Make Life Beautiful and Easy …

…With a Sprinkling System.

If you have a farm or a yard, you want your place to be lush green! However, keeping it that way can be a chore and expensive. When hand watering, it’s hard to know when it is time to quit or whether you have watered every part of your yard evenly. And, let’s face it, holding a sprinkler can bore a gardener to tears. Of course, you can buy the kind sprinklers you leave on the ground and move around. But getting them in just the right place each time you move it and getting the water pressure just right, so that you are watering every part of your yard, but not your sidewalk or fence, can be frustrating.

WHAT DOES A SPRINKLER SYSTEM COST?

There are two main categories of costs that factor into the price of owning a sprinkling system – The parts and installation, and the actual usage and maintenance.

1. Parts and Installation

Of course, there are many factors that go into the cost of setting up your system. Probably the most obvious one is the property factors – size, slope, soil, landscaping. Then there are equipment choices – number of zones, types quality of materials. Finally, there is the labor and possibly a permit.

When choosing parts, one needs to consider that the cost of the part is a one-time cost, while the water that some parts may save can mean long-term savings.

It is estimated that an underground system for a 2500 square foot lawn one can expect to pay between $2,500 and $5,500. The national average is $4,000.

Choosing subsurface irrigation, in which the water is on longer but slower, can save you from 30 to 70% in water use. With this type of system, will also cut your need for zones in half.

2. Usage and Maintenance.

A sprinkling system can save you money in water usage. This is because if installed correctly, with appropriate zones, and the controller is programmed wisely, the system will sprinkle evenly and only when and where water is needed, eliminating water waste.

You also save on maintenance when you choose good quality parts.

3. Budget Installation

The message is that saving money on parts is not always cost effective. If the investment is more than you feel comfortable with, it might make sense to start with a smaller part of your property and add on to it as you can afford to do so.

It’s also important to understand that there are some basic costs that don’t increases with the size of the lawn. So, if the property you want to water is double the size, the cost may only increase 50%.

WHAT HARDWARE IS INCLUDED IN A SPRINKLING SYSTEM?

Most obviously you will need pipes to channel your water. They are run from the main line to the area that you want watered. These pipes are dug underground so no one steps on or trips over them, and so they won’t distract attention away from your beautiful garden. There are two kinds of pipes used for irrigation, polyvinyl chloride pipes (PVC) and Polyethylene tubes (Poly). Both are plastic, the PVC is generally used in warm climates, while the Poly is used where winters are cold and soil freezes.

Second, you will need valves. These gadgets serve as gatekeepers, opening and closing to regulate the flow of water into each specific “zone” you want watered.

Third, there is the back-flow prevention device. That gadget protects contaminated water backing up and mixing into your drinking water.

Next are the sprinkler heads. In lawns these are generally placed in a small well so that the top is at ground level when not in use. This prevents them from being damaged by lawn mowers or other equipment; it also prevents tripping. And, hey, it looks better! When water comes at them through the pipes, they pop-up and filter the water through holes, causing the water to sprinkle gently onto the verdure. When surrounded by shrubs, sprinklers can be made to stand as much as 36 inches above ground.

The most complicated piece of hardware is the controller. It is an electronic device that is programmed to direct each set of sprinkler valves to open and close at certain times. It can also be configured to read the rain sensor and shut off the water for a time if nature has already watered.

Your sprinkler professional will lay your system according to your specifications. He will also zone your property based on a number of features on your property, for example, slope, soil, sun and shade, and, not least, the type of vegetation you have or plan to put in. He will know what kind of backflow device will work for your property, what kind of pipes to use, how many and what kind of valves would make most sense for your property. He will also determine what kinds of rotor heads will work best for you. There are steam rotors, gear driven rotors, impact-style rotors, spray heads or mist heads. Then he will place them so they work as efficiently as possible and no water is wasted. In some areas, he will see the advantage of drip irrigation for the most cost-effective way to water.

Once put in, you will love your new sprinkling system (not to mention your lush, green, beautiful yard and flowers). And you will wonder how you ever managed without it.

