I was curious if anybody has ever built their own mosquito misting system instead of buying the pre-built ones from one of the companies around the state.

I have priced out the general components of the control and pump unit and found that the mark up on those is pretty healthy.

Also curious as to their effectiveness once installed and working.

quote:

---

Also curious as to their effectiveness once installed and working.

---

I had a friend in Clear Lake who had one installed in her back yard. Every few hours it would mist a environmentally friendly spray. It worked wonders! Without it, the pool wasn't unusable during the mosquito season.

The previous owners of our home had one installed. It works great and keeps the pool area useable. It sprays for about 30 seconds at dawn and dusk and also has a remote so that you can turn it on for a cycle if needed.

CALAg,

Whereabouts did you get the list of items/materials and associated pricing as I may be interested in building my own system. We live near a creek so those little critters are horrendous.

My sister/BIL had a system installed at their place and swear by it.

TIA

same here

I have spent quite a bit of time lately looking at different systems on line to see how they are made. From there I have put together a rough parts list.

With the positive reviews and the price for which I THINK I can build the main unit, I will likely be building one this summer. We just moved in to a "new to us" house and the 50 mosquito that greet me outside my door each morning must go.

The main unit consists of a timer to run it for short predefined intervals, a high pressure pump and a 1/2 to1/3 HP motor. A level switch is included in some to keep from running your pump dry. There is also a reservoir to store the chemicals on for dispensing of course.

From there the systems are just composed of tubing and nozzles which are easy to find.

I will share my building experience once I am done building it and give any advice I can. The system I build is going to be housed in my garage to protect it from the elements so it won't be water proof.

CalAg,

Appreciate your response and I would be extremely interested in your results as I too have great interest in eventually building a system for our backyard area. A creek is ~75ft from the back side of our house and we are attacked as soon as we step out the house. I've tried several commercial products with very limited results and I am not crazy about hosing my self down with the various sprays on the market.

Anything you are willing to share would be greatly appreciated.

TIA

What about the systems that use sound or attract and trap the mosquitos?

Are those effective at all?

I know nothing about the sound type traps except that it sounds kind if like a gimmick. The traps that use propane to produce co2 have mixed reviews according some research I did a few years ago. They are meant to be places in areas that have a specific know breeding are for the bugs. The idea is to place the trap near there so they go to it instead of breeding. I don't think that would work where I live because they are every where and not coming from any specific identifiable locale. I would just rather repel and kill as many as possible. From what I have seen the misting system is the best tool for that.

At this point I have identified most of the critical parts and just need to put together the list, I will post it when I get it together to see if I can find any cheaper suppliers.

When looking at my house, i noticed the previous owner had a Mosquito Magnet in the back yard. I asked him how it worked, and he said he thought he cleaned "maybe one" mosquito out of it, ever.

A suggestion... instead of using a large (55 gal, etc) reservoir for your mixed chemicals, what about using a smaller reservoir of concentrate and using an aspirator to mix the chemicals into the water stream? Kind of like in high school chemistry class.

There are some available systems I have looked at with an injection setup, but they are considerably more expensive.

These systems end up requiring two pumps, 1 metering pump for the pesticide, and one high pressure flow pump for the final mix. This makes it much more expensive.

If you're in Dallas I have a guy that installs systems for about 1/2 the price of the bigger companies. Works great.

We tried everything until the mister and none of them worked. The only time we notice mosquitoes now is when we run out of the juice.

Thannks for the offer but I am in Houston. And thanks for letting me know yours works. From my research I had found the reviews for the misting systems were universally better than other options. Glad to hear that is staying true.

We had one put in a few months ago. They make a huge difference.

Well. I've been trying to figure out the parts needed to build one at a reasonable price and stumbled across this thread. Did you ever build a system or get a good parts list together??

CalAG - did you ever complete this list of components.. I am in the process of evaluating one or doing a DIY. would be great to see the list you put together. Thanks!

GaryClare - who is your guy in Dallas?

