Should I buy a flow sensor to my RainMachine Pro-8?
Why?
Can someone clarify the current flow sensor features that RainMachine support?
Based on the documentation, I only find three usefully features:
- Overall water consumption counter.
- Last detected leak event date. (Does this feature sent a notification to the user?)
- API watering/log/details flow click per zone
I was expecting a lot of other features that should be present for the flow sensor. As described on https://support.rainmachine.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/219266407/comments/360001181693
Regards,
Pedro
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If you are somewhat technical and willing to learn the RainMachine API to access the watering logs, I would definitely recommend a flow meter.
I was able to produce reports like those desired in the linked thread above using the RainMachine API data and a free cloud reporting service. I have the service call the RainMachine API once per hour to get log updates. So, it’s not real-time, but close enough.
My main goal was to be alerted to high flow events from broken sprinkler heads. I used the cloud reporting service’s workflow tool for alerting logic (also the free tier). It compares the latest zone flow rates to my stored thresholds and sends emails and text alerts. Hopefully, RainMachine will incorporate similar features and reports into their app eventually.
Btw, the RainMachine phone app does send a push alert when a leak is detected (Defined as the water meter measures flow when all zones off) but the threshold is not configurable yet. Depending on the scale of your water meter, this can cause some false alerts at the end of normal watering.
Here are example flow data reports created from the RainMachine API data:
Flow rate trend chart by zone:
Flow Rates & Thresholds by Zone (the red dots are my current thresholds):
An example alert that is emailed:
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