I, like many Americans, have a plastic watering can with no rosette. Rosette being the term-of-art for “sprinkler head”. The rosette was lost years ago, but the watering can itself remains in fine shape.
This is a classic pain-in-the-butt problem in our disposable society. No parts available: Nobody sells a rosette to fit this can. Cheaper to buy new: The generic one-size-fits-most rosettes I can buy (with shipping) cost more than a new plastic watering can.
Sure, if I’d bought an upscale watering can, the manufacturer would sell me my choice of replacement rosettes, at an appropriately upscale price. But this is a generic plastic can that I picked up at Ace Hardware a decade ago. It’s a nice, durable, functional design. But it’s not an artisanal watering can.
Rather than toss it, after looking in vain for a replacement rosette, I decided to make a new rosette for it.
If the opening of your watering can spout is about 1″ in diameter, plus or minus, you can make a replacement watering can sprinkler head out of a small over-the-counter (OTC) medicine bottle, e.g., the soft HDPE (high-density polyethylene) white plastic bottle that is the typical way that a small quantity of aspirin or Ibuprofen would be sold at the drugstore.
I found this “pill bottle” solution on the internet (reference The Wisconsin Vegetable Gardener, on YouTube). After looking over half-a-dozen D-I-Y rosette plans, this seemed to be the simplest.
But I improve it a bit, in this post.
First, I show how to use heat and a hose clamp to fit the plastic pill bottle to the spout of the watering can. Second, I use a needle (or small nail) attached to a soldering iron to melt the holes in the pill bottle. That said, you could also drill the holes, if you prefer.
I’m not claiming this is the only reasonable approach. You could attach something to the end of a watering can spout in many different ways. You could, for example, hot-glue it, or epoxy it. Worst comes to worst, you could just duct-tape it in place.
But what I did — using heat and a hose clamp — has the advantage of being very solidly attached, and yet easily removed and replaced.
Just do it.
Step 1: Obtain your pill bottle.
You will need a small HDPE plastic OTC medicine bottle. I keep saying HDPE because you want the soft, pliable bottle that (e.g.) Ibuprofen is sold in, not the rigid plastic bottle that actual prescriptions come in. In the U.S., the smallest of these OTC medicine pill bottles will have a 1″ opening, and be maybe 2.5 to 3 inches tall. As shown above.
Now you have to do just two things:
Make holes in that bottle
Attach it firmly to your watering can spout.
Step 2: Make holes in the bottle.
You can use a drill and small drill bits, but I decided to use a soldering iron to melt holes in the bottle. This goes faster than drilling, and leaves no ragged bits of plastic. To melt holes, take the tip off the soldering iron and clamp a sewing needle or small (e.g., paneling) nail to the end. The hot needle or nail will easily pierce the bottom of the HDPE bottle.
“Normal rosette”: The surviving rosette on the matching watering can has 36 holes, 5/64″ diameter (just over 1/16″). The curve of the rosette face means that the water streams spread out quite a bit.
I never liked the rosette that came with the can. It was too slow for watering large areas of the garden. The shower was too broad for watering a single small plant. And yet the individual streams of water were too large for watering seedlings without knocking them down.
I made two different replacement rosettes.
“Seedling rosette”: Use a hot sewing needle to melt approximately 40 holes in the bottom of the pill bottle. This results in many tiny gentle streams of water, and is good for watering small seedlings.
“Fast rosette”: Use a hot small nail (e.g., paneling nail) to melt approximately 60 holes in the bottom of the pill bottle. Angle the holes on the outer edge slightly (but only slightly) away from the middle. This results in a very dense stream of water, suitable for watering rows of plants quickly.
I assume I don’t have to detail how to drill or melt holes. Hold the bottle in one hand, hold the tool in the other, and go for it. Wear work gloves.
Edit 4/30/2024: In hindsight, don’t put so many holes in the bottom. The issue is that some of the water streams from closely-spaced holes will merge. The result is an uneven shower of water. If you want a “faster” head, use fewer, larger holes. I’ll be throwing away my “fast” rosette and redoing it in this fashion.
Step 3: Attach bottle to watering can.
