Today I was adjusting my sprinkler system heads and I had my spigot turned on with my hose and nozzle attached. Strangely, when two zones would turn. On the spigot would shoot water out until the sprinklers were. Fully charged and operating. Only two of the five zones would make the spigot leak. As far ask know this wasn't happening last summer. The main water. line leaving the house splits and one pipe leads to the backyard and this leaking spigot and the other leads to sprinkler system. Any clue what could be causing this to happen?
Plumbing – Spigot leaks when sprinklers come on
plumbing
Related Solutions
Look for something like this.
near or on the water meter. This is a pressure reducing valve, and it's used by some municipalities to control the pressure entering to house. They are adjustable, so the one in your house might be set too low.
If you have a manifold setup on the PEX system, check to make sure the shutoffs on the manifold are fully open. You can also check the main shutoff for the house, to make sure it is fully open.
If you still cannot get better pressure, you might try calling the municipality and asking them for help. It could be a problem with the system before it enters your home.
This answer assumes you are using city water, if you use well or another water source there may be more things to check.
You most likely got dirt or other debris in the line going to the faulty sprinkler head during the repair job. I would suggest removing the faulty head and then turn on that sprinker circuit to flush the line out. If there are other heads down stream from this head you should also remove those one by one and flush them as well. Finally take a good look at the "faulty" head and make sure that dirt did not get inside and cause it to malfunction. Most pop-up heads can be disassembled to permit inspection and removal of dirt and grit.
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Best Answer
Sounds like an anti-siphon reaction to me, full water pressure in the hose going to your roof, and the house water pressure temporarily drops from the large demand from those two zones until the sprinklers are fully charged. You can try adding an anti-siphon or backflow prevention valve on the faucet to verify (they make valves that screw on between the faucet and hose). If the leaking stops or significantly reduces, then you know that's the cause.
As for why it's leaking out the stem, I'm not sure, but it's possible that's by design. The cap on top should be a vacuum breaker, allowing air in the lines after the water is shutoff and pressure drops.