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^9 KNL setup

A project log for RPUno

ATMega328P Board

ronaldsutherlandronald.sutherland 06/10/2018 at 21:070 Comments

Twisted the firmware's AVR (it is not an ARM, which I hope to try soon) to get most things to fit in memory, but I did have to nix the Capture CLI commands. I think this is ready to run some valves in the garden.

KNL

So I replaced the RPUno^5 that was being used to irrigate a few zones (SxSWEncl).

RPUno^9+K3^2+RPUadpt^5

The RPUno^5 did good and so did the K3 it operated, I got to see a lot of data from it (K3^2+RPUno^5_log).

One thing is clear the Orbit valves do not get stuck when operated like this. I was having a problem where they would get stuck open, most likely that was caused by the hard water mineral build. Perhaps the frequent operation dislodges the buildup before it reaches a critical level. Unfortunately, the valve is no longer on the mainstream market. It received a lot of complaints about sticking (which were true from my experience). Having said that I still like the valve design, it is incredibly fast acting and is clearly durable when used with a frequency beyond what the controller it was sold with did. There are other valve options I will explore when I can.

Every day each of the three valves operated ten times for over a year. When I looked at the data I would cut and past it into the log. That was when I found a number of issues, some were the battery, some were damaged/broken/separated drip lines and the pressure regulators. Basically, the flow count tells me that I need to look for an issue. Zone 3 is going wild, but the emitters seem to be working and nothing I have looked at has failed, so I think the pressure regulator on it is having problems.

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