First of all, I use a rain sensor since “Weather Intelligence” (WI) is often wrong in my micro climate resulting in a running zone after/during a downpour or a WI skip when no rain fell on my property. The closest PWS is 1/2 mile away. @franz I need to use a simple rain sensor to effectively save water.
For example, see:
and
and
However
I have hanging baskets on my porch under the eaves. These need to be watered every day regardless of the rain sensor’s state (and WI’s state but WI is disabled for this schedule).
Rachio’s automated help returned the following answer to this question.
I learned from Daniel, on the Rachio support chat, that this information is incorrect.
That is unfortunate as this solution is exactly the reason I bought Rachio.
The automated chat also offers this apparently invalid but compelling alternative solution:
Please carefully read the last paragraph.
“This will ensure your water basket zone is watered daily without being affected by the rain sensor or weather conditions.”
Note that his thinking here is “The rain sensor is an external device that overrides the whole controller when it is raining.”
This misunderstanding of the Rachio controller is repeated in this Rachio support doc:
This was indeed the case when rain sensors simply opened the common for all valves.
However, this is not the case in the Rachio unit since the controller, via the app, can complete a Quick Run (open any valve) when the rain sensor is active. This clearly shows that the Rachio hardware,firmware and app software can ignore the active rain sensor.
So…
Do you have a cover over some of your plants? If so, do you need to water them regardless of WI and/or a rain sensor?
How many of you would like to see the software implement either of the above solutions offered by Rachio automated help?
Ignore Rain Sensor by zone.
or
Ignore Rain Sensor by schedule using a “Rain Sensor” check box in the Weather Intelligence menu.
Either solution, incorrectly offered by Rachio help, works for me.
I think #1 is the cleanest as covered vegetation clearly needs its own zone while schedules need to be adjusted over the growing season.
Please respond with your vote
This feature request was started back in 2015 but is still being ignored.
For example, see:
To make a rain sensor function for only some zones, you simply wire it up old school. This however, will not tell Rachio that the zone is disabled, nor will it let you manually run the zones from the app when sensor is wet.
Unhook rain sensor from the S ports. Connect 1 side of the sensor to Com. Connect all the zones’ Com wire to the other wire from the sensor, that you want disabled when the sensor is wet.