RainMachine Sprinkler Irrigation Controller Driver

[kblagron]

Kfly (Kevin) and I developed a CQC Driver for RainMachine that interfaces with the REST API that the hardware provides.

It currently works with the Mini-8, Pro, and Touch HD models. The driver will query for program and zone names and settings, and give you the ability to view and control various aspects of the device. 

All of the program and zone settings will have to be managed through the RainMachine application, as this driver only displays information that has already been programmed in the device. It also allows manual start and stop operations of programs and zones along with the ability to Snooze the Rainmachine for up to 365 days (i.e. disable) or Pause a currently running program and/or zone for up to 12 hours.

See the Help file (attached) for more information on how this driver works.

Updated to V1.96 which fixes the way the Snooze start time is gathered, and also adds the RainLastStartTime field which provides a date/time when the last Rain event occurred if you have a Rain sensor.

Updated to V1.97 to fix a few bugs that occur between the various systems.

Updated to V1.99 to fix a bug that occurred on a RainMachine update that now read 8 days of upcoming weather rather than the 7 it did before.   Also updated the http timeout request from 4 seconds to 8 seconds which seems to settle down the number of times the driver times out due to no data received.

[gReatAutomation]

Amazing work. Thank you all for your efforts.

[kfly]

Here is my template that I created for the RainMachine Driver.
Thanks
Kevin

RainMachine Template

[kblagron]

Do you have the definitions associated with the RainMachine Fonts for weather icons? (i.e. Partly Cloudy = "C").   I would like to see if I could match them up with the Weather Underground Icons.  I looked on the Rainmachine forum and knowledge base but never did find where they were defined.

[kfly]

Do you have the definitions associated with the RainMachine Fonts for weather icons? (i.e. Partly Cloudy = "C").   I would like to see if I could match them up with the Weather Underground Icons.  I looked on the Rainmachine forum and knowledge base but never did find where they were defined.

Not sure it helps but the rainmachine stores the day weather icons as a number.   The driver just converts to the corresponding letter to display.
You may want to load the font on a windows machine and see if the Letters A-Z fit some kind of standard.

// An enum we use to convert the weather icon number to font letter
    // left as default but could be changed if needed.
    // Rainmachine has a numeric value for condition icon. We convert to letter to be used by the rainmachine font
    Enum=WeatherConIcon
        a  : "0"; 
        b  : "1"; 
        c  : "2"; 
        d  : "3"; 
        e  : "4"; 
        f  : "5";
        g  : "6";
        h  : "7";
        i  : "8";
        j  : "9";
        k  : "10";
        l  : "11";
        m  : "12";
        n  : "13";
        o  : "14";
        p  : "15";
        q  : "16";
        r  : "17";
        s  : "18";
        t  : "19";
        u  : "20";
        v  : "21";
        w  : "22";
        x  : "23";
        y  : "24";
        z  : "25";
    EndEnum;

[gReatAutomation]

Does anyone have opinions on the best weather source to use? Finally got my RainMachine and am setting it up.

[gReatAutomation]

Here is a soil survey map for use with the custom soil types in RainMachine settings

https://websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov/app/...urvey.aspx

[kfly]

Does anyone have opinions on the best weather source to use? Finally got my RainMachine and am setting it up.

I use NOAA. Seems accurate for my area.

[kblagron]

I am using NOAA also, but haven't looked hard at the others to evaluate.  From what I can tell, you can select multiple weather sources and RainMachine will somehow come up with an average.  I will probably look at that down the road.

On the V1.91 driver - I fixed a bug but haven't posted it yet.  The bug will occur if you have a program that isn't programmed to start (I have one that is a 2 minute Manual Check of each zone to view sprinklers for issues), you will get an error - but driver still works.   I also increased the number of programs you can have from 4 to 16.  

The reason I haven't posted it yet is because I wanted to add this to the driver -> Show what Restrictions may be in play for your next Program's run.  Right now the driver will show the next run, but, in actuality, it may not run if something is restricting it.  For me in particular right now, it is "Water Surplus" which is where it has already rained enough or forecast to rain enough for my soil conditions and doesn't need to run, even though you may think it will run.

Let me know if you need an updated version and I will post before I get the restriction part completed.

[gReatAutomation]

Thanks. This thing is great. Is it possible to update the driver so that you can run a zone on demand? I see that this is an option from the web interface. There are times when I need to run a particular zone on demand, especially when I am trimming the grass around the sprinkler hears and need to locate a particular sprinkler head.

Could be a series of R/W fields for each zone:

Zone_X_Start - Write only - true
Zone_X_Stop - Write only - true
Zone_X_Pause - Write only - true
Zone_X_RunFor - Read/Write - x minutes

Thoughts?