I have the Rachio 3 sprinkler controller and a Husqvarna 450x automower.
Both the sprinklers and the mower run automatically as needed.
The mower is not ment to mow when sprinklers are running. For one, it breaks the sprinklerheads and the blades get damaged, also the strong water spray might get inside and damage the electronics.
How can I set up Rachio to stop automatic watering when the mower is active?
Does IFTTT add any features to realize this?
Currently I just allow the mower to mow at certain times and the sprinklers to come on at other times.
I’d prefer fully automatic sync between the mower and sprinkler controller.
Assuming you want to use the Flex Daily Schedule, it’s pretty easy. You can set FDS to not run say 1-2 days a week and to start late at night. For my system I start at 0003 hrs Su-Mo–We-Th-Fr-Sa.
You’ll notice Tuesdays it doesn’t water. And starting just after midnight, all watering is done by 6:00 am. Thus there is no watering from 6:00 am Monday through 00:03 am Wednesday. That leaves Tuesdays for mowing dry grass.
Thank you 7! I thought do do something like that too, but my lawn looks much better if it is cut more frequently than just once a week.
The setting I used last summer was to let the mower run during daytime and water at night. But as you mentioned, it is better to mow the lawn after a longer watering pause.
Also watering at night is noisy for one and damaging the plants roots.
Husqvarna does seem to use IFTTT, as far as setting up an integration to stop Rachio when its on, you would have to research into that on your own or through husqvarna or community boards.
Worst case, you might be able to wire a contact switch in as a rain sensor; when the mower isn’t docked it signals “rain” and prevents the system from watering.
@Maggus, how is the IFTTT recipe working now that you have a few months on it? Which one of the two works better?
Not knowing what the triggers or actions are for either Rachio or Automower, would it be possible to have Rachio only water while Automower is in the base station parked or charging? Since the mower needs more time to work than the sprinklers do.
The only thing I can really do is to patk the Automower. I got a routine that does this on rainy weather, but also when the sprinkler starts.
The problem is that it is then parked “until further notice” and does not resume the regular schedule on the next timer.
The Rachio3 sprinkler controller is now programmed to run at night and finish by 6am, Automower starts at 7:15am and that is not interfering and does not require IFTTT.
The IFTTT was more supposed to prevent me from manual watering when Automower is mowing the lawn. But that does not seem to work. It’ll water anyway.
The function “Don’t mow when sprinkler is running” does also not prevent a manual start of the Automower, when Rachio is watering.
