Hi Joaquin, thanks for watching! Shrink tubing works great! A lot of guys use that. It's just a little harder in repair situations to cut the tubing back, but no big deal really.
That would work great. I think the heat shrink might eliminate the need for silicone, but I need some research on that. Thanks for watching and commenting!
My cut irrigation wire is composed of three smaller wires within. Do I need to separate these wires and splice them to the corresponding colored wire separately?
Yes. Even if you don't think you need all the wires, go ahead and splice them all correctly to the colors. It can cause a mess later if you hook up the wrong colors or not all the wires. Thanks for watching and commenting!
2:30 grease-filled wire nut - if you have some waterproof or dialectic grease just fill a regular wire nut with it. Buying packaged grease-filled will cost about 4x the price of a regular nut.
Best way to find corroded splices that are buried directly in the ground is with a TDR. Even good splices buried in a valve box that is covered with an inch or two of soil and grass can be hard to find with a locator. Not with a TDR. I’ll never be with out mine now that I’ve used one.
TDR? I'm wracking my brain to figure out what those initials mean., lol. I know terminology is different from place to place. Or maybe there's a new piece of equipment I need to be introduced to? I've only used locators, pulsers, and station masters.
You're 100% correct. Thanks for bringing that up. I don't mention 2-wire systems in these basic videos for a reason. This video is part of a full course curriculum and somewhere in there I mention that this is not about 2-wire, but the traditional multi-strand or single-strand installation technique popular for several decades previously. But to clarify the point, on 2-wire systems, always use the direct burial style (2 piece) splice connector. And go even farther with it, and only use the same brand as the 2-wire system. If you use a generic brand, it can void your system warranty. I promise, small things like that matter on 2-wire systems, just like the grounding rods. I don't recommend 2-wire for irrigation beginners. Trust me, I've done repairs on huge commercial systems where the installation protocol wasn't followed and resulted in a big mess every time.
