Automatic watering of flowers

[h90]

We'll be only once a month at our weekend house (I hope we are there more often, but worst case) and I worry that all garden flowers will die during the dry saison.

I remember I once say some kind of timer with hose or tubes for automatic watering, from Gardena (spelling?). Anyone know if it is good, available in Bangkong and most important reliable. If it turns on the water and doesn't shut it off for 1 month, because for example the electric failed than this would be a big problem.

[Crossy]

HomePro and the other major DIY outlets have battery powered timers, fit and forget until the batteries fail.

[h90]

HomePro and the other major DIY outlets have battery powered timers, fit and forget until the batteries fail.

great! I thought about laying a hose to the plants and drill small holes inside. While it seems like a nice idea I worry that a few plants get all the water while other don't get any. Is there a professional solution?

[KittenKong]

You need something like this.

http://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/NEW-ARRIVAL-Drip-irrigation-system-Plant-watering-system-Micro-irrigation-self-irrigation-for-flower-pot-and/302405_526983312.html

There are many brands but they all seem to work more or less the same way. I used to use them back in Europe for my raised planters.

[RKASA]

You need something like this.

http://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/NEW-ARRIVAL-Drip-irrigation-system-Plant-watering-system-Micro-irrigation-self-irrigation-for-flower-pot-and/302405_526983312.html

There are many brands but they all seem to work more or less the same way. I used to use them back in Europe for my raised planters.

Yes Thaiwatsado has all that stuff. You need the little fixtures and tool to punch the holes - each can be adjusted for flow rate. I did a gravity feed with a head tank that is float control to keep it full just like a tolet tank. No timer or power required or needed as the rate can be set down to a drip and let run.

[h90]

Great! Thanks everyone

[frank0424]

Make sure the garden is well mulched to help retain moisture in the soil.

Set the water to come on at night rather than day time

[recom273]

I used to have a Gardena system back in the uk. Any of these systems are good ( battery / clockwork ) are good if you are onsite and able to monitor them - they seemed more for lazy people.

I think if your really serious about keeping your plants alive look more to a more industrial system. You could easily rig up a raspberry pi computer to a valve and a perforated pipe system.

There are instructions on the net.

[Mudcrab]

Your options may depend on water quality. If its town water you should be ok, anything else who knows?

High calcium water can tend to block the nozzles of any sprinklers or drippers you use. Filters will catch small debris but calcium and other chemicals will eventually cause a blockage.

However since you hope to be there once a month, or more, this can be easily checked and rectified at that time.

I have battery powered timers simply because I can screw them on to a tap and walk away, instead of having to dig a trench as is common with solenoid operated systems.

I've also come home to a complete flood where the batteries have died and not closed of the valve. My fault completely being a lazy b@@@333rd and not changing the batteries.

If I was to do it again ( and I will!!) I would definitely go with a solenoid operated system with power-failure-off solenoids (i.e spring operated closure).

[davidmann]

try a old thai lady ,next door ,cheaper ,and she never fails ,ours is up at dawn ,watering all the plants ,loves the job ,i give her 1000bt now and then ,truly good value for the money

[car720]

HomePro and the other major DIY outlets have battery powered timers, fit and forget until the batteries fail.

These things are never good as the ants love to get in and eat the wiring and build nests of mud in them......this leads to all sorts of problems.

Best way is some 19mm poly pipe or pvc with 4mm feeders coming off being fed from a small tank with a pump and a timer.

Once a day for 10 minutes. Keep the timer high and indoors and the tank closed and possibly fed by rainwater as a topup.

[car720]

Make sure the garden is well mulched to help retain moisture in the soil.

Set the water to come on at night rather than day time

Yes, plenty of coconut coir here as well and cheap as chips.

Holds water for days.

[arjunadawn]

I would like to share my observations regarding these kits (that may or may not be hooked up to a timer). The watering kits that traffic the garden, running here and there, and have small tits that various send water to the plants--- are less effective than the package suggests!

