Orbit Traveling Tractor Sprinkler

This travelling sprinkler has been a great addition to the garden. The cast-iron body feels sturdy and well made, and it moves smoothly across the lawn while watering evenly. I really like the adjustable coverage and three speed settings, as they make it easy to control the watering depending on the area. The automatic shut-off is also very convenient, so I don't have to keep checking on it. It saves a lot of time compared with moving a sprinkler manually. Overall, a practical and reliable product for keeping the lawn watered.

I was pleasantly surprised by this sprinkler tractor. It is a bit larger and heavier than I expected, which actually made me feel good about its durability right out of the box. The construction feels sturdy and well-built, not flimsy or gimmicky. Setup was quick and easy, and it started working right away. It travels smoothly across the yard and provides great water coverage. I've been using it to help establish new grass, and it's been a great! It’s a great way to keep the area consistently watered without having to move a sprinkler around. Overall, it's a solid, well-made product that does exactly what it's supposed to do.

You lay out the path with the hose, and this thing just does its thing. Wow, where have you been my whole life for the last 26 yrs I had homes with lawns? Now, there's some quirks with this sprinkler, like you have to make sure how you lay out the hose, and you have to be kind of exacting with how you place the stop bracket (it will miss it if it's not a perfectly straight path)...just learning curves to adapt to, as with all things. But I will say that overall, this sprinkler is awesome and WELL worth the price.

We have only used this a few times but so far we like it. It had an orifice at the outlet which flew off from the water pressure. We couldn’t find it so my husband had to do a MacGyver and jury rig the end; the other side was fine and it works beautifully since he fixed that. It is adjustable by the arms insofar as how far the water flings. The coverage was fantastic! The area we are doing gets completely soaked which is what we want there is a lever you can mess with which helps it move a little faster/slower (not a rocket by any means) We are planning on using PVC piping for the track rather than hose. It is very heavy metal and other than the one piece which flew off, very nicely made.

Update 9/28/2019: giving back the star i took away. Orbit support and warranty covers this unit for 6 years and sent me a replacement drive unit. this makes it even better! Update 9/24/2019: Taking 1 star back from my first review. Update at the two year mark Sept 2019. I use the heck out of this thing and the drive mechanism has failed at the 2 year mark. Just as I aerated and overseeded the lawn ARGHHHHH!!!! Amazon wanted $48 bucks for a replacement part (Orbit has it direct for $25 with shipping). I decided to buy a whole new tractor because I need it here in 2 days more than I need the extra $30 bucks I'm spending. I saw some other reviews where the plastic parts were breaking, wasn't strong enough to pull 75' of hose, etc. I didn't experience any of that. Most of the issues I had were my error, really. Making the turns too tight is a huge mistake. You need a nice sweeping arc. Last week the tractor got caught up on a good size root in the lawn, and sat there spinning on it - I could have avoided that root. Thats probably why the drive unit failed. A couple other times I hit a low spot in the lawn and it got bogged down and sat there chugging along in one spot for a while. Again, probably contributed to early drive failure. I'm going to be more careful with the new unit and see if I can't get more than 2 years out of it. I love this thing. I just can't justify putting in an irrigation system and this thing works as planned and expected. The shut-off mechanism works like a charm. Be mindful of a couple things if you plan to purchase: 1) No tight turns! Need to be gradual sweeps. 2) Hose needs to be straight leading up to the shut-off stand. Otherwise the tractor will not line up properly and will not shut off and may even continue onward. 3) Don't try and go past 150-200' of hose. The tractor may not be able to drag all that hose around. I came out one day and the tractor got "stuck" in one place, the wheels were churning into the ground and the water was still flinging everywhere. 4) It's slow, even on the faster setting. That's not a bad thing because you want your water coverage to be good. By my watch it takes about an hour to travel 50' on fast. The arms adjust so you can water smaller strips of lawn which is another plus.I chose this model over the other one on the market because of the color. The yellow will show more dirt and debris than the green one will.

