sprinklers_pi – An alternative sprinkler control program

[Ray]

After the winter season, yesterday I’ve activated my OSPi, connected to the web interface and tried to manually switch on one of the zones. Nothing happens. No switching, no water, no error message in the log. What’s going wrong here? Is there a problem with the hardware? How can I test/fix it?
rok

I assume you are using the sprinklers_pi program for manual control, is that right? Which version of OSPi do you have?

[nayr]

a multimeter set to VAC to check for voltage across COM and the station that is on is how you test the unit is switching.

did you have your system winterized? have you gone through opened all the valves and turned the water back on? It takes a several mins to refill my lines every spring before enough pressure builds to push the heads up and theres several valves that need opened and a few that need closed.. just booting the sprinkler back up in the spring usually isint enough.

[aweber1nj]

I actually have one of these (8ch) on my workbench: http://www.amazon.com/SainSmart-2-Channel-Duemilanove-MEGA2560-MEGA1280/dp/B0079WI2ZC/ref=cm_cd_al_qh_dp_t and am wondering if anyone has tried using it for the 24vac sprinkler valves? I ask because the info in the description says the SSR’s “Load Voltage Range: 75 to 264VAC”, and we’re talking about 24VAC (outside/below the range) here.

It would be a bit traumatic to run all my stuff outside and rip apart the current controller just to test, so it’s not that I’m just being lazy 😉

Thanks in advance for any insight.

-AJ

[rok]

@ray wrote:

After the winter season, yesterday I’ve activated my OSPi, connected to the web interface and tried to manually switch on one of the zones. Nothing happens. No switching, no water, no error message in the log. What’s going wrong here? Is there a problem with the hardware? How can I test/fix it?
rok

I assume you are using the sprinklers_pi program for manual control, is that right? Which version of OSPi do you have?

Hi ray!
I am using the alternative webinterface (1.0.6 – updated to 1.0.7) from Richard Zimmermann.
Should I try it on the root-console? Could you tell me how to do it?

[rok]

@nayr wrote:

a multimeter set to VAC to check for voltage across COM and the station that is on is how you test the unit is switching.

This was the first one in my test. No voltage change, if I manually switch on by webinterface.

@nayr wrote:

did you have your system winterized? have you gone through opened all the valves and turned the water back on? It takes a several mins to refill my lines every spring before enough pressure builds to push the heads up and theres several valves that need opened and a few that need closed.. just booting the sprinkler back up in the spring usually isint enough.

The valves and sprinklers working well. I tested it by attaching the valve cables on the power supply.

[nayr]

might take your microcontroller out, power up the OSboard and test that there is power on the other side of the triacs, if so it could be a signaling problem.. Check the Pi next all by its self and make sure its outputting a signal on the GPIO pins for the OpenSprinkler.

If you got no power on the other side of the triac then keep trying to trace it further up the schematics to see if there is a bad component on your OSBoard

[rok]

Uhm, sorry. I have no glue about all that things 😳
Could you please explain it for a noob like me?

[nayr]

Well; umm.. I guess pull your Pi out of the OS Board put some header pins (Ray sent me some with my OSBo) or jumper wires in the same pins connected to the OSBo and using a multimeter see if your getting any output (3.3v DC) with all the stations enabled.. verify output is gone with stations disabled.. This should verify your Pi is sending a signal. Sorry I dont have a pi so I dont know exactly what pins your looking for but it shouldent be too hard to figure out.

If your pi is sending a signal than its likely the OSPi board is faulty; if your not getting a signal out the Pi either you have a software issue or a faulty-pi

[rok]

Got it!
It was that damn connection cable between Raspberry and the Pi board. Fixed it and it works!!

[Ray]

@rok: if the cable becomes unreliable, you can send an email to [email protected] to request a new set of cables.

[rok]

@ray wrote:

@rok: if the cable becomes unreliable, you can send an email to [email protected] to request a new set of cables.

