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I am trying to understand the issue: I don’t think the program simply stops when the wifi is lost, the only reason program stops is if the controller reboots. Which firmware version are you on? If you are on the latest 2.1.9(2) it records reboot reason which will help diagnose the situation.
I can’t answer questions 1 and 2, but regarding 3: no, there is no new hardware release on the horizon. new firmware can always be uploaded to your controller when they are released.
What’s your master solenoid’s brand name and model number? Is it a pump start relay or is it a solenoid?
I think I got confused: by saying “upgraded the OS on the wireless router”, I guess you mean the operating system on your wireless router? I thought “OS” means OpenSprinkler, but given your description, it sounds like by OS you mean operating system.
By “did an upgrade on the OS for our wireless router” did you mean you upgraded the firmware on the OS, or did you mean you upgraded the router?
The controller works either in WiFi or wired Ethernet mode, but not both. If you plug in the wired Ethernet module, it will only function in wired Ethernet mode and will NOT transmit any WiFi signal.
Besides, to use WiFi you actually have to configure it to log onto your WiFi router. If you never configure it, of course it will never send any WiFi signal.
Yes, you can. This can be done by using the ‘HTTP Station’ feature — you can take a look at the OSBee API to see what command to use to trigger a zone to run on OSBee, and basically set up a zone on your OpenSprinkler as HTTP zone with that command. This way, when the zone is turned on or off, it send a HTTP command to OSBee to trigger the actual zone action.
The current version of OpenSprinkler 3.0 allows an Ethernet add-on: you can purchase OpenSprinkler 3.0 with the wired Ethernet add-on.
@JonInAz: what specific error message are you getting? “unsuccessful” does not give enough details for diagnosing the problem.
First thing is to check the orange terminal block: on your picture, the pin on the left (closer to a row of 5 or 6 ground pins) should be ground, and the pin on the right (closer to the COM) terminal is the COM wire. So obviously these two pins (on the orange terminal clock) are NOT connected — the two sharp triangles facing each other are called PCB spark gaps, they are for releasing high voltage charges but are normally completed separated from each other.
Next, if you are using 12VDC to power the board, DC power has polarity. So make sure the negative of the power goes to the ground pin on the orange terminal block, and the positive goes to the other (i.e. COM wire).
If the power is connected correctly, the power supply’s negative pin is obviously shared with the circuit ground, and that in turn should be shared with each of your transistors’ emitter pins.
1) It depends on which version of OpenSprinkler hardware you have:
– for OS 2.x and OSPi: the cable uses 8 wires
– for OS 3.x, if your controller is AC-powered, it only uses 6 wires; if DC-powered, 8 wires; if Latch, 10 wires.
Judging from your description, I assume you have OpenSprinkler 3.x. If your controller is AC-powered, then you only need 6 wires. A standard Ethernet cable has enough wires to make a custom cable.2) I am not sure what’s the name of the plug, I know that it’s the same type as IDE cable in computer systems, but with less number of wires (IDE cable usually has 2×20 wires).
3) No, the expander does NOT need to be connected to a transformer. However, all zones on the exapnder share the same COM (common) wire, which is not part of the extension cable. So if you are thinking of having some zones 50m away from the main controller, and some more 100 meters, then those zones must also have a COM (common) wire, and that wire needs to go all the way back to the main controller. So technically your common wire also needs to be that long, in addition to the custom extension cable. On the other hand, the common wire is shared by all zones so you only need one such wire.
@jsmart4: thanks for your feedback. Please note that we also offer Raspberry Pi-based OpenSprinkler, which is based on RPi and it runs a full Linux operating system, with both WiFi and Ethernet connection options.
Also, OS 3.0 is based on ESP8266, a 32-bit MCU, not 8-bit. I honestly do not know what causes the connectivity issues in your case, particular as you encountered it both in the WiFi version and Ethernet version. I honestly admit the product hasn’t been tested exhaustively with all WiFi routers or Ethernet switches — we can only test it with the WiFi router models we have. That said, I don’t think the connectivity issue is a generic issue with the product itself. I think it has to do with your particular network setup, which, without the ability to replicate here in house, I do not really know how to diagnose the issue.
