blue water pipe

Cahill

Cahill

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for several years now i have had garden hose pipe running around the edge of my paddocks.where it crosses gateways i had threaded it through a piece of drainpipe for the pons to walk over it.it has lasted much longer than i ever expected it would.(about 20 years and replacing the odd section here and there)

anyway,now i have replaced it with 20mm blue plastic pipe(the proper stuff)which now i intend to put underground,but,knowing us,we will not get around to it for ages so i was wondering,should i put drainpipe back over the gateway bits again or will it be ok?

there is a livery yard i have driven past who have their blue pipe exposed around the edges of the fields and thats been there a while.
must also add,in freezing weather i unlink it at the sourse tap and bucket it over to the yard.

any thoughts on this please?
 
I think the blue alcythene pipe is meant to be buried because its affected by UV light. If you are going to leave exposed I think you are meant to use the black stuff. You may be alright if its a shady position and no doubt it will take a long time to degrade but it may spur you on to bury it. Think this is right or so my husband always tells me!!!!
 
The geek and plumbing merchant employee in me agrees with the above - the UV penetration can cause all sorts of nasties to bloom in the water I think! Ideally you'd want to bury it I reckon, backfilling with pea gravel - less likely to freeze (something to do with air insulation) than backfilling with the soil? OMG I am a total complete and utter geek (slopes off to try and have a blonde moment and correct the planetary imbalance caused by this outburst hehehe). Ideally someone can even tell me I'm talking nonsense, otherwise my job is indeed taking over my life...
 
Ours is above ground and has been for about three years... it has not yet broken and hopefully the nasties will continue not to kill my horse
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May bury it one day when its too late
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Water regulations state that it must be buried 3ft deep or have adequate frost protection!!!.......................Sorry one of the geeky things I happen to know!!!
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Weirdo in shop is right about UV/heat and algae/bacteria growth, but for regulations it's more to do with possible contamination of human supplies if depressurisation caused the water in your pipes to be back syphoned into the main (only possible if non-return valve not fitted). Sorry another Geek moment!!!
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yes,i have a non-returnable valve,there was a big thing about that and yard hoses a few years ago wasn`t there?
 
Sorry, used to work in water industry..... The pipe should be buried, but what actually causes the pipe to degrade is water pressure. The higher the pressure, the shorter the life of the pipe. If you have low water pressure, then sunlight will affect it more, but the converse is true if you have high pressure. Freezing will impact, but I'm assuming you dont live in Iceland.

The non-return valve I imagine you have is on the actual tap, and not the start of your pipe (where meter is). If the mains ever empty (hence the de-pressurisation that PS talks about) the water company has to clean the pipes by using high concentration of chlorine.
 
the pipe is quite cheap,about £20 for 100m.it`s the fittings and taps that add the price up but they are very user friendly.
 
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