Thank you Ray, I am not entirely sure if I needed a soil sensor and a LM393 analog comparator.
Is it possible if I can ask it simply if the below soil sensor will be compatible and that sensor would be the only thing I need to buy to connect it to the OpenSprinkler?
I did ask the chatGPT about the soil sensor and wonder if all the info below that was said is more or less true and I could go ahead and buy this soil sensor?
ChatGPT answer:
Hunter Soil-Clik: This is a soil moisture sensor that uses a hygroscopic disc to detect moisture levels in soil. It has a dry contact output that can be connected to an irrigation controller or other device. The sensor is easy to install and requires no maintenance.
Yes, the Hunter Soil-Clik is compatible with the OpenSprinkler irrigation controller. The Soil-Clik is designed to work with any irrigation controller that has a normally closed (NC) or normally open (NO) switch input. The OpenSprinkler controller has a switch input that can be configured as either NC or NO, depending on the type of switch being used.
To connect the Soil-Clik to the OpenSprinkler, you will need to connect the two wires from the Soil-Clik’s dry contact output to the switch input on the OpenSprinkler controller. The Soil-Clik comes with a pigtail wire that can be used for this purpose. You can also connect multiple Soil-Clik sensors to a single OpenSprinkler controller, as long as each sensor is connected to a separate switch input.
Once the Soil-Clik is connected to the OpenSprinkler, you can configure the controller to use the sensor to trigger irrigation. You can set the Soil-Clik to activate irrigation when the soil moisture drops below a certain threshold, and you can also set a delay time to prevent the sensor from triggering irrigation too frequently. The OpenSprinkler’s user manual provides detailed instructions on how to configure the controller to use the Soil-Clik sensor.