Let me explain: I have bought the ones available here in thailand, i have ordered various types from DHgate, the same as offfered at ALiExpress. I had gotten really into it but was concerned about the various tits in relation to the length. I did not find one stretch of the various kit hose enough for my purposes so i put a few together. I actually wound up putting in more tits/nozzles then i thought wise. I wanted brass nozzles but could find them no where. In the end I had a kit that looked great, could be hooked up to a timer, met at the house by the faucet with a lever that allowed me to direct water either to my collapsable hose, or the new micro tubing watering system. Guess what? It sucked!

I had seen other kits at stores in my travels that worked brilliants, with lovely fine mists sparying from the nozzles over a considerable distance. This is what motivating me to use such a system. When I finished my project I realize I had not used such a system, i must have used just a cheap home owner product that looks like the professional type. We have great pressue- I can shoot a stream of water two houses away from the yard, with the shower on. When I turned it on I had various tits drizzling and nothing at all at the end port. I had no leaks. I went and adjusted every single nozzle to its lowest opening and barely made a difference in the water traveling about 10 meters. I then went and turned every other one off completely and found i nearly doubled my distance to about 5 meters; however, no single nozzle sprayed effectivley, and most just dripped.

I was so unhappy but thankful I spent a bit extra and bought a different set of nozzles, as depicted in an ALi express link above. I also tried different tubing that i bought separately from DHGate and constructed my own with the "T" interesection tits you can buy at homepro. No matter what combination i tried i found that i was unable to have an effective project. Now, one year old, it proivdes nothing more than a superhighway for the red ants. I could not find brazz fittings that worked. I could not reason the manner to step down the hose lumen size to raise pressure and i could not find anything resembling a home pump designed to icnrease pressure.

For me the project was a failure but it looks great- anyone just walking by would think I really knew my stuff- but i dont. I would consider what/if any professional kits exist.

Edit: There is a difference in these jets/nozzles that may not be clear. Some are misters (I think the brass ones) and others are just micro faucets adjusted by rotating the core- basic faucet- and these are terrible.

Edited January 4, 2015 by arjunadawn

[utkb]

I use the Gardena here in Abu Dhabi, but in Hua Hin we pay for a gardener three times a week to water the lawn and plants at 1500 baht/month who also cuts the grass.

One thing that would concern me about the automatic systems is the battery life and if these might be stolen easily. Maybe a little paranoia on my part (and over payment of the lawn service)

[KittenKong]

We have great pressue- I can shoot a stream of water two houses away from the yard, with the shower on. When I turned it on I had various tits drizzling and nothing at all at the end port. I had no leaks. I went and adjusted every single nozzle to its lowest opening and barely made a difference in the water traveling about 10 meters. I then went and turned every other one off completely and found i nearly doubled my distance to about 5 meters; however, no single nozzle sprayed effectivley, and most just dripped.

Edit: There is a difference in these jets/nozzles that may not be clear. Some are misters (I think the brass ones) and others are just micro faucets adjusted by rotating the core- basic faucet- and these are terrible.

The micro-drip kits do work. It's just that they dont do what you want them to do.

MIcro-drip is specifically designed to drip water onto a precise point (normally at the base of your plant), not to spray it. I have used these systems in single runs of 40 metres or more with about 3 dozen nozzles and they all worked fine for years. And that was just a very cheap supermarket brand.

You do have to be careful setting them up. I used to run mine every day for 2 hours starting at 10pm, tied into my automatic underground lawn watering system.

[h90]

I would like to share my observations regarding these kits (that may or may not be hooked up to a timer). The watering kits that traffic the garden, running here and there, and have small tits that various send water to the plants--- are less effective than the package suggests!

Let me explain: I have bought the ones available here in thailand, i have ordered various types from DHgate, the same as offfered at ALiExpress. I had gotten really into it but was concerned about the various tits in relation to the length. I did not find one stretch of the various kit hose enough for my purposes so i put a few together. I actually wound up putting in more tits/nozzles then i thought wise. I wanted brass nozzles but could find them no where. In the end I had a kit that looked great, could be hooked up to a timer, met at the house by the faucet with a lever that allowed me to direct water either to my collapsable hose, or the new micro tubing watering system. Guess what? It sucked!