I am not familiar with batteries used in solar power systems, but I believe 12VDC output is pretty standard and OpenSprinkler DC-powered or Latch both accept 12VDC input (a few volts higher is fine, but should not be more than 15VDC).
Latch is supposed to be more power efficient as the valve stays indefinitely in one state and only draws power when you change its state (from open to close and vice versa). That said, the controller itself also consumes a certain amount of power (around 100mA to 150mA in idle state). As it uses linear regulator to drop 12VDC to internal voltage, this is a power consumption of about 12*0.1 to 12*0.15, which is 1.2 to 1.8 Watt power, which pretty small.
If you go with DC-powered OpenSprinkler, each valve when open consumes about 12VDC * 0.3A = 3.6 Watt power.
Yes, the OLED display used for OpenSprinkler is 0.96″ I2C SSD1306. You can find it on many websites, including Aliexpress, on which many vendors sell it for just a couple of dollars with shipping included. Just watch out the pin ordering: it should be GND-VCC-SCL-SDA, which is the most common type. I am, however, aware of a couple of new models which use VCC-GND-SCL-SDA ordering, and that is incompatible. So check out their product pictures before burying.
The best way for now is to buy directly from our website. We ship orders to Australia every day. Among all countries, shipping to Australia is surprisingly reliable and fast (delivery time is usually around one week with Express and two weeks with first-class).
@mmavrof: sorry, my message was meant for those who have OS 3.x with wired Ethernet module. Since you have OS 2.3, that doesn’t have replaceable ethernet module, so we will have to try to resolve it through firmware changes.
As long as you have a sufficiently beefy power adapter, you should be able to open 6 valves at the same time. Yes, 3A is plenty for 6 to 8 simultaneous valves.
I am not familiar with the “modular contactor” that you linked to. Usually to control a pump the common way is to use a pump start relay, which many manufacturers sell.
There is always the possibility that the Ethernet module itself is the problem. If you submit a support ticket, we can arrange to send a replacement Ethernet module to see if it addresses the issue. You can also search for ‘ENC28J60 module’ on Amazon to get a replacement.
I guess the best way to debug is to acquire the same router so we can do some in-house testing. Out of curiosity, where did you buy this router? I looked on Amazon and can’t find this particular model.
1. While the built-in support for master zones only handles 2 masters, you can always achieve similar effects by manually schedule master zones. Specifically, OpenSprinkler supports ‘parallel zones’, so if you need 3 master zones, you can just set those three zones as ‘parallel’ (i.e. turn off ‘sequential’ flag), then manually schedule each in a program with other zones. This is not as convenient as automatic scheduling of master zones as the two built-in ones do, but it does allow you to achieve more than 2 master zones.
2. Each main controller only supports 1 flow meter at the moment (while there are two sensor ports, only Sensor 1 port supports flow sensor). If you want 3 independent flow meters, you will need 3 main controllers.
3. OpenSprinkler support sequential zone operations. Yes it can work with IFTTT to trigger an action when temperature forecast is above some threshold. This can be done by setting up an IFTTT applet, where the trigger is temperature condition, action is a webhook command sent to OpenSprinkler, you can use the ‘run a program’ API to trigger a specific program to run when the temperature condition is met.
4. By default we use DarkSky weather data. You can check DarkSky website for weather data reliability near your location.
5. OpenSprinkler 3 now supports both WiFi and wired Ethernet. If you have powerline Ethernet adapter, you can surely use wired Ethernet on OpenSprinkler.
Yes, the power adapter (12VDC, 2.5A) is fine. If you want to double check, you can use a multimeter to measure the voltage, the polarity should be center positive, side negative (this is the most common type). DC-powered OpenSprinkler can accept any DC voltage in the range of 7.5VDC to 12VDC, with a minimum of 1 amp output current. More than 1 amp (such as 2.5 amp) is totally fine, and it allows you to open mutliple valves at the same time, but is not necessary if you only ever run one or two valves at the same time.
Well, this cannot possibly be caused by upgrading firmware — the IC chip popping is gotta be a hardware-related problem and should have nothing to do with firmware update. So it’s probably a co-incidence that it happened more or less at the same time with the firmware update.
You can send a support ticket at support.opensprinkler.com. From the look of the board, this seems revision 0 of OS 3.0. We do still have a few replacement power boards and will respond to your support ticket once it’s in.
