Homeownership in a house that has been flexible enough to let me explore my options and creativity has allowed me to review the option of creating a greywater irrigation system. Below, I provide a basic description of the overall structure.

When we purchased the house, the laundry was just outside in the Arizona room. The water was drained through a sink that was installed next to it. We used to fill buckets with water as clothes were washed, carry them outside, and use them to water particular plants in our yard. We discussed the option of installing a greywater irrigation system at some point, but that never solidified until recently.

I found multiple posts discussing how to create a basic system that diverted water from the washing machine into either the yard or sewer. Some of the parts listed in those tutorials were extremely expensive and hard to come by, so I was set on simply carrying buckets of water when needed.

The plan

The goal was to divert water from the wash into the yard or the drain. In general, I needed to connect the drain hose from the washing machine into a part that would allow me to decide whether water should go into the yard or the drain. Water that would go into the yard should be relatively clean—the water for the drain would need to handle some serious contamination. Below, I post a schematic of the system (built entirely using PVC):

Instructions

These are the parts that I used to assemble this system:

• Rubber coupling (1 1/2")
• 1" PVC pipe (I used ~30 feet)
• 1" PVC to garden hose adapter (male)
• 1" Check valve
• Y hose connector
• 1" PVC clamps
• Irrigation to hose adapter
• PVC cement

Once I had all the parts, I used the rubber coupling to connect the wash drain into a short 1" PVC pipe. That pipe was then connected to a 1" check valve that prevented water from flowing back into the washer. That valve was then connected to another short 1" PVC pipe. The 1" PVC to garden hose male adapter was added after (the black plastic part in the photo). From here and on both sides of the Y adapter, I used PVC connectors to go from garden hose thread back into a 1" PVC line. Lastly, I used the PVC clamps to ensure that the whole structure was stable and in place.

The last thing is to connect the irrigation poly (3/4") into one of the ends of the system. The other end (which I'm not showing), goes to the drain.

Safety information

One of the diverters in the split should always be open. If that doesn't happen, the wash could suffer some damage. That's likely the biggest issue with this solution. A 3-way valve could provide a better solution...but finding one in town provided to be almost an impossible thing for me.