I had seen other kits at stores in my travels that worked brilliants, with lovely fine mists sparying from the nozzles over a considerable distance. This is what motivating me to use such a system. When I finished my project I realize I had not used such a system, i must have used just a cheap home owner product that looks like the professional type. We have great pressue- I can shoot a stream of water two houses away from the yard, with the shower on. When I turned it on I had various tits drizzling and nothing at all at the end port. I had no leaks. I went and adjusted every single nozzle to its lowest opening and barely made a difference in the water traveling about 10 meters. I then went and turned every other one off completely and found i nearly doubled my distance to about 5 meters; however, no single nozzle sprayed effectivley, and most just dripped.

I was so unhappy but thankful I spent a bit extra and bought a different set of nozzles, as depicted in an ALi express link above. I also tried different tubing that i bought separately from DHGate and constructed my own with the "T" interesection tits you can buy at homepro. No matter what combination i tried i found that i was unable to have an effective project. Now, one year old, it proivdes nothing more than a superhighway for the red ants. I could not find brazz fittings that worked. I could not reason the manner to step down the hose lumen size to raise pressure and i could not find anything resembling a home pump designed to icnrease pressure.

For me the project was a failure but it looks great- anyone just walking by would think I really knew my stuff- but i dont. I would consider what/if any professional kits exist.

Edit: There is a difference in these jets/nozzles that may not be clear. Some are misters (I think the brass ones) and others are just micro faucets adjusted by rotating the core- basic faucet- and these are terrible.

I thought of just some water dripping to the plants. 5 Meter doesn't sound good. I need something like 30 meter, but would have 4 places too take water from.

I can imagine that if the hose is too small in diameter there will be too much internal friction for the water.

[sandyf]

I have had a few goes at this. The first time I used the small black sprinklers from Home Pro but not a lot of good, they block up far too easy. I then used the half inch sprinklers and made up the hoses myself from clear 5/8 hose from Home Pro. I only had the 2 sprinklers so I ran it off a 1/2 HP pump from a tank using a standard 24 Hr timer. Worked very successfully. Only real problem was that the timer had a 30 min minimum and with about 4000 litres in the tank it would only last for about a fortnight unattended. Sister in law helped out on a long absence.

I have laid a lot more grass since then and this year have 8 sprinklers running off a 2 HP pump. I had to get the sprinklers with adjustment to get the most efficient cover.

If you are using sprinklers from a tank, they must be above the tank water level to use it on auto.

Some of the direct water timers will not work on pump pressure. I brought quite a good one from the UK only to find out it was for mains pressure.

[h90]

Your options may depend on water quality. If its town water you should be ok, anything else who knows?

High calcium water can tend to block the nozzles of any sprinklers or drippers you use. Filters will catch small debris but calcium and other chemicals will eventually cause a blockage.

However since you hope to be there once a month, or more, this can be easily checked and rectified at that time.

I have battery powered timers simply because I can screw them on to a tap and walk away, instead of having to dig a trench as is common with solenoid operated systems.

I've also come home to a complete flood where the batteries have died and not closed of the valve. My fault completely being a lazy b@@@333rd and not changing the batteries.

If I was to do it again ( and I will!!) I would definitely go with a solenoid operated system with power-failure-off solenoids (i.e spring operated closure).

Common sense would be to design such a device in a way that closes it when electric fails......Battery fails and turn on the water fully for 1 month, scares me....

