some agricultural wells, if one works at it, can reach that for a sustained 24 hour pump test. I've drilled a few in my time. Thing is most residential wells are never given a sustained yield pump test. It takes time and costs money. And isn't needed -- with properly sized equipment, even a pretty fancy mega mansion can get by on a gallon per minute quite nicely.

Until you start to irrigate. As the calculations note, full irrigation for a quarter acre lot is around 700 gallons a day -- or the amount of water used by 9 average people.

Since you are on city water, @sunlight33 , I would suggest -- if your city has enough water for irrigation use (it may not -- many don't) and allows you to use it for irrigation and the cost per gallon isn't too high -- it would suggest that you supply your irrigation system with a storage tank capable of holding that much water -- say a day and a half worth, 1000 gallons -- doesn't have to be pressurized -- and a dedicated pump. Fill the tank using a float valve and a line at perhaps a gallon per minute flow, and size the irrigation pump (try Northern Tool for tanks and valves and pumps) to suit your sprinkler equipment.

ethicalpaul

For this kind of system to be worth the money you normally go with well water that can do 10-20 gpm

How would the water pressure or flow rate (within reason) affect whether an in-ground system was worth the money? My cursory research says that sprinkler heads work best at 30psi. I think you do have optimal pressure at 50 I'm on city water and I'm at about 40

I would think a better gauge of if it's worth the money would be the question of how much your time is worth moving around the sprinkler That's your decision of course!

sunlight33

Just to check, a booster pump can increase pressure but flow rate is pretty much set in stone by the supply coming in, so water from sprinkler will shoot out farther but the amount of water will remain the same with a pump, is this right?

hot_rod

https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.supplyhouse.com/product_files/Grundfos-98562817-Product-Overview.pdf

These are very common in areas where you have low water supply, top of pressure zones such as you are.

Your plan to increase the valve and piping is your least expensive route, give it a try first, see if it gets you what you want.

A flow test would indicate what your lateral line is capable of. Measure static pressure, nothing running. Then open all high flow taps and note pressure.
Ideally you would calculate what you actually want for gpm, and required pressure for the sprinkler heads. Everything would size to that load.

The home on your block with the largest pump will win the gpm wars

sunlight33

I have another idea, would adding a buffer tank (like a WellMate) improve the flow rate?

hot_rod

sunlight33 said:

I have another idea, would adding a buffer tank (like a WellMate) improve the flow rate?

No, unless you pumped and stored at an elevated pressure.

As suggested above the flow at the actual tap is determined by the pipe size and valve restriction, and the force (pressure) driving it.
So back to your original idea of increasing the hole (whole) size

Meter size could get you some increase. Many residential meters are actually 5/8. Where I worked a 3/4 or larger could be installed, but it was an upcharge from the city utility.

We just bought a home in Utah, the state allow 2500 gallons or rainwater collection and storage. We also get 1 hour a week of irrigation water from a canel behind us, I'll divert that into the tank also.

Buy as much pump and and pipe to deliver what you want from the tank, become your own irrigation provider.