Rachio Flow Meter is EOL: Which to get Now?

Why not pair with an ultrasonic flow meter that is surface mount? I’m not sure if I believe Rachio’s explanation, but they said installation was one major issue with the old style meter. Seems that a meter with surface mounted technology would solve this issue – however yes it potentially has the issue of not being as accurate as inline technology.

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Dang

a) It’s still advertised on the website…???
b) The WFW was a key selling factor for me -
c) R. missed the chance to communicate to all user (i.e. potential future buyer) - very sad
d) Thanks for sharing alternatives here. I hope they will fill the functional gap.

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what connector does the everdopmeter red and black wires connect to on the gen3?

RE: crc2004

I found these instructions on the Rachio website for connecting wired meters:
Rachio Support

Red is the signal and black is common on the Everydrop meter.

I also got a Flume and love it. Super simple to install (no plumbing) and pretty darn accurate. Think it would be great if Flume and Rachio got together and created a simple integration. Feels like it would be a Win/Win for both companies.

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John now that it’s been 6 months, how is the Flume system working out for you? I saw they just teamed with BHyve…would hope Rachio support in the near future?

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Reading between the lines in your posts here, any update on timeframe for your new meter?

It has been available for a couple months now.

Yes, the Flume has been working great. It has been very accurate and reliable. I had an issue early on, that with my particular type of water meter it was doubling the readings. The Flume tech team responded quickly, were aware of the issue, and fixed the problem on their servers. I’m hopeful that Rachio will support the Flume at some point. The Flume measures my whole house water usage.
Since my irrigation typically runs before we wake up, it would be easy to determine the water being consumed by irrigation vs regular water usage - or if the flow suggests a burst pipe, so that the Rachio could shut down the zone. Here is an image of what the Flume dashboard looks like.

I’m interested in the everydropmeters meter, but this isn’t one that Rachio claims support for. It doesn’t seems that many are using this brand either. Anybody had any luck with it?

Seems that they’ve designed it to be compatible with one of the presets:

Right. I saw that. I guess no “official” support from Rachio concerns me. That’s partly why I was looking for others experiences.

Maybe the official support shouldn’t concern me, but I don’t really understand how the devices communicate and how Rachio can be assured to use the data from an “unsupported” sensor.

Disclaimer: I have not tried the wired version of the meter.

The official ex rachio wireless flow meter is based on the same tech, for most part it should work as well. As a current user of the wireless version, I can say it will work for major issues, such as complete lack of water, stuck zone valve (in case there is also a master valve) and a broken sprinkler head. It doesn’t seem as reliable as more expensive meters, but does a good job for the price.

I think that the meter is not officially listed because Rachio wishes to avoid support calls from people trying to use the wired version with their controller. This is just my opinion though.

Well, I just purchased one so I’ll update once it’s installed and wired up.

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“Red is the signal and black is common on the Everydrop meter.”

I am replying to my own post because there seems to be some confusion. To be clear, Red is “sensor signal” and black is “sensor common”.

You should always follow the wiring instructions of the controller you are using. Even Rachio has different instructions and signal naming for GEN 3 as opposed to GEN 2.

GEN 3 instructions:

As you can see, it is showing connection to S1 or S2 and “24VAC -”.

GEN 2 instructions:

As you can see, in this case you are connecting to “SC” which is sensor common.

There is nothing magic about all the wired sensors. They put out a frequency proportional to the flow rate. They all use the equation Frequency = (GPM/K) - offset. So, they all are wired the same way according to the controller manufactures requirements. When you choose a meter from the app, you are simply choosing the K and offset in the equation. But, remember that you are running the 2 wires of any wired sensor all the way back to the controller…not shared.

The above is a hard wired flow meter version NOT a wireless version like Rachio’s discontinued flow meter/sensor. Rachio gen 2 and 3 controllers wete designed to be compatible with existing flow meters which were installed via previous irrigation controllers. Well thought out.

Agree with positive comments on Flume… Our house also has the WFM with Rachio. Big vote here for some Flume / Rachio integration, since the Flume install most of my effort’s gone into tweaking Flume alert settings so I don’t get false high flow warnings and alerts every time a Rachio schedule runs. Gotta be some way for programmers to set up a recurring “scheduled time to recognize irrigation flow rate” between the Rachio and Flume ecosystems?

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Had my Flume for over a year now, and it has already paid for itself by telling me about leaks before they caused damage or lasted long enough to impact the water bill.

I really want to correlate watering controls with water usage to make diagnosis of irrigation leaks (or stuck valves) easier.

I’m also trying to decide whether to go with Orbit B-Hyve or the Rachio 3. If Flume and Orbit have actually followed through on their press releases, that would likely tip me in that direction. But my perception is that the Rachio is the better device of the two, and wish all my water-related things could cooperate!

Big issue with supporting online connected sensors is that leak detection will not work offline.
Rachio was always careful not to make internet connectivity a must for normal operation. If something goes wrong with local wifi, ISP, Rachio servers, etc, your controller will still be able to run a scheduled watering and monitor for leaks when combined with a supported flow meter. Let me emphasize this, leak detection is performed by your controller locally (unless something has changed that I’m not aware of), in case a leak is detected, your controller tells the server about it, rather than the other way around.

Integration with something like Flume is that even though both devices are local to you, they cannot talk directly to each-other. Points of failure is thereby doubled, whereas if anything goes wrong in this chain you may end up with a large water bill regardless of protection you’ve expected.

My advice? Buy a $100 flow meter and dedicate it to your irrigation controller, let Flume worry about your whole house and rachio about your yard.

I do not have Flume (personally waiting for a model, with power over Ethernet support, I can leave berried in the yard) so I do not know the challenges you are otherwise left with regarding irrigation controllers. I am interested in hearing if there is something in particular that is preventing you from using the two systems at the same time without intercommunication between them.

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