How to perform a wet check that actually leads to repairs

Three weeks after a routine wet check, the property manager calls. There's a brown patch spreading along the clubhouse lawn, and she wants to know why nobody caught it. You pull up the inspection and there it is, in the technician's handwriting: “Zone 6, rotor not turning.” The problem was found. It just never became a repair.

That gap between finding a problem and fixing it is where most wet checks lose their value. A wet check is a hands-on inspection of an irrigation system while it runs. A technician activates each zone, walks it, and looks for anything that wastes water or leaves the landscape short of it. But the inspection itself is only half the job. The other half is recording what you found in a way that leads somewhere. This guide covers both.

What a wet check is really for

It's tempting to think of a wet check as a box to tick on a maintenance contract, but the best irrigation contractors treat it as the moment they learn the most about a property. Systems drift. Heads get clipped by mowers, nozzles clog, plants grow into spray patterns, valves start to weep, and somebody changes the controller schedule during a heat wave and never changes it back. None of that announces itself until the turf browns or a walkway stays wet all morning.

A good wet check catches those problems early, while they're cheap to fix and before the customer notices. It also builds a history. When you know which zones on a property keep giving trouble, you can recommend real fixes instead of patching the same head every month.

Before you turn anything on

The most useful preparation takes five minutes and happens before the technician leaves the shop: look at what you already know about the property. What did the last wet check find? Are there open repairs still waiting on approval or parts? A technician who arrives knowing that zone 7's valve was flagged last month will check it first, rather than rediscovering it and writing it up a second time.

Access is the other thing worth sorting out ahead of time. Locked gates, pool enclosures, dogs in backyards, and controllers inside garages are the most common reasons a zone ends up marked “could not inspect.” A quick message to the homeowner or property manager the day before saves a return trip.

And if the property doesn't have a reliable zone map, plan to build one on this visit. For each controller, note every zone, what it waters, and a plain description of where it is. It takes longer the first time, but every future inspection, repair, and report gets faster, and a new technician can find their way around without calling the office. It's also worth stocking the truck with the parts you replace most often, such as spray heads, nozzles, rotors, risers, and common valve repair parts, so small problems can be fixed on the spot rather than written up for later.

Start at the controller

Before walking a single zone, spend a few minutes at the controller. A surprising share of coverage complaints turn out to be scheduling problems rather than broken hardware. Check that the date and time are right and the controller has power. Look through each program's start times, run times, and watering days, and ask whether they still make sense for the season and for any local watering restrictions. If there's a rain or weather sensor, make sure it's connected and doing its job.

Pay attention to anything that looks odd: a zone that's been switched off, a run time far longer or shorter than its neighbors, or a program nobody seems to have set on purpose. Sometimes the fix for a dry area is simply restoring a run time someone shortened months ago. Note the controller's name or location too, because when you write up findings later, grouping them by controller makes them much easier for anyone to follow.

Walking the zones

Now run each zone, one at a time, and walk its full area while it waters. This is where experience shows. A seasoned technician isn't just looking for geysers. They're watching how each head behaves and whether the water is landing where it should.

Heads that don't pop up, or pop up and barely spray, usually point to a broken head, debris, or low pressure. A head throwing a column of water straight up has likely lost its nozzle or broken off its riser. Heads that are tilted or have sunk below grade, often from settling soil or foot and mower traffic, throw water at odd angles and leave dry crescents behind them. Fine misting or fogging tends to mean the pressure is too high for the nozzle, which wastes water on the wind.

Look beyond the heads, too. Water hitting sidewalks, walls, and windows means arcs and radii need adjusting. Dry spots in an otherwise healthy lawn suggest clogged nozzles, spray blocked by plants that have grown up, or heads spaced too far apart. Soggy ground or pooling, especially when it stays wet after the zone shuts off, often points to a leak in a lateral line or a valve that isn't closing completely. And if a zone won't come on at all, or won't turn off, the trouble is usually at the valve, the solenoid, the wiring, or the controller rather than in the field.

For each zone, settle on a clear result: it passed, it failed, or you couldn't inspect it. That sounds almost too simple, but a consistent result for every zone is what makes an inspection report readable, both for the property manager and for the next technician who opens it.

Writing it down so someone can act on it

This is the step that separates a useful wet check from a wasted one. Remember the clubhouse lawn: the technician found the problem and wrote it down. What went wrong is that “Zone 6, rotor not turning” sat on an inspection sheet where nobody owned it.

A finding someone can act on answers a few basic questions. Where exactly is it? Not just the zone number, but a description a stranger could follow, such as “zone 7, front entry beds, left of the walkway.” What did you find, specifically? “Valve won't shut off, water running at the valve box” is useful in a way that “valve issue” is not. What did you already do about it? If you replaced a head, say so and note the part. What's left? If it needs a return visit, approval, or a part you didn't have, say that plainly. A quick photo, before and, if you fixed it, after, settles most questions before anyone has to ask them.

Notes like these feel slower to write in the moment. They're much faster than the phone calls and repeat visits that vague notes create later.

Fix it now, or write it up?

Most technicians develop good instincts here, but it helps to make the rule explicit. Small, quick repairs are usually best handled during the visit: a broken spray head, a clogged nozzle, or a head that needs straightening or raising. Fix it, record that you fixed it and what you used, and move on. The customer gets a better result, and you avoid a second trip for a five-minute job.

Anything bigger deserves to become its own piece of work: a valve that needs replacing, a lateral line leak that means digging, a coverage problem that needs extra heads, or anything that falls outside the contract and needs the customer's approval. Writing those up separately, rather than leaving them as lines on the inspection, is what gives them a chance of being finished.

After the truck leaves

A wet check creates work, and its value depends on what happens to that work. Each unresolved finding should become a follow-up repair with its location, description, and photos attached, so it can be assigned, scheduled, and tracked. Repairs that need sign-off should go to whoever approves them, whether that's the homeowner, the property manager, or your own supervisor, with enough detail that they can say yes without a phone call. Zones you couldn't inspect need a plan to get access.

Then tell the customer what you did. A short report covering the zones checked, what passed, what was fixed on site, and what you recommend is often the only part of the work a property manager actually sees. It's what justifies the contract. Finally, keep the whole record with the property, so the next inspection starts from everything you've already learned. We go deeper into this stage in From findings to finished: following up on irrigation inspection repairs.

A word on backflow testing

Many cities and water districts require backflow preventers to be tested every year by a certified tester, with results filed with the water provider. The rules vary a great deal from place to place, so it's worth checking what applies where you work. If someone on your team holds the certification, treat backflow tests as their own scheduled work rather than an add-on to the wet check. If not, note the device's condition during the inspection and refer the test to a certified partner.

Where software fits

Most of what makes a wet check valuable is habit: preparing, walking every zone, writing findings someone can act on, and following through. Software can't do the walking, but it can make the habits easier to keep. In Groundlark, technicians record wet checks zone by zone, grouped by controller, with a pass, fail, or could-not-inspect result, notes, and photos for each zone. Problems they find become their own follow-up tickets with the issue, the work performed, parts used, and before-and-after photos, and the inspection can be exported as a PDF or CSV report for the property manager.

If that sounds like the way you'd like your irrigation work to run, take a look at our irrigation contractor software page, or book a walkthrough and bring along one of your recent wet checks.