Thanks!

Dittos travis77's comments...

same as travis77

It would be cool if there were a dissolvable pod that would fit in the housing, or a lawn sprinkler diaphragm that included the chemical, and just needed to be replaced every year or so, so that this could happen with the watering of the lawn. *OPPORTUNITY, Ags!* .

I ordered a mosquito / biting midge fogger and it should get here soon. Will try and post an update about how well it works. I'm hoping for the best, those little SOBs were just about thick enough to carry me away this afternoon.

So, I opened this thread thinking, "I looked into this years ago, but never got around to doing it because my misting system budget got spent on a play set for the kids. I wonder what this person has found..."

Well, *****

I never got around to building it. My irritation with the bugs in my yard ended with the fact that nobody in my house is getting mosquito bites when we are outside, so no harm no foul. I will look to see if I have my parts list from back then.

My recollection is that the controller was going to be the quasi difficult part to put together, but with the advent of arduino and the like, it should be pretty easy to make a robust controller/scheduler.

CalAG said:

---

So, I opened this thread thinking, "I looked into this years ago, but never got around to doing it because my misting system budget got spent on a play set for the kids. I wonder what this person has found..."

Well, *****

I never got around to building it. My irritation with the bugs in my yard ended with the fact that nobody in my house is getting mosquito bites when we are outside, so no harm no foul. I will look to see if I have my parts list from back then.

My recollection is that the controller was going to be the quasi difficult part to put together, but with the advent of arduino and the like, it should be pretty easy to make a robust controller/scheduler.

---

Looking forward to what you come up with CalAG...I hate not being able to enjoy our back yard without applying a crap load of DEET first.

This came in the mail today. Hot death will rain upon all biting bugs on our half acre as soon as the chemicals I ordered get here. For now, the reaper waits patiently.

Do you have a link to where you got it? I'm getting destroyed every time I go in my backyard.

Seor Chang said:

---

Do you have a link to where you got it? I'm getting destroyed every time I go in my backyard.

---

It's almost halfway to the bottom, I went with the $250 one because we just have half an acre. The three chemicals they mention are about half price on Amazon but the fogmaster is about the same everywhere I looked. It feels really solid, like some of the tools and whatnot I inherited from my grandpa.

http://bugspray.com/article/sandflies.html

So, I dug through my computer where I remember making a list of parts, prices and websites, and didn't find anything. The best I can give you is the process I used to pull the list together.

System Design:
There are plenty of DIY websites that want to sell you the kit for you to install yourself. These are relatively helpful in that they will allow you to spec out your system and get the parts list. The key is that these sites don't give you the full specs on the parts (i.e. pump pressure, and flow specs), but will sell you the parts and a decent markup. I recall going through several of these sites, until I got a good idea as to what the specs on the pump were.

Nozzles and Tubing:
These are easy to find on any number of websites. They generally give you the flow rating for the nozzles, but the operating pressure is harder to find. My recollection is that they ran between 100 and 250 psi, but that would DEFINITELY require verification. The flow rate on the nozzles are really low ( I recall 0.05 gallons per hour).

Pump/motor:
The maximum flow rate of the nozzles combined with the maximum number of nozzles This combined with the maximum number of nozzles for a 1/2 hp motor and pump combination will point you to the right direction for pumps. As I recall, I ended up finding pumps and motors on the Grainger website. It took a bit of searching and relearning about pump curves to pick one.

Controller:
The controller was hard to find, and I never did find the perfect fit. The requirement for the controller is to be able to control a decent size motor, AND have the ability to control to like 5 minute run times, multiple times per day (dawn and dusk). The recommended run duration can be obtained from a number of the DIY websites.

Tank:
Plastic drums were easy enough to find, or you could even use a garbage can.


In the end I was guestimating that I could probably save almost 25% on the price of one of the DIY units. At the time it was worth it, as I only had 1 kid and some extra free time. Now, with a second kid and limited free time, i would probably buy one of the prepackaged systems and install it myself.