[LNKDES1]

I set up about a dozen timed systems when I lived in Hawaii. It's pretty straight forward. Kept the timers up by the houses & ran wiring to the valves, usually attached to a manifold. For 3 yrs never had any problems other than changing an occasional drip head. When I moved here, I couldn't find any decent heads or tubing, so on my last trip back to the States, I purchased what I needed, 1/8" tubing, 1,2 & 3 gpm drip heads & some spray heads that would spray a half & qtr circle. The supplies offered here are pretty substandard for what I've used in the past. You can keep the timer (2,4,6 or 8+ zones) inside the house. Most have a battery backup. Here is an example of a Hunter timer that you can get with either 2,4 or 6 zones. I would suggest getting more zones than you need in case you want to expand your system. http://translate.google.co.th/translate?hl=en&sl=th&u=http://www.sprinklethai.com/%25E0%25B9%2580%25E0%25B8%2584%25E0%25B8%25A3%25E0%25B8%25B7%25E0%25B9%2588%25E0%25B8%25AD%25E0%25B8%2587%25E0%25B8%2595%25E0%25B8%25B1%25E0%25B9%2589%25E0%25B8%2587%25E0%25B9%2580%25E0%25B8%25A7%25E0%25B8%25A5%25E0%25B8%25B2Hunter.html&prev=searc

Good luck with it. Oh, and make sure if you order one from outside Thailand that it is 220V.

[arjunadawn]

I set up about a dozen timed systems when I lived in Hawaii. It's pretty straight forward. Kept the timers up by the houses & ran wiring to the valves, usually attached to a manifold. For 3 yrs never had any problems other than changing an occasional drip head. When I moved here, I couldn't find any decent heads or tubing, so on my last trip back to the States, I purchased what I needed, 1/8" tubing, 1,2 & 3 gpm drip heads & some spray heads that would spray a half & qtr circle. The supplies offered here are pretty substandard for what I've used in the past. You can keep the timer (2,4,6 or 8+ zones) inside the house. Most have a battery backup. Here is an example of a Hunter timer that you can get with either 2,4 or 6 zones. I would suggest getting more zones than you need in case you want to expand your system. http://translate.google.co.th/translate?hl=en&sl=th&u=http://www.sprinklethai.com/%25E0%25B9%2580%25E0%25B8%2584%25E0%25B8%25A3%25E0%25B8%25B7%25E0%25B9%2588%25E0%25B8%25AD%25E0%25B8%2587%25E0%25B8%2595%25E0%25B8%25B1%25E0%25B9%2589%25E0%25B8%2587%25E0%25B9%2580%25E0%25B8%25A7%25E0%25B8%25A5%25E0%25B8%25B2Hunter.html&prev=searc

Good luck with it. Oh, and make sure if you order one from outside Thailand that it is 220V.

...and this post indicates why I had a problem- I just did not know all this stuff. Thank you.

[callaway]

Global have decent electric timers Plug in pack to mains supplied with unit) and 24volt solenoid valves. One wire from your solenoid goes to the common point on controller and one to the station marked 1 thru 4. All you need to do is have your tap open, have solenoid from the tap, set your controller to desired watering and start time. When the controller starts it will open valve until the set duration is finished then will close the valve. I bought a battery operated system and got less than a week out of it before it failed. Now I purchased a decent controller from Australia (4 station) and a good Richdel solenoid valve. Now no problems at all. Only problem is if you do not have ok water pressure to operate the solenoid valve correctly. If you require more info just message me. Good luck and hope this helps

[h90]

I set up about a dozen timed systems when I lived in Hawaii. It's pretty straight forward. Kept the timers up by the houses & ran wiring to the valves, usually attached to a manifold. For 3 yrs never had any problems other than changing an occasional drip head. When I moved here, I couldn't find any decent heads or tubing, so on my last trip back to the States, I purchased what I needed, 1/8" tubing, 1,2 & 3 gpm drip heads & some spray heads that would spray a half & qtr circle. The supplies offered here are pretty substandard for what I've used in the past. You can keep the timer (2,4,6 or 8+ zones) inside the house. Most have a battery backup. Here is an example of a Hunter timer that you can get with either 2,4 or 6 zones. I would suggest getting more zones than you need in case you want to expand your system. http://translate.google.co.th/translate?hl=en&sl=th&u=http://www.sprinklethai.com/%25E0%25B9%2580%25E0%25B8%2584%25E0%25B8%25A3%25E0%25B8%25B7%25E0%25B9%2588%25E0%25B8%25AD%25E0%25B8%2587%25E0%25B8%2595%25E0%25B8%25B1%25E0%25B9%2589%25E0%25B8%2587%25E0%25B9%2580%25E0%25B8%25A7%25E0%25B8%25A5%25E0%25B8%25B2Hunter.html&prev=searc

Good luck with it. Oh, and make sure if you order one from outside Thailand that it is 220V.

