[mb42]

Great question. Those are the spacers I refer to in the original post. That was an important part of making the enclosure work for this purpose as I had several wires to hide and an electrical box that required extra depth.

I went to my local hardware store and found some nylon spacers. If you search Amazon for “nylon spacer bushing” you will see what I am referring to. I also brought one of the screws that came with the enclosure with me to the hardware store so I could find longer replacements. It was a little tricky to keep the spacers on the screws as I tilted the panel up and aligned them with the holes, but you can do it.

Best of luck! Let us know how it turns out.

[mb42]

I would also like to express my need for sequential programs (Not stations, as that already exists). In my case, I have 12 drip stations watering over 3 programs. Each program contains 4 drip stations running concurrently and the programs are balanced in accordance with my flow rate. These programs run for 30 minutes each, starting at 1am, 1:30am and 2am, respectively. This allows me to water at a relatively consistent rate for 90 minutes. This is vital to those of us on a well.

As mentioned, the challenge comes about when I utilize the weather adjustment. As you can imagine, when I adjust to 150%, for example, I have 8 stations running concurrently as the programs begin to overlap. This is a problem as I am exceeding my flow rate.

Being on a well, I wish to have my pump run continuously. Thus I do not want to spread out my start times to, say, 1am, 2am and 3am as this would cause unnecessary pump cycling (On for 30 minutes, off for 30 minutes – if weather is set to 100%). If the program logic worked hand-in-hand with the weather adjustment to run sequentially, this would alleviate the problem.

Thank you,
Mike

[mb42]

I have also seen this symptom (GFCI tripping unexpectedly) when there is more than one GFCI outlet on the same circuit.

[mb42]

As someone who had high hopes for OpenSprinkler when I purchased it several months ago, I remain quite disappointed with the limitations of programming in general. I too have 30+ zones. I have been forced to implement a complex array of 25+ programs and have to track them in a spreadsheet so as to make sure I do not have any overlap and risk programs not running.

I have created several, sometimes very detailed posts, explaining the challenges with OS programming and made many recommendations for solutions that align with what I believe would be a best-in-breed combination of a microprocessor based controller with features common to commercial controllers. These recommendations have been greeted with responses from Ray, which I certainly appreciate, stating these new features are “planned”.

But at this point, I have two remaining questions:
1. When will the new programming features be deployed?
2. How can I help OS evolve into a device that not only matches the programming capabilities of other controllers, but surpasses them? Hopefully my previous posts are helpful, but I am willing to help more.

Thank you,
Mike

[mb42]

@ray wrote:

OK, I will check the 64-bit version. The programs are written in Processing and exported using Processing as well. I am pretty sure we checked all platforms and made sure the updater program works on all. But you are right that the 32-bit version can work just fine on 64-bit Windows.

I did use the 32-bit version last night and it worked fine. There seems to be files missing from the 64-bit zip file.

[mb42]

@ray wrote:

I have expanded the zip, but see no obvious exe to launch the GUI.

In the unzipped folder, do you see a subfolder named application.windows or something like that? Go to that folder and you should find an executable program there.

In the “application.windows64” folder I see the following:
lib
source
osFirmwareUpdater.bat

When I attempt to run the batch file, I get an error: “‘java’ is not recognized as an internal or external command”

Anyway, I just downloaded the 32-bit version of the firmware updater as well. Looks like it contains an exe file. I will give that a try tonight. A detailed set of instructions for updating firmware (step-by-step) would be fantastic! I don’t want to turn my device into a brick.

[mb42]

I have been able to download the new firmware and GUI, enter bootloader mode and my Windows 7 PC recognizes the USB device in Device Manager – after installing the driver. My question is this; how do I then launch the GUI and proceed from there? I see no straightforward way to launch the GUI and I am stumped. I have expanded the zip, but see no obvious exe to launch the GUI.

All of the instructions for a firmware update seem to end at downloading the firmware updating tool. No real instructions beyond that seem to exist – or I am simply not looking in the right spot.

Help from experienced firmware updaters would be appreciated.

[mb42]

Great! Glad to hear Multiple Start Times are in the works. One other advantage of this feature I’ve noticed comes when using the “% Water Time” feature. As it stands now, it has been cool and I am running at 66%. With splitting up my watering into so many programs my system is watering, stopping, watering, stopping, etc. because my program start and stop times are set up with the assumption of 100%. For someone on a well, it is much better to have the system run for long periods of time and fewer programs allows for this.

Until then, I’m managing my 11 programs via a spreadsheet. Once we have Multiple Start Times implemented – as well as independent station run times in the same program – I’ll be down to a much more efficient/manageable 4 programs.

[mb42]

My recommendation would be this… Implement the Rain Delay feature in terms of days not hours. Commercial controllers I am familiar with are programmed in this manner. This makes it easier to push back any programming rather than skipping it.

For example, setting a rain delay of 1 day would delay everything scheduled during the current day, a 2 day rain delay also delays watering scheduled for tomorrow. Then, simply add the number of days delayed to the “Starting in X Days” parameter for each program. So if “Program 1” was set to run in 3 days, it would, under a 2 day Rain Delay, now be scheduled to run in 5 days.

In the case of a delay caused by rainfall, would you ever really be delaying watering for just a few hours? If it rains, I know I always want to delay (not skip) my watering schedule for at least a day or two. Thus, I believe the Rain Delay should be a true delay, and in days.

And if you would like to retain the current approach of skipping programming by a number of hours, you could potentially retain it as a “Shutdown Period” or similar. I think that better reflects the function.

[mb42]

To complement the “Run Every” option, I recommend you allow the user to set Multiple Start Times for each program. Multiple start times allows the user to run the program several times each day at times of his/her choosing. I recommend you allow at least 6 start times per program, per day. For example, the user could run the program early in the morning and then twice during the hot afternoon at specific times, but not at equal intervals. This is common on other/traditional controllers and much more flexible than the interval approach. And if you allow both, there is no trade-off.

Have you considered this feature?

[mb42]

Hello Ray,

I ordered my OpenSprinkler last night and am very much looking forward to receiving it. This device is something I have literally day-dreamt of for many years – ever since installing my Hunter controller 10 years ago. This is a fantastic concept and I am happy to see someone with your background and talent is so passionate about making it a full-featured product.

Anyway, I am very interested to see the ability to assign different station water times within a single program. Actually, that seemed like a bit of an omission when I viewed the firmware 1.8 video tutorial. I realized that I would be able to work around it with so many programs available, however, with 28 zones in my complex landscape, this feature is a must. Thus, my question is this… When do you foresee a new firmware update that includes this functionality?

Thank you in advance!
Mike

[Author]

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