My wish list

Hi Rachio team,

I have been waiting for this sort of a product for a long time. I got my nest and realized how backwards my sprinkler controller was and how much can be done with a smart controller. You guys picked up on most of the features I would want. Here are a few things that would really help.

  1. make it easier to provide accurate nozzle flow rates. Can we just put in the vendor and the degree of spray and you calculate the best flow rate? It took me forever to find the rainbird flow rates, and even when I found the data I could not properly parse it so I just gave up. Catchup technique is extra cost and time. I bought a smart system to save time.

  2. even better would be if we could enter the water consumption readings from the water meter when we do zone set up. If you have this you may not really need #1. Like run each zone for 1 minute, and ask us to enter before and after water usage numbers from water meter. This number is REALLY fundamental to a “flex schedule” and its so hard to set right now. Makes “flex schedule” less friendly.

  3. The watering history is really hard to parse because its just a bunch of line items and there is no sense of grouping based on date. Its just a long list where I have to keep a mental track of what line item applies to what zone. Its hard to explain the UX issue. I would have expected to see a nice calendar UI, just like you have on the “Watering schedule” ui. and when I tap on it I see the history. In fact you have all this already built, why not just allow us to move back in time when viewing the “Watering schedule”

  4. I have a bubbler nozzle for one zone and fixed for another. If i create a schedule with mixed nozzle types it won’t cycle and soak. this is a common complaint in your forums and I tried to understand the explanation you provided and I could not. This is not something we should have to worry about. Give us an override if we still want cycle and soak with mixed nozzles.

  5. Build in tips to help maintain our grass and gardens. Example, nest reminds me to change filters. Can rachio remind me of regular maintenance tasks like put fertilizer, pluck weeds, etc etc. I am not a lawn expert so would love Rachio to guide me on routine tasks.

Otherwise awesome product! Look forward to what more things you guys do. I already got 3 other friends to buy this product.

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As another fellow user of the Iro, for a few months, I just thought I would give my 2 cents on some of your thoughts/ideas.

I have been seeing many people comment on automating flow rates, but here is my problem with this: I believe most nozzles have an adjustment screw to vary the flow rate. My irrigation installer had mine adjusted at all different settings for various parts of my lawn. So even if I used the documentation from the manufacturer’s website, it wouldn’t be accurate. From what I have read and researched, I believe that the only good way to get an accurate flow rate is to do a catch-cup test.

I would love to be able to take a reading from the water meter, but I am guessing that the people who are recommending this have a digital meter that would give them a very precise reading. Unfortunately for me, I have an analog dial that is very tough to get a precise measurement.

I completely agree with you and there have been many posts about this as well as my own recommendation to create some sort of collapsable accordion format that would allow you to only see the main events and then drill down into their details if you wanted. I really hope a better format for this will be added in the somewhat near future, but I am guessing there are some higher priorities at the moment.

What I believe Rachio support has recommended in these circumstances is creating a separate schedule for bubblers and drip zones, since these are a different way of irrigating and should not use Cycle and Soak.

I have to disagree here, as I have seen way too many pieces of software that start out with a specific purpose and then try to be all things to all people and it just makes for a app that only does an ok job at most of them, instead of a great job at their original intended purpose. I am sure there are other apps that have been written for lawn care and I would recommend using one of those instead of asking Rachio to add features to their software for things other than irrigation that would most likely create more headache as well as delay enhancements for irrigation functionality.

Again… just my 2 cents.

@jimB34m Thanks for jumping in here! Really appreciate it.

@sairam71 Thanks so much for taking the time to write your thoughts. It’s super helpful, and we really appreciate it.

@jimB34m did an excellent job in responding to your comments. While I can’t share anything specific, you’re hitting a lot of topics we’re thinking hard about.

@kevinro, could you speak to this?

Thanks!

Thanks a lot for your responses. @benblackmer if you need beta testers for anything, you can throw me on your list!

Thanks you!

We definitely will!

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