Hello, I just got my Rachio a week ago so I am trying to understand what it is doing and how to best tune it in. My question is the following (I have it set to flex schedule).
Yesterday it says it ‘completed a flex schedule for 118 minutes with 3 cycles’. Each cycle was 19 minutes and 30 minute pause in between them (due to Smart Cycle I suppose). When I look at the water usage chart it says that in this cycle it used 850 gallons. That seems excessively high to me.
My yard is closely 2000sq. f. (rectangular) all 1 zone.
How many sprinklers, model \ nozzle of sprinklers & operating pressure ? You can then figure out if you’re really close to the 15 GPM that is being calculated.
@tachtevrenidis, thanks for reaching out. Our reporting takes your nozzle, square footage, and duration of watering to calculate the total gallons applied to your lawn. For details, please refer to this support article. To edit your square footage valves, you’ll need to access your Advanced Settings on a zone by zone basis.
Let me know if you have any other questions or concerns we can help with.
@emil, what kind of a generic answer is that? I have done all that. There is no way that watering a 2k sq. f. yard for 57 minutes results in close to 1000 gallon water usage.
Using the support article referenced in my last reply, we need to apply this equation:
(SF x PR)/96.25= Total number of gallons per minute used in that zone. And if you multiply that by the duration (D) you will see the total number of gallons used for that particular zone during a schedule.
PR = Precipitation rate of the nozzle
SF = Square footage of zone
D = Duration that the zone runs for
(2000 x .7)/96.25 = 14.55 gallons per minute
14.55 x 58.18 = 846.52 gallons, which round up to 850.
I hope this helps to explain your water usage to date. Let us know if you have any questions.
buy a flow regulator if you are looking for hyper accurate measurements in water usage. their gallons used estimate is as accurate as the details YOU have provided and will not take into account irregularities in water pressure or faulty heads. however, it may be worth verifying that the soak intervals are not being included in running times when computing the estimated water usage for a zone.
out of curiosity, what is the precip rate you have configured for this zone? how is your head to head coverage?
What size is your service line? Have you done what I recommended earlier in the thread?
The flow is definitely doable using a standard design & equipment to cover 2000 SqFt.