That looks very professional, but a bit expensive. Do these includes the valves, if not what to purchase for the valves?

[kamalabob2]

My wife has a decent size fruit and vegetable garden on a plot of land behind her Father's home in a Buriram Village. Not the place I choose to live. But with the Schaefer Legend submersible well pump from Franklin Electric I stepped up and bought a "garden kit" from Netafim at Ruangsangthai Builders Merchants in Buriram. Frankly her family are not always focused on watering but this Netafim FDS 500M system made it easy for the kind hearted village relatives to keep the vegetables and fruits watered. The Netafim representative in Buriram understands and speaks English. He was willing to go to my wife's plot of land and prepare an irrigation plan. It is not the least expensive I had seen. It seems however superior in build and function to any drip water system I had previously bought at Home Depot, Costco or Lowe's. The Netafim irrigation representatives will be at the February 13 through February 17 free "Buriram Home & Garden Expo" held inside Ruangsangthai builders merchants. It might be an option for those expats to bring a general plan of your garden and obtain a sensible price from the Netafim man who will have Garden kits and other Netafim products at the Expo Booth. Khun Sutouch of Netafim Drip Irrigation has been very helpful to my wife on her organic fruit and vegetable garden venture in Buriram. I have a Super products small kit for her house in Buriram and it is not a challenge to clean out the drippers from time to time. I had not seen Netafim prior to buying the Super products home flower garden kit or I might have weighed the long term costs.

http://www.netafim.com/Data/Uploads/140402%20FDS%20500.pdf

Edited January 4, 2015 by kamalabob2

[Torrens54]

Check out "Garden Reticulation Systems."

A Couple of suppliers in Australia may ship to Thailand.

"Bunnings Hardware" or "Total Eden."

[Sandman77]

Need automaticly watering system for our whole farm around 15 rai, any ideas where I can get one in isaan and how much it coasts include installation?

[Crossy]

Need automaticly watering system for our whole farm around 15 rai, any ideas where I can get one in isaan and how much it coasts include installation?

What are you growing Sandy?

It may prove better value to pay a man with a hose.

[h90]

I saw some products are available on Ebay at very low prices. With this shipping that includes the import tax.

Saves a lot money.

[Bakeman]

Maid is also gardener. She waters and plants everything. She even made brick walk ways. Tough old Thai woman.

[samuijimmy]

I've read through most of this, in my opinion especially with drip or small tube, automatic watering, on should install a filtration system, to prevent clogging of the nozzles, ... even the larger sprinklers get plugged too!

As for battery operated, On/ off devices, the batteries should last a season... just make sure to get good quality batteries and perhaps renew before going away, if they have been used for a while.

Best time of watering, especially if overhead watering would be just after sunrise, this will help prevent fungus problems .... and rot.... especially on flowers...

This is what not to do.... having too much pressure, that most of the spray is flying in the air! I just saw this the other day...

Edited January 8, 2015 by samuijimmy

[h90]

I've read through most of this, in my opinion especially with drip or small tube, automatic watering, on should install a filtration system, to prevent clogging of the nozzles, ... even the larger sprinklers get plugged too!

As for battery operated, On/ off devices, the batteries should last a season... just make sure to get good quality batteries and perhaps renew before going away, if they have been used for a while.

Best time of watering, especially if overhead watering would be just after sunrise, this will help prevent fungus problems .... and rot.... especially on flowers...

This is what not to do.... having too much pressure, that most of the spray is flying in the air! I just saw this the other day...

that spray may make the area cooler?