Here’s where things get fancy. In my case, I need to firmly attach an HDPE pill bottle with a 1″ opening, to a watering can spout that’s well under an inch in diameter.
Plausibly, you could just hot-glue it. Spread hot glue on the end of the spot, jam on the pill bottle, and you’re done. Maybe drill some holes in spout and can to give the hot glue physical purchase. Or epoxy.
But I like to be able to remove the rosette to clean it. (This, because I use rain barrels, and there are always little bits of leaf trash and such in the water.) I want this to be firmly attached, but removable.
And I mean firmly.
I do not treat these watering cans nicely. I don’t want to have to treat them nicely. I don’t want some Mickey-Mouse attachment. That rules out duct tape and similar.
My solution is a stainless-steel hose clamp (1″ to 1.5″, depending on the spout), a heat gun (or hair dryer, probably), and a piece of electrician’s tape, used like pipe-thread-sealing tape, to ensure a water-tight seal.
Put the hose clamp around the mouth of the pill bottle. If the child-proof-cap ridge gets in the way, take a sharp knife and trim that ridge off. (One bottle I used required that, one did not).
Tighten the hose clamp, mount the bottle on the spout, and heat the hose clamp area evenly with the heat gun. Move the heat gun around. It only takes a few seconds for the HDPE to soften. At which point, tighten the hose clamp. Maybe hit it with the heat again, and tighten again.
Hint: If you smell plastic, then the HDPE is plenty hot enough. If the surface of the plastic starts to get shiny, then you are way over plenty hot enough. Seriously, with a real heat gun, on high, we’re talking maybe ten seconds.
Anyway, tighten the clamp fully tight, let it cool, then loosen the hose clamp slightly and unscrew the pill bottle from the end of the spout.
I could not get the two hard plastic surfaces (pill bottle and watering can spout) to form a watertight seal. Wrap a couple of layers of electrician’s tape tightly around the (threaded) end of the watering can spout. (This, to form a seal, as you would using Teflon tape on regular pipe threads.) Thread the pill bottle back onto the spout. Tighten the hose clamp.
And you are done.
Edit 4/30/2024: In hindsight, skip the electrician’s tape, particularly if you want to be able to swap different rosettes on the same watering can. The tape does give you a nice, firm, watertight seal. The problem is, it’s a little too firm. It makes it a struggle to remove the rosette, e.g., to change from a normal rosette to a seedling rosette, or to remove the rosette to clean out accumulated debris. On balance, I think it’s better to leak a bit of water, as you water, but be able to remove the rosette easily.
Conclusion
My two new pill-bottle rosettes work exactly as planned.
The “fast rosette” shown above gives a dense, concentrated shower of water. The “seedling rosette” (not shown) gives a shower of gentle, needle-thin water streams. It’s a solid build, in that the hose clamp keeps them attached.
The only thing lacking is the ability to swap between them quickly.
Kudos to The Wisconsin Vegetable Gardener for the original pill bottle concept. All I did was work out how to adjust the fit.
Appendix: Internet options for D-I-Y rosettes
The first step in this was to find solutions on the internet. This is what I came up with after 15 minutes of search via Google, for watering can rosette, and watering can head:
- PVC plumbing parts, hot glue (Instructables).
- Tuna can (YouTube)
- OTC medicine (e.g., aspirin) bottle (YouTube).
- Soda bottle and a piece of pipe (Facebook).
- Soda bottle and electrical tape (YouTube).
- 3D printer (Printables.com).
- Peanut butter jar lid (not a generic fix, works for one brand only, YouTube)
Of those, option 3 (pill bottle, The Wisconsin Vegetable Gardner, on YouTube) looked the most feasible, and possibly the least goofy.
Option 1 looks very solid, but was more work than I cared to go to. Option 2 also required some effort, and I wasn’t too keen on using a metal can. Options 4 and 5 rely on soda bottles, and just looked flimsier than I cared to make. Option 6 is both out-of-scope, and not guaranteed to fit. Option 7 doesn’t apply to my can.
The clear winner was Option 3. OTC medicine bottles are made out of thick HDPE plastic, which is going to last a lot longer than a soda bottle. All I needed to do was figure out how to adjust the size of the bottle opening to fit my watering can.