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Steff
Steff
4 years ago

Mike and Hannah and Tim were incredible I could not have asked for more honesty and incredible work ethic and responsible and accountable and wow wow wow way incredible customer service and they fixed my issue to 100% and I’m so happy and so pleased I would recommend sage quality solutions to anybody! Thank you Mike again to your team and to Hannah and Tim coming out for his incredible work he did on my system and even this morning he called before he was coming out to let me know his timing and that is incredible customersService! Bongo loving… Read more »

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  Our Service: You may call or schedule online to request an appointment. We can take your call Monday through Friday between 8:00 am and 5:00 pm. If we are on another call and you leave a message, we will quickly return  your call. Our service technicians work from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm Monday through Friday and sometimes Sunday. We will book a 2-hour arrival window. After completing the repairs, we invite you to observe that everything we did meets your physical expectations. If satisfied, the technician will create the invoice on-site and collect payment. We accept cash, checks, or a payment via credit card. Click this link to see and understand our pricing. After We Leave: You will have verified that everything is operating as it should; however, that does not mean you can forget about your lawn, trees, and bushes. Like any mechanical system, problems can arise unexpectedly or be missed. As such, someone must monitor the health of the lawn, trees, and bushes after we leave. If you observe stress in any of the items above, you should begin hand watering and call us to schedule another appointment. Warranty: We will warranty all parts we install against poor craft or manufacturing defects until the first freeze. Our technicians will do their absolute best to resolve all sprinkler system-related issues. Please confirm everything is working well and that you are 100% satisfied before allowing the technician to leave. Things to double-check include good zone coverage, reasonable clock settings, and no leaks in the backflow or manifold. The technician will gladly walk you through the areas above and help you understand how to adjust your clock. A return visit (if needed) will be treated as a new service call to keep our pricing low. So, double-checking the work is a win-win for everyone. We do not warranty grass, bushes, trees, or living things. The homeowner is responsible for physically inspecting their vegetation periodically and identifying any problems. As the summer goes on, you will likely notice that some lawn areas need more water. Please be sure the technician shows you how to change your programmed settings. If you are uncomfortable making changes, call us for another service call. It is important to remember that we do not live on the property and cannot know if there is a new or existing problem after we leave. This is why it is so important that the homeowner study the health of their vegetation to ensure all is good. Testing the system periodically during the day is also an excellent idea. This will help you identify problems before they become serious. Sometimes, leaks in a system can manifest themselves in different ways. For example, in rare cases, a leaky manifold right next to the home can send water into the basement. The homeowners must notice problems like this on time before extensive damage occurs. This can be done by periodically inspecting the manifold box and basement. If we are found to be at fault, we will refund up to everything paid for the service. Drip Systems: It’s pretty easy to identify a zone in your lawn that is not working. When manually testing your system, you can physically observe that heads are popping up and that the spray pattern is appropriate. Monitoring the drip system isn’t quite as easy. Generally, you can confirm that it is going on if you hear air being pushed out of emitters, and you can also find a few emitters and confirm that water is being pushed out. It would be tough for us or anyone to confirm that every emitter performs correctly. Typically, there are 3-4 emitters per tree above the soil and the landscaping fabric and rocks or wood chips. As such, easily getting to and inspecting them all would be very difficult and time-consuming. That being said, we are happy to do this if you want to pay for this service. We would charge $90/hr. High Water Bills: We are often called out after a customer receives an unusually high water bill. We are quite good at finding and fixing this type of problem. That being said, please don’t wait until your next water bill to ensure we nailed it. On a hot day, a typical lawn needs 125 gallons for every 1,000 square feet. Other sources state the lawn needs around .6 gallons per square foot. A typical lawn will use about 2,000 gallons on a watering day. So, have the technician show you your water meter, which is normally rounded to the nearest thousand. Please note the reading in the evening and then recheck it in the morning after your lawn has been watered. If you used 5,000 gallons when we were expecting only 2,000 gallons to be used, we still have a problem. In this case, we will search for additional possible problems. Since we do not live on the property, we cannot take responsibility for your water bill. Please work with the technician to enable you to determine if all is well after we leave quickly. As a side note, we typically resolve problems like this on our first attempt. Winterization: Hundreds and perhaps thousands of customers use our service yearly to winterize their sprinkler systems. Our process to winterize your sprinkler system entails utilizing a gas-powered air compressor to push all the water out of each zone and to the bleed valve at the basement shut-off valve. We invite you to observe this procedure of physically removing all the water from your system. In rare cases, people will find freeze damage to their system in the Spring. This can occur if someone inadvertently turns on the water to your sprinkler system during the winter or if the main shut-off to your sprinkler system has a prolonged leak. The latter problem can refill your system over several months, assuming it is a slow leak. The best way to detect this problem is to periodically inspect the bleeding valves on your backflow throughout the winter. There should be no sign of water after our winterization process. Our Appointment: Upon arrival, we don’t know if the job will take 30 minutes or four hours. Our goal is to arrive early in the 2-hour arrival window and leave before the arrival window is closed. Unfortunately, sometimes the job takes much longer, which can then cause us to need to reschedule subsequent appointments. In general, we like to try to finish what we started. To minimize the impact on other customers, we do our best to save some windows each week if a customer needs rescheduling. Nobody wants to be rescheduled, so we do our best to prevent this. Would you like to schedule an appointment? Book Now
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