Thanks ray. I buyed a new one. I am from germany. I think the shipping cost are more expensive than the cables 😉

[tkessler2]

I’m in Mexico hoping to pick up my OS Pi system next week. My watering system is at a “weekend” vacation home; I’m getting big water bills. I’m trying to reconcile my water meter readings with sprinkler usage. Air in the city lines is a known problem, nor can I discount leaks or unaware consumption somewhere.

I’m about to go to the municipality and donate to them a better air valve and meter with pulse output. That will allow me to put a data logger on the meter; it would be way cooler if the PI could log the pulses directly..That would make it easier to correlate the watering cycles with the consumption, have the data available via the net, etc.

I don’t have a lot of time to dig into the code…will try…for now I submit as a feature suggestion… Debugging water consumption, like power, is going to be a big deal…The pi has all the capability…. Another cool feature would be the ability to log actual flow from a sensor on a line. For instance, incoming municpal water branches to two lines, you’re trying to troubleshoot consumption to one of the lines, need to log on each line…

thanks,

Tom

[Ceer123]

I just got my system setup and I am impressed with the software. I am using a relay board to drive the valves directly. So far it has been working fine. I am having trouble keeping the application running however. I have had to restart it twice in 24 hours. I checked the log but there is nothing in there useful. Is there a way to increase logging to see what is causing the crash?

Also, we have had a a couple cool days this week which caused the weather adjust to not run the schedule at all. It would be great to see in the log that the weather caused the schedule to not run. Right now it doesn’t log anything. I modified the Weather.cpp file to adjust the temperature by a factor of 2 instead of 4 so the schedule would run. (50 degrees is -80% added to the humidity adjustment equaled -100%)

Finally, on the log what is the Y axis? Would it be possible to make that gallons of water? If you could specify in the zone setup how many gallons per minute each zone uses the graph could do a calculation to see how many gallons were used.

[rhillman]

HI Tom, Ray,

Our flow meter is a netafim flow meter we used for the cyber-rain irrigation controller. Most of these have what’s called a pulse reed switch that pulses the output after every gallon.
Should be able to just have a pull-up resistor connect to the switch such that the switch pulls the signal down when pulsed. If you count the pulses per time period you would know the flow rate.
With your newest design if you could have some area on the board to wire this in that would be great.

The flow rate when the valve is just turned on is not a good indication for leak detection. You have to wait until all the lines fill up and the air is out. This depends on many factors in your system but is usually 20-90 seconds. Then the system can sample the flow rate once stabilized and give a very accurate flow rate. It won’t find a very small leak, but does tend to find if a head is broken off or a pipe has a crack in it. It has helped us tremendously and saved us a lot of money by detecting problems early on.

One of the other posts someone mentioned using a pressure sensor for detecting leaks. I don’t recommend this. Most irrigation systems have a pressure regulator and it’s primary goal is to maintain the water pressure even if you have higher or lower flow rate. Maybe there are some isolated situations where a pressure sensor works, but we have had great luck with the flow sensor.

To detect leaks the best way we have found is to use 1 good flow sensor installed before all your valves. Then when you turn on a valve you can check the flow rate for that valve. Also if your yard has hose connections and someone leaves that on, it should see it as well – so for example if it see’s a flow rate for more than X minutes after the last valve is off then it could email you. Also this helps detect leaks in the main lines BEFORE the valves. And if a valve fails to turn on, you would get an underflow condition so you would know one zone isn’t working properly.

[renoir]

Hi Richard,

thank you so much for sprinklers_pi! This software is fantastic! Especially the automatic timer adjustment based on values provided by wunderground is a huge improvement over common on/off rain sensors. I’m interested a lot in this part of your program. So far I’ve found the formula in weather.cpp, however I don’t understand how this formula has been put together. If you could share your insights… I’m asking because slight modifications or even 2 distinct formulas might be useful. I use a micro irrigation system in my garden. My potted plants are on different circuits than those planted directly into the soil. Soil in pots tends to dry out faster (less volume, the pots are porous, etc), therefore I believe it would make sense in a fully automated irrigation system to take into account at least two formulas for different evaporation factors, one that kicks in sooner than the other. If you would comment on the formula, I’d have something to work with.

