running water lines

pat32rf · Jun 12, 2010

I ran a line to a horse barn a few years ago for a fellow and hit bedrock as well. Had him buy some long runs of eavestrough heating cable and tape it to the plastic pipe. Then dump some sand on it (no sharp rocks). We then covered it with 12" wide strips of blue 2" styrofoam. Then backfilled.
Past five years he has had no problems with freezing, but if/when he does all he needs to do is turn on the heating cable until he restores water flow. He knows roughly where the shallow spots are and if he has trouble plans to lay bales of straw along them.
He bought the better quality PVC 3/4" pipe (will withstand freezing) and there were places that we could only dig 24".
If you can keep virgin snow over your pipeline it will also help.
You could also run twin lines with a circ pump to keep water flowing....

doall · Jun 13, 2010

I don't know what you guys have to deal w/ that far north, but I just put cut offs on all my pipes that go away from my house and use pex. I can just cut it off when its freezing. but I suspect that yours may never thaw in the daylight hours for days at a time. do they not make a auto waterer with a trickle feature and a return maybe.

tommu56 · Jun 13, 2010

I have little to no top soil at my cabin and it is all shale under it and my bx23 did fine burring my well line 3-4 ft. It did take some time but if you can get a tooth in the rift in the rock it will usually brake off.
One thing I found out with a little machine don't reach out and pull tward your self with the hoe work the face of the trench right under the tractor pulling up the face will be ragged and actually help because your bucket tooth/teeth will catch on the ragged edges and brake up the shale just let it fall to the bottom of the trench when you get a bucket full down there (after multiple rips up the face) scoop out the bottom.
Again it did take some time.
I did hit some areas were I had to lower the septic tank down and driled shale with a rotary hammer and pins and feathers broke the sheets loose then broke them up with the hoe. again I had every thing but the pins and feathers.
The hole was 10' square and only a 6' x 2' x 18" piece of shale to remove again time was of no concern literally I just kept chipping away at it.

tom

piller · Jun 13, 2010

Had a 1600 foot long water line installed on my farm in 2007. Contractor used a large tracked trenching machine that could grind through rock. Entire line installed in one day. Encountered rock for about 250 feet at the beginning of the line which was slow going then the machine just cruised the rest of the way.

pat32rf · Jun 13, 2010

We normally figure that a safe frost depth is 4', but there are many variables. If we get a lot of snow before the weather turns cold, the frost under the snow may only go down a few inches. If the snow gets packed down, then it looses its insulating value and the frost goes deeper. A plowed driveway will have the deepest frost.
If a water line freezes, it normally stays that way until things warm up or you take remedial action.

CharlieS · Jun 13, 2010

On another note, anytime you have electricity around livestock water tanks, even if its only a single 120 volt outlet, be sure to set a ground rod and bond all metal parts of the tank and housing, as well as the outlet ground to the rod.
(master electrician by trade) Through the years, i've installed or worked on to many water tanks to count, and i've found that as little as a nominal 3 volts leakage to the tank/water supply itself neither cattle or horses will drink from a tank. In extreme cases i've had to set multiple 8 foot rods to get enough grounding contact to reduce voltage leaks to null. In one extreme case we actually had to pour salt water around the ground rods to reduce soil to rod contact resistance (due to very dry soil) to achieve an adequate ground.
Be sure to use approved copper/copperclad or galvanized rods and not just an old hunk of iron thats laying around. Eventually iron rusts away and thus a good ground is lost.

ultrarunner · Jun 13, 2010

Is unprotected PEX a problem buried in the ground regarding gophers and other gnawing creatures?

pat32rf · Jun 13, 2010

I've never actually seen PEX used underground, just PVC. There are many grades of PVC, from really cheap, up to the stuff they used in my Geothermal (and probably some even better). Never had problems with the good quality stuff and its cheaper and easier to work with than the equivalent sized PEX as far as fittings go. (as long as you get the solid stainless clamps)
What is that stuff they use for natural gas lines?

dan_d · Jun 14, 2010

wow, more feedback, thanks!

CharlieS, good point about the grounding I'll definitely make sure the water pipe is grounded properly since it will be insulated & heated (tho given the lack of soil depth i'll probably use a plate instead of rod). Luckily that's the only metal in the system, the tank and float are both poly/plastic. I have had heaters in the tanks the last 4 years and they've never seemed to bother the horses, so hopefully it stays that way!

doall, once the ground is frozen here its frozen until springtime! if the water pipe gets frozen, some plumbers have long snakes that spray out warm salty water which will get pushed thru the pipe if you're lucky enough to not have any T's in the line, otherwise, its a nasty job to dig in the winter and guess where the line might be frozen!

tommu56, the backhoe had to do exactly that (pull upwards on the rock) on a big chuck that was only about 6" under the topsoil, took about 30mins to get that out! unfortunately the rest of the bedrock has nothing to grab onto...

pat32rf, glad to hear someone has had luck putting foam over top like that. I was thinking about doing that for the really shallow areas in addition to the insulation/drainage pipe i am using.

Cheers,
Dan