I'm glad I read many reviews of this traveling sprinkler before purchasing the Orbit 58322. It is true that you need to keep three feet of hose behind the sprinkler before you loop the hose back to the hose connection. Ours just refused to move if you had a less generous loop. It travels our 100-foot hose without a problem. I've been careful to keep curves at a radius of 10 feet, and to make sure there was three feet of straight hose before and after the shut-off ramp. I am a bit concerned that the plastic shut-off ramp that snaps over the hose will break over time as the plastic becomes more brittle from UV exposure (although I am storing the sprinkler and ramp in my garage to extend its life). I'm using 5/8-inch-daimeter hose and I think trying to snap the ramp over 3/4-inch hose would be very difficult. I have newer sod, so I also keep the traveling sprinkler centered in a row of sod, and avoid the seams as much as possible so the tires don't get caught in a rut. I like the weight of the cast-metal sprinkler because it doesn't jump off the hose, and the adjustable sprinkler wands allow me to keep the water on my property by rotating the wands to the radius that fits my yard. The spray pattern is a circle with no spray in the middle, but with the sprinkler travelling, the entire lawn is well watered by the end of its route. And the sprinkler has shut off properly each time I've used it; just make sure your hose has three feet of straight section before and after the shut-off ramp. But, given those caveats, the traveling sprinkler works great! On the down side, I originally had the sprinkler set on HI speed and then decided to try it on LOW, but there was too much standing water at the low speed. When I changed the control back to HI, the sprinkler will still only travel at LOW speed. I'm reluctant to take the cover off of the gear box for fear of voiding the warranty, so I'll try spraying some silicone lubricant in the transmission from the speed controller and decide if my sprinkler is defective. It should not have this problem after only three uses. I'll update this review sometime in the future to explain how this issue is resolved. Otherwise, this is a great solution to watering my lawn.

SUMMARY (since this review is so long): I think this works fine if used in straight lines with a 100ft or less hose and are able to keep an eye on it while in use. I think it will last a reasonable amount of time if the sprinkler is always lifted from and placed parallel with the ground with two hands (not letting the arms hit the ground), always putting the sprinkler away after using it (not leaving it in the sun or inclement weather), and don't overtighten the compression fittings for the arms. If 100ft or more of hose is to be used, the sprinkler needs to turn during use, or you are looking for a "hands off" solution, then continue reading below. WHAT: "Orbit Tractor 58322 Traveling Sprinkler, (Pack of 1), Green" WHY: My backyard is something around 75ft by 100ft. Watering it by hand takes hours. Using a sprinkler I have to move around is prone to over/under watering and interrupts whatever I am doing to move the sprinkler. I wanted something that would provide even coverage and water distribution while also being "hands off" once set up. PROS: - Works great when used in straight lines or with hoses 100ft and under - Angle of the arms is completely adjustable to set how wide of an area to water - Two travel speeds allows for lightly watering in high speed or double the watering in low speed CONS (explained below): - Easy to "derail" and start traveling unconstrained through your yard - Arms can come out of the spinning T coupler and waste a lot of water - Sometimes doesn't stop when running over the ramp that is supposed to shut it off - While the body is cast iron, the wheels, stop valve, spinning T-coupler, and "motor assembly" are all plastic This sprinkler easily gets pulled/pushed off of the guide hose in a few situations. Turns have to be gentle and somewhat large (I found 5ft radius or larger works well enough). If a lot of hose is being dragged behind the sprinkler (75-100ft or more total in my case), it is likely that it "derails" even with big gentle turns. I can clearly see the whole sprinkler getting pulled and tilted to the side with the dragging hose. This is with my lawn cut at 2.5-3in. What I found is pulling the loop of hose that is getting dragged so that it is in front of and alongside the path will greatly decrease the likelihood of the sprinkler "derailing" as long as the length of hose it is dragging is kept at or under 50ft in total. On two occasions, I have had one of the arms pop out of the spinning T-coupler on the top of the sprinkler. That results in much less travel speed, coverage, and the sprinkler just dumping a ton of water out within a few feet of the sprinkler. Considering that the whole spinning T-coupler that holds the arms in and attaches to the body of the sprinkler is plastic, I don't dare to use tools on it to tighten the arms in more than I can do by hand. The arms are just straight metal pipes and it is a simple compression fitting that holds them in. There is nothing that holds the arms captive to the sprinkler if the compression fittings are not completely tight which is unfortune as simply adjusting the arm angle is enough to loosen the fitting where the arm could come loose during use but not enough to be apparently too loose. On two different occasions now, I have had the sprinkler not stop after reaching the stop ramp. The first time I checked on the sprinkler only to find it had traveled past the stop, derailed, and was still running. The second time I found the sprinkler to be sitting on the ramp not moving but still running with the back wheels digging up the grass and the stop valve only partially depressed resulting in the sprinkler spinning at a lower speed. This is with my lawn at 2.5-3in of height and the sprinkler on flat ground. Perhaps this has something to do with water pressure, I really can't say for sure, but I usually see 60-65psi at the wall with the sprinkler running (though 100-105psi when shut off). As for all of the plastic parts, I am certain they will fail long before the cast iron body does. If I don't pick the whole sprinkler up with two hands, just lifting it by the front handle often results in the arms hitting the ground thus putting undue stress on the plastic spinning T-coupler. The hose attachment, while brass, is connected to the plastic drive mechanism so I suspect that any sudden yank on the hose to either side of the sprinkler could result in that snapping the plastic housing. The fact that an entire drive mechanism assembly with wheels is readily available for purchase is not a good sign to me in terms of long-term durability. POTENTIAL IMPROVEMENTS: I think there are numerous improvements that could be made to turn this 3-star product into a 5-star one. Firstly, change the front wheel design so that the wheel sits behind the pivot point (like a shopping cart wheel) instead of being directly below the pivot. That will improve its ability to follow the hose without getting pushed over it by the back wheels. Second, widen the track width of the rear wheels. With the wheels close together, simply dragging the hose behind the sprinkler after a turn causes the whole unit to tilt towards the side with the dragging hose. By widening the back track width, side-to-side stability would be improved and also help keep the front wheel from "derailing". Third, provide some means of holding the arms captive to the spinning T-coupler so that they cannot pop out of the sprinkler during use even if the compression fitting is not completely tight. Fourth, improve the stop ramp and stop valve design for more consistent and reliable stopping. OVERALL: As seen in the summary at the top, I think this sprinkler is going to work fine and last a good amount of time when treated well and used in constrained situations. Once you wish to go beyond 100ft of hose or add turns, the idea of a "hands off" solution really goes out the window which is unfortunate since that is exactly my use case and why I got this sprinkler to begin with. I plan to do several modifications and improvements to the sprinkler and will report back on my findings.

