It is a nice unit, at least for me, but I need to find a way to monitor water consumption in case of line break. Any suggestion on this?
Someone is developing a zwave flow meter… do a quick search to find it. There are non-zwave versions you could also wire in different ways to get the info to Vera if you want to DIY it.
Someone is developing a zwave flow meter… do a quick search to find it. There are non-zwave versions you could also wire in different ways to get the info to Vera if you want to DIY it.[/quote]
I was not able to find it. There is Secure SWM 301, but I have never seen anybody installing it and giving a feedback. Thank you anyway.
They recently updated the Android app and it is a great improvement over the old one. Much faster and looks good too! If you’re on iOS (get on a better OS! ;D ) they’re preparing an app update in May.
[url=http://www.rainmachine.com/help.php]http://www.rainmachine.com/help.php[/url]
One reason would be so you can hook up a motion detector and spray those damn rabbits when they come to eat your greens 
Having researched all of the available smart irrigation controllers I purchased the Rachio Iro. It seems to have the most advanced intelligence. The system is wifi based, so it won’t directly integrate with a Vera hub, but it doesn’t have to.
Here is a review of the product: http://www.groovemgmt.com/rachio-iro-review.html
[url=http://www.groovemgmt.com/rachio-iro-review.html]http://www.groovemgmt.com/rachio-iro-review.html[/url]
Ciprian,
Is there any updates on the API yet?
Thanks mate,
Michael
I emailed them yesterday and they said it was delayed and had no ETA
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End of February . . . I guess they didn’t specify the year :
Yeah I keep bugging them too, same response. It’s August now so I guess its not the month…but the year…lol
I have seen them doing small updates to the F/W and improving the Apps. I would be a happy camper with regard to my home automation if I could get this and my Honeywell wifi thermostat (pending API there too) interfaced through MCV.
[quote=“bformato, post:26, topic:176726”]Having researched all of the available smart irrigation controllers I purchased the Rachio Iro. It seems to have the most advanced intelligence. The system is wifi based, so it won’t directly integrate with a Vera hub, but it doesn’t have to.
Here is a review of the product: http://www.groovemgmt.com/rachio-iro-review.html
[url=http://www.groovemgmt.com/rachio-iro-review.html]http://www.groovemgmt.com/rachio-iro-review.html[/url][/quote]
How is your experience with this ?
It seems people are overall happy in online reviews but there are still some quirks… like it is not smart enough to not water the ‘dy after’ a rain… when the ground is still wet/soaked! … not having this is a gap that cannot be forgiven - they should at least allow the owners to specify an option to turn the water off the day after X inches of rain. Heck, I often leave the watering off for 2-3 days after a hard rain.
[quote=“Aaron, post:31, topic:176726”]How is your experience with this ?
It seems people are overall happy in online reviews but there are still some quirks… like it is not smart enough to not water the ‘dy after’ a rain… when the ground is still wet/soaked! … not having this is a gap that cannot be forgiven - they should at least allow the owners to specify an option to turn the water off the day after X inches of rain. Heck, I often leave the watering off for 2-3 days after a hard rain.[/quote]
This is the same with the rainmachine. I’ve had it since April and I’m not at all happy with the “auto schedule” stuff.
It checks the NOAA 4-6 times per day to determine how much rain has fallen in your area, and how much to decrease your programmed schedule to make up for it. I’ve never noticed it watering less.
It can also be raining all day long, and it will still turn your sprinklers on in the afternoon, while it’s raining.
There is a “rain delay” function that lets you go in and stop the watering for a set # of hours that I’ve had to use several times.
There is no place to connect a rain sensor to this unit, though I suppose you could wire one up before your sprinkler leads.
If they had an API available to where I could check the weather myself and stop the watering when it rains I would be happy. But it doesn’t look like they are close to releasing an API. I’ve snooped the url’s in both wireshark and chrome developer tools and am able to see the commands sent, but I haven’t been able to figure out the login token stuff yet.
[quote=“Tubal”][quote=“Aaron, post:31, topic:176726”]How is your experience with this ?
It seems people are overall happy in online reviews but there are still some quirks… like it is not smart enough to not water the ‘dy after’ a rain… when the ground is still wet/soaked! … not having this is a gap that cannot be forgiven - they should at least allow the owners to specify an option to turn the water off the day after X inches of rain. Heck, I often leave the watering off for 2-3 days after a hard rain.[/quote]
This is the same with the rainmachine. I’ve had it since April and I’m not at all happy with the “auto schedule” stuff.
It checks the NOAA 4-6 times per day to determine how much rain has fallen in your area, and how much to decrease your programmed schedule to make up for it. I’ve never noticed it watering less.
It can also be raining all day long, and it will still turn your sprinklers on in the afternoon, while it’s raining.
There is a “rain delay” function that lets you go in and stop the watering for a set # of hours that I’ve had to use several times.
There is no place to connect a rain sensor to this unit, though I suppose you could wire one up before your sprinkler leads.
If they had an API available to where I could check the weather myself and stop the watering when it rains I would be happy. But it doesn’t look like they are close to releasing an API. I’ve snooped the url’s in both wireshark and chrome developer tools and am able to see the commands sent, but I haven’t been able to figure out the login token stuff yet.[/quote]
I have a positive experience with mine, do you have set to use the weather data this function can be toggled off? Also if you lose wifi connection on the device then it waters on normal schedule without using data.
The biggest issue I have is that when we have scattered rain showers it could rain inches a mile away and no rain where I actually live triggered the RainMachine to not water. If anything it waters less than I would prefer. My water bill this summer over last summer is 50% of what it had been.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I almost bought The Rain Machine until I read this:
There is no place to connect a rain sensor to this unit, though I suppose you could wire one up before your sprinkler leads.
The lack of a rain or freeze sensor is a deal breaker. I live 35 miles from the National Weather Service office. It could be flooding in my neighborhood and bone dry at the NWS office.
For $249, a sensor option should be included.
[quote=“Lonestar10, post:35, topic:176726”]I almost bought The Rain Machine until I read this:
There is no place to connect a rain sensor to this unit, though I suppose you could wire one up before your sprinkler leads.
The lack of a rain or freeze sensor is a deal breaker. I live 35 miles from the National Weather Service office. It could be flooding in my neighborhood and bone dry at the NWS office.
For $249, a sensor option should be included.[/quote]
agreed… it seems like all these devices are created by people that don’t know what the consumer wants/needs.
The Hydrawise unit has two sensor ports. I’m pretty happy with it.
I got tired of waiting on the API release. I ditched the RainMachine and went with OpenSprinkler instead. While the hardware may not be as pretty, the web interface, mobile app, functionality and existence of a Vera plugin make this a winner IMO.
Anyone interested in purchasing a slightly used RainMachine? ;D
Yeah, it’s sad they are taking so long.
From Green Electronics:
Sorry for the delay. The real reason is that we are planning to release 2 new products this winter/spring and we try to publish an API that would work for all 3 devices, backwards compatible. That is a real challenge and we will probably publish a subset of this API in 3-5 weeks.Thank you,
Dragos