Btw, I already made a french translation of the webif and I could make a german one, too. If this is of any use, let me know where tho send the translated content.

[himanshulotia]

Hi Richard,

I have installed your program and it works very well. However, as I live in Mildura ,Australia (zip code 3500), your program doesn’t accept my zip code. I read somewhere that it require 5 digit zip code. Can you please amend your code so it can start accepting zip code from other regions as well other than USA / Canada.

Also , I am not programmer but when , I open your weather script , it relies on yesterday’s rain amount, wouldn’t be it is useful, if it checks current condition or condition within 6-10 hours and than decide on adjusting watering time / flow.

Another , addition would be if system can get data regarding heatwave and update frequency of water based on number of hot days , would also be effective.

These are my suggestions. Also please let me know, once you update weather script , so it can accept any zip code from around the world.

Looking for future upgrade.

Thanks

[jonathon]

Can you please amend your code so it can start accepting zip code from other regions as well other than USA / Canada.

Hi himanshulotia,

Rather than using a zip code, I think you should be able to use the “PWS ID. The PWS ID can be found on the Weather Underground site in the header of each weather station. For example, see image attached.

[himanshulotia]

Hi, Jonathon,

It works great..

Thanks for your help.

[llomll]

Hello,

The program is great and I have been successfully using it for a month now. I have one questions though, not sure if it is feasible or now.

I am sharing the same Pi for Sprinklers and landscape lights. The issue I run into is that the sprinkers_pi goes and sets all the GPIOs low prior to turning sprinkler GPIO High. This results in my landscape lights to go OFF prior to sunrise.

Any thoughts how I can go about “excluding” the landscape light GPIO so that it does not get set to low by sprinklers_pi?

Thanks,

[Sepp1945]

Hi Jonathan,

I have setup the WUnderground as per instructions, but I get —- Invalid Response from WUnderground server!—-
I have the following settings
IP 118.214.200.120
API Key: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx07
set to PWS
PWS ID IQUEENSL351
Port 8080

Your help is very much appreciated

Thanks

Sepp

[jonathon]

HI Sepp, try changing your Weather Underground IP to: 38.102.136.138
I too was initially using the wrong IP address. I assumed that I should enter the ip address for api.wunderground.com but was corrected by the helpful users of this forum.

[Sepp1945]

sorry Jonatham,

did the change but still the same reply … should I get a new key? many thanks

Sepp

[Jmgreen7]

Hey all,
I apologize if this has been asked already but the thread is 18 pages deep. I’m looking to build one of these but I’m sure what hardware I need.
I had this picked out: http://www.amazon.com/RASPBERRY-MODEL-756-8308-Raspberry-Pi/dp/B009SQQF9C but I know that it doesn’t come power or whatever programming cable (USB?) that it needs. I then looked at this :
http://www.amazon.com/Raspberry-Ultimate-Includes-Essential-Accessories/dp/B00CXACPN0
Can some of you guys walk me through what I need to get started?
Thanks,
Jason

[kandlg]

@Jmgreen7 wrote:

Hey all,
I apologize if this has been asked already but the thread is 18 pages deep. I’m looking to build one of these but I’m sure what hardware I need.
I had this picked out: http://www.amazon.com/RASPBERRY-MODEL-756-8308-Raspberry-Pi/dp/B009SQQF9C but I know that it doesn’t come power or whatever programming cable (USB?) that it needs. I then looked at this :
http://www.amazon.com/Raspberry-Ultimate-Includes-Essential-Accessories/dp/B00CXACPN0
Can some of you guys walk me through what I need to get started?
Thanks,
Jason

See the bottom of page 2 of the manual on the product page:

http://rayshobby.net/docs/ospi14_manual.pdf

The pi in your first link is what I used. Buy a 4GB or larger SD micro SD card and a USB/wifi dongle if you don’t have ethernet where it will be installed. If you already have a working 24 VAC sprinkler system you don’t need anything else.

[Jmgreen7]

Thanks for the input. For some reason, I was under the impression that all I needed was a pi board. What is the ospi(sp) board providing so I understand why it’s needed?

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