Thanks again, Steve,
[I know that you already know all this stuff - I'm writing the following for other growers who may also be drip tape beginners]
One of our volunteer ladies did just that this morning - disconnected the tape at the valve and simply moved the tapes aside and, with one person at each end, quickly put them back when finished. The tapes are now lying right next to the little plants, within the 'lay-by" mounds created by the wheel hoe. The plants will soon be big enough to not be damaged by the contortions of the tape - there may be a little minor damage if the tape actually covers the seedlings, but I think think the cultivation problem is solved.
I have one zone of 400' of permanent trellis where we will plant Sugar Snap peas pretty soon. I had some pressure regulation problems there - blew it apart a few times trying to drop the pressure by opening valves in the other zones. I finally installed a 12# preset pressure regulator and that worked. I found that I shouldn't open more than one zone at a time, so I'm going to add more lines to the trellis zone to accomodate full flow from the well. The well tank is overflowing with only 400' of line running (we have a float valve on the pump but the compressor runs all the time).
The trellis zone is is a long way, and slightly uphill, from the well and I can't have the pump turning on and off, because, despite a check valve in the 2" supply line, the water leaks out and when the pump restarts it takes too long to fill the line again. I guess the check valve is leaking. On that zone, I need to get just the right amount of water flow to keep the pump going without overflowing the tank (wasted electricity).
I also added vacuum relief valves at all zones. Thinking about our conversation re the physics of siphoning, I removed the top of one valve after I shut off the water and it was indeed "sucking air" just like they warn. So I guess it would suck dirt too.
I'm really impressed on how much we can actually irrigate with this little well, using drip tape! Seems like I can theoretically have enough zones to do the whole three acres just by changing valves every couple of hours. If it ever rains and our pond refills, I will pump the lake water into the well storage tank, install a larger pump and have unlimited water ( the lake pump delivers 60GPM - which we needed with our primitive system of sprinklers and flooding).
Jack
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