Recent Posts

71

Smart Irrigation Discussion / Horse arena watering

« Last post by bluewater on May 15, 2012, 08:13:26 pm »

Just a quick note to say thanks for a great product. We're using an EtherRain 7P to control a 2-zone system pumping out 45gpm of rainwater catchment onto a horse arena. It's great to be able to remotely fire up the system from home 30 minutes before going out to drag the arena. We've used it for a season now and I just fired up the system after winterization and all continues to work perfectly. Thanks!

72

Feature Requests / Re: More water on hot, dry days

« Last post by Jim on May 11, 2012, 07:42:27 am »

Hi djrobx,

Thanks for your input; it's an interesting idea, and historic monthly or seasonal temperatures are generally available.

JIm

73

Feature Requests / More water on hot, dry days

« Last post by djrobx on May 10, 2012, 07:18:57 pm »

We've had LawnCheck going for a good year now.   What a nice, solid product.  I recommend it wherever I can.

One fairly big limitation I've observed is that my lawn is not getting enough water during unseasonably hot or dry weather.  

LawnCheck has as "Hot days" feature, but one temperature threshold is not sufficient.   85 degrees is unseasonably hot for May, but is a cool day in August.    This means I have to manually adjust it every month.    It'd be neat if we could specify a "hot" day as a number of degrees away from the "season average" that most weather services provide.

Another way to attack this issue is to look at the humidity level.  My lawn really has problems when the humidity gets into the single digits like it has this week.

Thanks for the great product!

74

New Questions, Ask Your Questions Here / Re: Master Valve

« Last post by Knighty on January 09, 2012, 01:36:01 pm »

Jim

Thanks for the response. Yes, it explains it perfectly. Should have the EtherRain units delivered this week from US ( I am in Autralia) so can get system working.

Regards
Knighty

75

New Questions, Ask Your Questions Here / Re: Master Valve

« Last post by Jim on January 04, 2012, 06:12:43 pm »

Hello Knighty,

You have the EtherRain 7P controller so you don't have to worry about control of the master valve through the LawnCheck scheduler.  With the 7P the relay that controls the master valve closes automatically when a cycle is run.   This causes power to be sent to the master valve thereby opening it.  This assumes of course that the master valve is connected to the terminal indicated on the label.   The relay automatically opens (thus removing power from the master valve) automatically when the cycle has completed.  

Also, with EtherRain 7P you can control a maximum of 7 zones and any value entered in zone 8 in your LawnCheck schedule is ignored by the controller.

Hope this answers your question.

Jim

76

New Questions, Ask Your Questions Here / Master Valve

« Last post by Knighty on December 23, 2011, 12:58:01 am »

Only new to LawnCheck and just planning the installation of my EtherRain unit to be run through LawnCheck. I am intending to run a Master Valve to only be open when the individual zone valves are switched on. This is as a double safety as the garden is at my holiday house and last year one valve did not shut properly resulting in a very expensive water bill. My issue is I cannot figure out how you do this with LawnCheck, cannot inf a thread dealing with the issue so any assistance would be great.

Thanks
Knighty

77

General Lawn and Garden Irrigation / Re: Thanks for another great year

« Last post by Jim on December 10, 2011, 10:48:49 pm »

Hello Gangee,
Thanks for your note.  Sorry for the belated response.

LawnCheck had a lot of new members this year (2011) and we beefed up the mobile access site a bit.  If you want to try out instant access so you can more easily test your zones with an iPhone, iTouch, or Android, when spring comes around please let me know and I'll set up your account and explain how.

LawnCheck now has users on five continents!

Cheers,
Jim

78

General Lawn and Garden Irrigation / Thanks for another great year

« Last post by Gangee on October 19, 2011, 07:54:49 am »

Howdy Jim,

Just wanted to thank you for another great season using LawnCheck. It's made all the difference for me. It's allowed me to take over the management of my property, it got me back out in my yard. While I'm still nothing more than a hack gardener, I'm learning. And I enjoy it. Next year I'll add another zone or two, that'll dial things in even more.

LawnCheck is fantastic, I look forward to using it for years to come.

Thanks again,

79

Feature Requests / two pause features

« Last post by ihstiv on October 08, 2011, 08:54:30 am »

1. I would like to have the ability to click a single button to pause all zones at once - essentially and 'off' switch, that would remain off until I switch it back to 'on'.

Currently I have to pause each zone individually, and specify how many days I want to pause for. It makes sense to leave this feature intact, but just add a global 'off' switch as well. I suppose I could just unplug the controller to have the same effect, but it's not in a convenient location for me, and I'd like to be able to do it remotely.

2. It would be great if there were a feature that could be configured to 'pause' all zones for x # of days after it rains. I think it would have to be based on weather reports and/or rainbrain - with the pause switch being tripped after x amount of continuous rain. 

The ground stays nice and wet here for several days here after a big rain.

Cheers
Steve

80

Feature Requests / Re: Feature request: usage log web interface

« Last post by ihstiv on October 08, 2011, 08:47:05 am »

Hi Steve,

Thanks for your request.  I have a few things in queue before getting to charts.  However, if you or anyone else reading the forum has an idea of the type of chart, and the format, it's possible the such a report could be generated given that it's much easier to write a report than it is to write an iPhone app   and if the format made sense, maybe we could do it sooner.  Monitoring water use is a big part of saving water, and that's what we want to help to do as a primary goal of LawnCheck..

Thanks,

JIm

Hi Jim,
Sorry for the delayed response.

The main issue w/ the current text/log files for me is that I have a hard time figuring out which cycles have run since their names arent displayed.

I guess what I'm after is just an easier way to take a look at the cycle run history on the site at a glance. I'm not married to the details for how this would be set up.  It's just a lot of clicks and head scratching currently.

Thanks
Steve