Clogging investigation of pressure compensating button emitters: an experimental study of four types.

Drip irrigation is of prime importance from several points of view as the most effective and reliable method. Nevertheless, emitter clogging is the major problem related to this technology. Furthermore, pressure compensating button emitters are widely used considering their advantages resulting from the uniform distribution of water, reduction of evaporation, and deep percolation. In the present study, we report on four pressures compensating button emitters and their resistance to the clogging. Our research objectives incorporate two aspects; executing a 980-h experiment of drip irrigation by taking into consideration the temperature calibration equation, and evaluating the performance of the emitters by using the following four parameters: the relative average discharge (Dra), coefficient of uniformity (CU), emitter uniformity (EU), and the flow rate variation (q). Thus, analyzing the evaluation of those parameters provides the potential of choosing emitters that have a high resistance to the clogging. The main conclusion of this research effort is that three types of the four emitters display a satisfactory resistance to clogging.