Is this right for Flex Schedule?

[vdubtx]

Thanks again for all of the info and help. Will certainly be tweaking to get the best use of my new device.
Will check back in when I have had a bit of time and some more watering history to let know how things are coming along.

[franz]

@vdubtx

The rest of the folks have done an amazing job of answering questions

My only feedback would be if you are just starting out maybe try one or two zones on flex for a few weeks before going for the full enchilada. It is kind of a leap of faith, and better to do your fine tuning on a couple of zones first and get into the flex flow rather than the whole yard. Just my two cents.

[vdubtx]

Update with about 6 weeks of usage in the books. Lawn is looking good, I went ahead and used the flex schedule to do it all and watched to see what happened zone by zone. First 2 weeks after I installed, we got some pretty good rains, but watched the device tell me that it wouldn’t water due to forecasted precip and letting me know when the rain sensor triggered etc.

The only thing I have a question on is it seems there is a lot of run off on the 3rd cycle that is being run when it does it’s watering. I really hate to waste any water if the soil is not able to absorb it according to the schedule. Any suggestions for settings that I could plug in that would help with that.

Soil is a clay/loam type. I think would say more to the clay side of things, but not 100% sure. I will be doing the mason jar test this weekend to be sure I know what soil we do have. Other things I need to do are measurements by zone and catch cup test once I am able to order those.

Really liking the Rachio and it’s ease of use.

[azdavidr]

Have you looked at the Web Soil Survey site @vdubtx ? If not, try the info. at this post. Note that there is a section that talks about Smart Cycle and how to tweak soil settings for runoff, while maintaining the frequency of watering.

Using Web Soil Survey to define your soil settings

I found through my own experience that setting an incorrect soil type can have a dramatic impact on the watering duration and frequency of flex schedules. I’d lived in my home for 22 years and always assumed we had a lot of clay in our desert soil. Through these forums I found that was not the case, and instead we have sandy loam. Changing that setting really had a big impact on my scheduling. Finding out your soil type can be confusing, but I personally found the USDA Web Soil Survey site t…

[vdubtx]

Thank you azdavidr. Awesome site and it tells me I have Houston Black Clay. I will adjust to that soil type and the available water number to see how that affects the runoff that I see now. The Smartflex did adjust and shows 40 minutes less run time for the zones that are on that cycle. Will see what happens. Thanks for help.

[azdavidr]

@vdubtx

Thank you azdavidr. Awesome site and it tells me I have Houston Black Clay. I will adjust to that soil type and the available water number to see how that affects the runoff that I see now. The Smartflex did adjust and shows 40 minutes less run time for the zones that are on that cycle. Will see what happens. Thanks for help.

You’re welcome. Glad to know that you found it helpful.