Before I start digging?

[KWentling]

So, two weekends ago, I rented a Cat 303.5 mini and dug about 500' of 6' deep trench for 3 new Woodford hydrants and a
curb stop for a future sprinkler system. I actually had planed on 800' and two more hydrants, but underground rock altered
that plan. I got all the polypipe, hydrants, and the curb stop in the ditch and it set open over the following week under pressure.
Had no leaks, but I did have the hydrants covered with washed rock and enough dirt to hold them upright so a small leak might have gone undected. I backfilled last weekend with the BX22 and used lots of water as I backfilled due to the extremely dry cloddy dirt.
Tuesday the wife hooks up her drip system up to one of the hydrants and ran it for about 48 hours. Now I have a wet spot showing
up at the lowest point of the ditch, which is also where there are two tees and one splice located. This particular hydrant had the set screw that raises the plunger loose from the factory, so when the wife opened it to bleed the air out, nothing happened. I closed the handle and tightened the screw and it worked, but might not be adjusted right. That hydrant has been off for 24 hours or so and the
wet spot hasn't grown so I'm thinking that hydrant is the culprit. Looking on Woodford's site it would seem that the only way it can leak out the weep hole with the hydrant on would be if the plunger is leaking. I wouldn't think that on a new hydrant, but who knows.
I guess the first thing to do is adjust the handle as instructed on Woodford's site. Then pull the head off and pull the plunger out and take a look. I have had to replace one of those in the past that looked good but leaked. I wonder if I could make up a pressure gage and hook it up to the hydrant, close the supply valve off, open the hydrant and look for the pressure bleeding off?
Any other ideas? If it comes to digging something back up, at least it will be easy digging for the little BX.

Kim

 

[Gary Fowler]

If you didnt fully open the hydrant is will continuously leak water out the weep hole. When correctly set, they close off the supply and allow the water to drain out the weep hole. When opening, the pressurized water spews out the weep hole till the top seat closes of the bottom of the hydrant. I would bet that the hydrant wasnt fully seated in the fully opened position which allowed the water to continously flow from the weep hole.

 

[KWentling]

If you didnt fully open the hydrant is will continuously leak water out the weep hole. When correctly set, they close off the supply and allow the water to drain out the weep hole. When opening, the pressurized water spews out the weep hole till the top seat closes of the bottom of the hydrant. I would bet that the hydrant wasnt fully seated in the fully opened position which allowed the water to continously flow from the weep hole.

You could be right. I just got back from the hardware store and I'm going to put a pressure gage on it and see whats up. Thanks for the idea.

Kim

 

[KWentling]

You were right Gary. She told me it was putting out too much water with it full open so she bumped the handle down some to reduce the flow. She also said it ran more than the 48 hours that I saw it. I did use the pressure gage and confirmed that if the handle is not full open, it leaks out the weep hole. That particular hydrant more so than the others, which I'm thinking means I need to "choke up" a little on the rod. Wow, thats a relief. Wasn't looking forward to digging in the mud. When she first told me we had a leak, I had visions of a rock puncturing the pipe when I backfilled. That would have been fun trying to find.

Kim

 

[DJ54]

Being you already have your pipe buried, this idea is way late, but maybe good for future reference, or someone else reading this thread planning on running their own hydrants. We learned the hard way years ago, to run the pressure line through a larger sized poly pipe for a conduit. We used 3/4" pressure line, ran through 1-1/4". If ever you have a leak,all you need to do is dig up the hydrant end, and unhook. Pull out the old, and push a new line through. The low pressure pipe works great for the conduit, and less expensive.

I spent a little extra, and ran a seperate line/conduit for each hydrant last fall for my new ones, and built a manifold in the well pit that allows a person to shut off each individual hydrant.

The first water line we put in back in the mid 60's developed a leak after about 5 years in the ground. We have a lot of sandrock in that area, and a small piece rubbed a hole through the line. That was back in the days when funds weren't available for a backhoe to dig it. All dug with a #2 Razorback, and that's not a lot of fun.

A little extra money spent now, may save a lot of time and money down the road...

 

[Gary Fowler]

Glad to be of help. Brother in law installed a new 1" hydrant that wasnt properly adjusted and it leaked the same way. We had to lower the handle on the rod a bit to make it seat good so it wouldnt leak. That is the nature of the beast with those freeze proof hydrants, its all or nothing, if you want to throttle back you have to do it with another valve.