Reasonable for a Gen 2?

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Hi All,

I’m looking at picking up a Gen 2 with the Amazon sale this weekend. I do have a couple of questions that I’m hoping you all might be able to help me with before I proceed. Here’s a picture of how the zones are laid out right now, with dots representing heads.

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The entire area being watered is grass. I’d like to get a Gen 2, but I’m not sure how it’d work out for me. Unfortunately, the contractor that originally installed the system years ago just eyeballed it. I’m not in a position right now to re-engineer the zone layout, but I could definitely swap some nozzles.

The way the system was put together, all of the zones intentionally overlap so there is coverage throughout. For instance, Zone 2 heads overlap spray with both zones 1 and 3. Here are some notes on the zones:

Zone 1 is 2/3 under a large tree (shady) and 1/3 sunny

Zone 2 is moderately sunny

Zones 3-5 take a beating from the sun, being south-facing and in direct sunlight. Also, in between zone 5 & 4 is the top of my septic tank. There’s only 6-8" of dirt on top of the tank and given the heat generated by a septic, it’s always drier than everything around it.

Will a Gen 2 help me out enough to justify the cost given the significant zone overlap and variation in conditions, if I’m not in the position to re-engineer the head and zone placement right now?

Thanks

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Well, I think you can always gain more water effeciency over a dumb controller if you use one of the flex options. I think 6 inches of dirt is enough to keep grass growing if you set the root depths for both of these zones to 6 inches (not ideal).

What you will gain out of the iro regardless of head placement is proper watering technique in a fire and forget method, remote control and some auditing…then you will be able to identify which heads need to be moved down the road.

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This large a layout begs for a “Catch cup” study. Check out the catch cup discussion. Catch Cups

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You are right but his/her hesitation at having to move heads around made me a little shy at recommending that out of the gate.

But @elad, he is right, you will be able save even more water with that data.

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If moving heads is out of the question, changing the type of head and distance they cover is the next best option.