Hi,
I am new to Rachio. with my old controller, I usually set each other day for 10min each time.
I tried the Flex daily with Rachio, and set the correct area size for each zone and soil type. and Rachio recommend me to water 40min each zone. Is that normal?
From the Flex daily calendar, I saw I only need to water 1-2 times a week.
Each zone I have around 300-500sft. and I have around 7-10 sprinklers in each zone.
Thanks so much!
10 minutes every other day sounds very low. Assuming you have a flow from your sprinkles totaling 1" per hour (I think that’s high, based on my experience), you’re only applying 1/6" of water every other day, or about 0.58" of water per week. I don’t know where you live, but I think it should be at least double that. And if it waters half as often, a time of 40 minutes doesn’t sound unreasonable.
OTOH, if your lawn has been fine with only 10 minutes every other day…
thanks! I think you are right…I am a new house owner, so I am not sure the correct time…now my grass is a bit yellowish…I will try more water then. just don’t want to waste too much water here in california…
You don’t want to water daily normally. You want to water a little longer and let the water soak into the ground allowing the grass roots to grow deeper down. That’ll make for a better lawn and use less water. Generally you want to have it water in the early morning so the water has a chance to soak into the ground, and not evaporate in the heat. You also don’t really want to water in the evening as that’s not good either. Your grass will get watered more when it’s Hot out, and water a lot less in the winter. My Rachio didn’t water my lawn once this last December. I’m north of S.F. Not like there is any Snow or rain every day. It’s temp, and now much moisture the Rachio thinks is in the ground and water else. My lawn sections normally get around 23 minutes each on the days my lawn is watered.
Before you were doing every other day for 10 minutes. So say that’s 30 minutes a week. So 40 minutes for 1 or 2 days a week is not really crazy if you think about it. Again, less daily watering, and more into longer but less days watering. Making for stronger lawn roots as they have to go deeper and less weeds. Deeper where there is still moisture in the ground.
Keep a eye out on your lawn and make sure it’s not dying or something. Check out how the Rachio is watering your lawn once in a while as it adjusts its self.
It depends; zones with pop-up heads should be run under 10 minutes every 3 to 4 days depending what part of the country you are in. Rotors emit less gallons per minute than pop-ups, so the should be set to 20 minutes> plus. A drip station emits gallons per hour and should be set to 2 to 3 hours.
Here is the math. On a water meter that is 3/4 inch, a properly designed system will safe flow at 22 gallons per minute. If you run your system for 10 minutes you will spray 220 gallons. That is quite a bit. Rotors emit less gallons per minute so you need to double the time like 20 minutes or more. Hope that helps.
Mine probably aren’t designed well: the rotor zones flow between 10 and 12 gallons a minute. And that’s still fast enough to have to have soak times on most.