My old controller, which was put in by the previous owner along with the 6 zone system, does not look like anything on the rachio videos about switching from a old controller to a new one… The wires going into the old controller, red and white, look all the same. In addition, the previous owner installed a toggle switch. The green and black wires are twisted together with the white wire, which appears to go to a rain gauge on the roof that I don’t plan to use.
I do not have a pump.
My question is do I just plug in the red and white wires and the “c” wire into the new unit? What do I do with the green and black wires? Just cap them off?
@neilnole - Thanks for ALL this pictures, they provided enough information to figure it out.
Keep the Red/White wire pairs together as they currently are. It looks like the previous owner used stranded wire instead of solid wire and I’m not sure of the gauge of wire - so there are two wires going to each valve providing power. So label each pair together. Those go straight to the Rachio numbered terminals.
The Green/Black wire pairs are the common side to the valves. At the big white wire nut where all the Green and Black wires come together, take out any wire that is not one of the Green/Black wire pairs coming up the gray pipe (e.g. white wire going to the rain gauge on the roof and the wire coming from the on/off switch). Join all the Green/Black wires with a pig tail (short piece of wire) back into the wire nut and put the other end of the pig tail into the Rachio C terminal. There will only be one wire in the Rachio C terminal.
It looks like the switch may have been used to override the rain sensor (if I’m following the wires correctly).
It does look like the previous owner did use water proof wire nuts out in the field (good), however, I’m not sure if the wire used is direct burial rated like this →
If it is a short run to the valves, I might consider replacing the wire with something like the above (also available from Lowe’s). An added benefit is that each valve would have a dedicated color coded wire.
Welcome to the community and re-post if you have any more questions.
