I have horses and sheep that live about 100 feet from the main house/ outside water faucet. We want to install a pipe that allows access to the water down at the corrals, what sort of things should I be worried about? It seems simple, lay the pipe then connect to the main water line, but I know that I'm dealing with a high pressure so I should probably install a safety valve? maybe even turn off the water before adding the pipe? etc. Tips/Advice for safety & efficiency?
P.S. Never laid pipe before, never worked with the water mains either. Complete newbie in this area.
Best Answer
A lot depends upon whether you live where it can freeze. If you do then you want to bury the pipe from the house to the stock tank in the ground at a depth sufficient to prevent freezing. Then you want to use a frost-free farm or yard hydrant type valve to join with the buried water line and bring the water service up to the working level above the ground. The hydrant has an actuator lever at the top the works a rod inside the pipe all the way down to the actual water shut off point under the ground. When the rod is pushed down so that the water flow is off the hydrant is designed to drain the riser pipe through weep holes at the bottom. This prevents freezing of the riser pipe above ground.
Some hydrants will require the addition of a back flow preventer if you intend to leave a hose attached while the hydrant is off. This so that the drain feature will work correctly by letting air into riser pipe.
The auto drain feature is one reason it is necessary to lay in a good amount of pea gravel or crushed rock around the bottom of the hydrant so that it is easy for the water from the drain feature to flow away from the pipe and down into the surrounding soil.
Here is a picture of a typical hydrant: