So I’ve invested a lot of time into Flex Daily. When I say a lot, I’m thinking on the order of 100 hours over the last 2 years. I’ve read all the articles, measured my soil type to set Available Water, measured my true water flow using various methods (a bucket and/or flow meter), used the drip emitter spreadsheet here to set my Area and Nozzle Inches per Hour, read various agricultural articles to know how many gallons/week various trees need and to set the Crop Coefficient correctly, etc. Meanwhile I walk my property with a moisture meter, check plant/tree health frequently, and make small adjustments, and frankly I’m getting fed-up. The most recent case of Flex Daily trying to kill my landscaping can likely be traced to the Weather Intelligence data being wrong for as yet unknown reasons.
So pre-Rachio I had a Universal Devices ISY994i with an Irrigation Module using the Penman–Monteith method. I became familiar with concepts like Evapotranspiration and tracked it in a spreadsheet (see end of message). From this I know basically how often my irrigation should run for any given time of year, which is every 2-3 days right now.
Really what I’d like is more predictable, less opaque scheduling that still adjusts for the weather. E.g., I know how long and how frequently I need to water by zone right now. I’d like to tell the Rachio that (e.g., Zone 11 60 minutes every 3 days) and have it build a schedule around that still adjusts for the weather (that would become 2 days if it’s really hot or 4 days if it’s really cool, and every 4 days in September, 5 days in October, 10 days in November, etc.) instead of spending hour upon hour tweaking Available Water, Root Depth, Nozzle Inches per Hour, etc. which are all lies upon lies at this point just to get the behaviour I want.
Suggestions? Because like I said, I’m fed-up and exhausted at this point.
Id probably move to flex monthly or a fixed schedule. Using weather intelligence with those schedule types is still very efficient and much more predictable.
