Local temperature sensor can be used to drive watering programs/weather adaptation
Feature request:
* Local temperature sensor can be used to drive watering programs/weather adaptation
Possible solutions:
* Integrate temp and humidity sensors into RainMachine
* Enable temperature sensor data source beyond weather stations
Use case:
* Greenhouse
* Indoor gardening
Background:
I am working on building an automated irrigation system for vertical gardens in my greenhouse. The vertical gardens came with drip irrgiation supplies and I want a smart controller to drive the valves and need to get fertilizer injector, etc to make this all work. Since this is my first system of this type, I want to build what I need to get started (2 zones...really just one is MVP...) and have room for expansion.
For me this is part of my work on home automation and I have been fixated on the Home Assitant platform. It has some similar characteristics to RainMachine, which is what drew me here - open source basis, runs locally (not cloud dependent). But...the RainMachine product currently does NOT really work for a greenhouse/indoor use case. My main challenge is: Weather adaptation feature is dependent on weather stations and not local sensors. I have a personal weather station, but it is outside (because local weather services are not accurate enough to reflect local conditions, especially wind). I have built local temperature sensors with wifi-enabled microcontrollers...very cheap and effective.
So it seems that my possible path with Rainmachine is:
* Use the automation platform (or IFTTT) to force a program to run based on temperature levels
* Get some code written to add my local temperature sensor to the "Deverloper" tab of weather stations.
My non-RM path is: build my own controller with a wifi-enabled microcontroller ($5) and a relay and needed adapters. This is definitely cheaper, more of a hassle, and I can use some community code to do evapotransporation calculations. However, I'd really like to press the easy button here...c'mon RM!
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Usually with greenhouses, you disable Weather Adaptive since greenhouses are temperature/humidity regulated. If you want weather adaptive in your greenhouse, I would disable all weather sources and add my own that reads temperature/humidity from your sensors. If those sensors are accessible through WIFI it shouldn't be difficult.
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Yes, that's what I figured I would have to do. It would be REALLY great if the RM could just subscribe to the MQTT topic I'm publishing the temp to!
And again, trying to make sure I understand the value prop of RM. My understanding is that beyond the weather itself (eg rain or not), it will respond to the temperature conditions and adjust the amount of watering. That seems like a good thing for the greenhouse which is why I thought it could be a good fit. But if I'm off on why one would get an RM, please let me know :)
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