The product is generally good. Why do you want to buy a traveling sprinkler? Because you lay your garden hose down all around your yard which becomes the path the sprinkler will follow - it will travel along this path and water your entire garden/yard - no manual and multiple changing of sprinkler positions required - this will save you tons of time. But there are 2 major considerations with this particular sprinkler you must be aware of: 1. plastic gears 2. questionable effectiveness of auto-shut-off ramp I've only been using it for 2 weeks now so can't say much about durability. This is not my first time using this type of sprinkler - I had one about 12 years ago that was excellent - very heavy, solid metal and had metal gears. The metal gears added to the weight of the product but weight is not a down-side with this type of sprinkler because it makes the sprinkler more stable as it travels across your yard and the metal gears give it maximum durability. I had to sell my old sprinkler because of a long stint out of the country, unfortunately. Having the need to buy one again, I tried to find sprinklers with metal gears but couldn't find any so went with this one, which seemed like the best of all the options I read about. Now on to the issues. This sprinkler has plastic gears. This could be a problem and something I do worry about especially given that to replace the gears, if (when?) they go bad, probably will cost you just as much as buying a brand new sprinkler. The plastic gears do make the sprinkler lighter but as I said above, you should not be worried about weight at all; in fact, greater weight is good. Plastic gears can be worn down far more quickly than metal gears. The 2nd issue with this sprinkler is the auto-shut-off ramp - it's literally a ramp that the sprinkler travels over which then triggers an off switch underneath the sprinkler. This is a very important feature because you want to be able to just set the sprinkler, go out on the town and come back home to find your entire lawn watered and the sprinkler sitting in your yard, turned off and ready to be brought inside. If the ramp doesn't work, there's no telling what can happen. For sure the water will keep running but worse, the sprinkler might run into a fence or a wall or fall into a ditch. In any of these cases, unless the sprinkler arms get stopped from spinning by the obstruction, the sprinkler will keep trying move forward which will strip the plastic gears. So far, my success with the ramp has not been very good (I have a ½" hose; a larger diameter hose will get you better ramp results but there is a maximum diameter the ramp supports (⅝") - check your hose size before buying). But, I did observe carefully the operation and think now I've got the hang of it - you have to make sure the hose leading up to the ramp is perfectly straight for at least 5' to 10' and perfectly straight on the other side of the ramp for about 5'. Also, the ramp must be perfectly in line with the path of the hose. If the ramp is even a little but angled, the springier will jump off the ramp, the auto-shut-off will never be engaged and you might get stripped gears if it runs into a wall or something else. When I first started using the sprinkler, I was getting 0% success rate with the ramp. Now I'm up to probably 90% after the changes I described above. But despite this, I don't think you will get 100% reliability with the ramp - it really needs to be redesigned to ensure the sprinkler can never jump off.

Irriga e cammina!!! Proprio bello!

Super sprzęt musi mieć tylko właściwy wąż 5/8 cala, dobre ciśnienie wody. Robi dobrą robotę. Polecam

O produto é de excelente qualidade, veio embalado e protegido corretamente e chegou dentro do prazo.

I had one of these 20 yrs ago. It travels along the hose watering as it goes. My yard was flat then, now my yard has tree roots, holes and has a definite slope. The tractor handled it all. The one thing it can’t do it turn a corner but if you can make it a gentle curve of less than 45* then it just goes. I highly recommend this for someone who has plants to water but no sprinkler system put in

Super quick delivery and item works as expected. No issues.