I hope this helps even though it isn't what I had hoped to provide.

So, I dug through my computer where I remember making a list of parts, prices and websites, and didn't find anything. The best I can give you is the process I used to pull the list together.

System Design:
There are plenty of DIY websites that want to sell you the kit for you to install yourself. These are relatively helpful in that they will allow you to spec out your system and get the parts list. The key is that these sites don't give you the full specs on the parts (i.e. pump pressure, and flow specs), but will sell you the parts and a decent markup. I recall going through several of these sites, until I got a good idea as to what the specs on the pump were.

Nozzles and Tubing:
These are easy to find on any number of websites. They generally give you the flow rating for the nozzles, but the operating pressure is harder to find. My recollection is that they ran between 100 and 250 psi, but that would DEFINITELY require verification. The flow rate on the nozzles are really low ( I recall 0.05 gallons per hour).

Pump/motor:
The maximum flow rate of the nozzles combined with the maximum number of nozzles This combined with the maximum number of nozzles for a 1/2 hp motor and pump combination will point you to the right direction for pumps. As I recall, I ended up finding pumps and motors on the Grainger website. It took a bit of searching and relearning about pump curves to pick one.

Controller:
The controller was hard to find, and I never did find the perfect fit. The requirement for the controller is to be able to control a decent size motor, AND have the ability to control to like 5 minute run times, multiple times per day (dawn and dusk). The recommended run duration can be obtained from a number of the DIY websites.

Tank:
Plastic drums were easy enough to find, or you could even use a garbage can.


In the end I was guestimating that I could probably save almost 25% on the price of one of the DIY units. At the time it was worth it, as I only had 1 kid and some extra free time. Now, with a second kid and limited free time, i would probably buy one of the prepackaged systems and install it myself.

I hope this helps even though it isn't what I had hoped to provide.

I know it's not automated but I bought a backpack sprayer last year similar to what mosquito joe uses. It has been working well for us.

Thanks CalAG, this may get me started once I get done rennovating the house...hopefully within a year or so! Appreciate the time and trouble you went through to provide this info.

jaggiemaggie said:

---

I know it's not automated but I bought a backpack sprayer last year similar to what mosquito joe uses. It has been working well for us.

---

What kind of price range up front, and recurring for the chemicals?

Can you post a link to the unit you purchased please? Thanks

The Fife said:

---

This came in the mail today. Hot death will rain upon all biting bugs on our half acre as soon as the chemicals I ordered get here. For now, the reaper waits patiently.

---

Wear a respirator, nitrile gloves and goggles at least. My dad had one and I willy nilly sprayed our yard several times a summer as a young kid. Worked but t is probably what gave me my childhood cancer.

I bought the blower made by stihl and I use talstar.

shimmeringshark said:

---

The Fife said:

---

This came in the mail today. Hot death will rain upon all biting bugs on our half acre as soon as the chemicals I ordered get here. For now, the reaper waits patiently.

---

Wear a respirator, nitrile gloves and goggles at least. My dad had one and I willy nilly sprayed our yard several times a summer as a young kid. Worked but t is probably what gave me my childhood cancer.

---

Yep, I've got all that. I also plan on using it in the evening when the air is still, starting at a far corner of the yard and working my way back towards the house.

The 3rd component came in the mail yesterday. Today it's supposed to rain so tomorrow the games begin!

Thanks CalAg and everyone else who replied. really appreciate the info!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4753954/Man-shows-kills-4-000-mosquitoes-NIGHT.html

Dan Rojas of YouTube channel GreenPowerScience revealed the cunning plan

He uses meshes on industrial-strength fans to trap the mosquitoes en masse

CO2 from a seltzer bottle or the breath of his dog Rocky acts as bait for the bugs

Rubbing alcohol is then sprayed on the trapped critters to kill them quickly

It evaporates leaving no residue - so lizards and ants can eat the bodies

Rojas stresses that Rocky never gets bit, and sleeps indoors at night