Dear visitor, welcome to SPRINKLER TALK FORUM - You Got Questions, We've Got Answers. If this is your first visit here, please read the Help. It explains how this page works. You must be registered before you can use all the page's features. Please use the registration form, to register here or read more information about the registration process. If you are already registered, please login here.
Tunnel Under Driveway
What's some idea's for a do-it-yourselfer that needs to run a 1" mainline under a driveway where the soil is heavy clay with lots of rocks.
The ground was so hard when we moved into this new neiborhood five years ago that I had to buy a railroad pick (5lb head) to dig in the ground to install edging.
Without the proper machinery and based on what you say your soil is like, you should call a drilling/boring company to come in and do it for you. Make it 3-4 inches and insert a PVC sleeve pipe so you can always run other things through in the future.
Do you have any other way around the house to avoid the driveway.
If its asphalt you can always open a trench then repatch and reseal. I've done this where the asphalt driveay meets the concrete in the garage. DOesnt look as obvious , But you will always see the scar.
The driveway is concrete and the water meter is on just the other side of the driveway. I either find a way to go under an 11' wide driveway or I go the entire length of the driveway and across the entire length of the back yard adding an additional 200' to the mainline. (Did I mention I was trying to do this as a one-man DIY job?)
I thought about the possibility of tying into the main on both sides of the driveway (there are a few things on THAT side that need watering too) but I'm trying to start with a 1" main as close to the meter as possible to maximize my capacity (5/8" meter with 3/4" main to house).
Next door neigbor installed a system last year. His suggestion was to use a 1/2" piece of rebar to make the hole (presumably, I'd do this twice, first with rebar to make a piolet hole, then again with black pipe to get the final desired size to insert a 1" copper main). I tried a test at the sidewalk a week ago. With wet ground, the test went ok (rebar went easy using only a 2lb hammer).
I'm going to try tomorrow morning with the rebar. If I have to, I can get a 5lb sledge to help. The biggest conserns are 1) that I might hit a large stone that I would have lots of difficulty getting thru, and 2) that I'm not going to get the line buried as deep as I'd like to avoid possibility of pipe damage from occational freezing conditions (we live in the middle of Alabama where we average a snowfall once every-other year and the snow only lasts for one day before it's melted... so I'm not going to spend the time/expense to seriously winterize my equipment).
I'll report back with results over the weekend.
Try this. I don't know if it will work for the big distance, but it could be something to try:
Take a 3/4" by however long you need it piece of pipe, cap it and drill a 1/8" hole. Add a female adapter on the other end with a NPT to garden hose type coupler. You then use the water power to blast away the dirt and debris. Usually it will create just a slight larger hole than the 1" pipe. It works on sidewalks, ect, but don't know if it will work for the long distance without sloping down at the end too far.
Just a thought.
Water pressure isn't going to do it by itself. The ground has too many rocks.
As for attempting it this weekend, rain!
Plus I've run into some additional issues. I don't have much of a hill to work with, so it looks like I might have to first dig a 10' long trench leading upto the driveway so that I can get the rebar and pipe down to the desired depth so that I can make sure I'm fairly level. And it looks like I'm going to have to do it from the less than optimum side (i.g. got to dig deeper going from right rather than left side) because I've got the power line running to my house under the driveway, and it's allong the right side. I know I can be accurate at where I get started, but it's going to be a little more difficult to accurately hit a spot on the other side.
BTW, I've got to go a total distance of 11' if I go perpendicular to the driveway. For various reasons (mainly location of power line and water pipe to the house and slope of the driveway) I might want to do it at an angle, which would make the distance more like 12' to 13'.
Let us know how it works. This one sounds tough.
Thanks,
Pete
Am I allowed to post links on this? If you really wanna do it yourself and the hose trip would work try the "borzit." I think it's under 300 bucks and is a really amazing tool. That's their webiste... with a .com afterwards... let me know if I dont have to talk around posting links anymore cuz that was annoying
Are you allowed to post links!?!?!?!?!?! That is an insult!!!! Haha....
This isn't LS..........[8D]
Haha... that's what I was getting at... never understood their logic for that though... Keep up the good work guys
Last time I talked to someone at a local store, they were saying that I should be able to hire someone to bore me a hole for about $10/ft. That would make for a cost of less than about $150, so purchaing a $$$ piece of equipment would be useless.
Still have not gotten around to trying to bore under the driveway. Other projects have been getting in the way. One of these required I bore a 7-8' hole under my air-conditioning unit. Needed to install some dranage, but I didn't want to go around or plow through this decrative box round the air-conditioning unit. I was able to quickly use the 1/2" rebar to dill a poilet hole, then run a little bit of water through the hole to make it easier to use a piece of black pipe to expande the hole to easily install a 3/4" PVC pipe.
I'm starting to get a little more confidence that I can tackle the driveway on my own. The only real issues left is the fact that I won't be boring into a hill, I'll have to bore across a hill (so it will take some time/effort to pre-dig a trench that I can use to pound the rebar under the driveway) and still having to possibly worry about a power line I KNOW is under the driveway (but someone told me that it should be at least 2' if not deeper and shouldn't get in the way).
Since I last posted, I've done some more "test" boring for a distance of up to 7-8 feet. I've got a dec had build a set of planter boxes beside the house
SPRINKLER TALK FORUM - You Got Questions, We've Got Answers »
Help with Design & Installation »
Installation Issues »
