AusBonsai

Over the recent Christmas / New year break, I have had 2 trips of 3 days where no one will be home, and thus had to have something to water Allof my trees.

I already use an automatic watering system for most on them, but about 20 or so need to be hand watered every day as I cannot get a line to to them.
I use a Holman programmable controller driving 3 solenoids on a tap to water in 3 sections, and these all come on for 5 minutes every day @ 7 - 7:30 am.

Rather than rely on someone to visit daily, on one of my benches that is well sheltered, I replaced some of the 180Deg sprayers with 360 Deg ones so the ground in front of the main bench will also get covered.
I then moved all my unwatered trees to this spot. As it in shade from gum trees most of the day it never gets overly hot, and happy to report they are all coping well.

The watering system is Ultra reliable as in 7 years, I have had to replace the controller once, and in that time 2 solenoids have needed replacing. If I was to go away for more than 4 days, I would have someone visit just to make sure it comes on daily. They would only have to do anything if there was a failure.

How have you coped on holidays this year?

Ken

I have three of these running three different lines. Some of the lines over lap so even if one line fails the plants will get some sort of water. I figure having 3 desperate connections means even if one fails I don't loose all my trees. Works well for me. I also put up shade cloth at this time of the year.

Josh

Thanks Josh. I assume that is battery powered?

I originally started with self contained battery ones and after going thru about 5 in 2 years, ( different Brands / Models), I figured that i would spend a little more and get a much better system
The Battery ones used to leakthru the internal seals from the solenoid motor / Valve actuator, to the battery or electronic components. Another variety just leaked rainwater into the battery compartment with negative results.
Batteries can just go flat too

Unless someone checked it daily i found they could not be relied on.
Multiple overlapped runs will alleviate that concern, but I cannot get that happening here.

Ken

I've trusted the Holman set-up that Josh uses. Nearly 2 weeks away and the neighbours reporting it's still doing its 5 minute cycle at 7am and 3pm each day. I've had it running for nearly a year now and it's the most reliable battery operated version I've had - electronic vs electrical timer has this one lasting for several months on one battery. Planning on moving to the mains powered open source WiFi version eventually - hopefully not prompted by a watering disaster though......

Hey Ken, are those your Murraya's in the styro boxes in shots 3 & 4? Your efforts encouraged me to dig a couple up earlier in the year that are both doing OK now. Although one took nearly 5 months to start shooting again, the other (despite being hacked back more savagely) didn't miss a beat.

Steve B wrote: Hey Ken, are those your Murraya's in the styro boxes in shots 3 & 4? Your efforts encouraged me to dig a couple up earlier in the year that are both doing OK now. Although one took nearly 5 months to start shooting again, the other (despite being hacked back more savagely) didn't miss a beat.

Yep that is the Murrayas.

Doco you new setup when you can aas i will be interested too.
Good you hear some battery timers are OK to use, The ones i started out with were Crap.

Ken

I've had these for a couple of years now with no issues. I change the batteries every year regardless or if I'm going away for an extended period I change them. I would like to change to the wifi unit some time, would be a great way to monitor watering with your plants.
How often do you water on the timers for Ken?? I do 10mins in the mornings and 10 in the evening but thinking I may reduce it a bit say 7 in morning and 6 in the evening plus add a midday 2 min water (especially with the hot weather). Interested to hear what other do.

Josh

I use the soaker hoses from aldi that connect together. That way I can connect 2 or 3 and water either the whole front or back off the 1 timer, including the lawn. Last time I was away for 10 days and not only didn't lose a plant but also everything looked lush.
Think I ran 10 minutes every second morning and 5 minutes every alternate afternoon.
Timer was a simple battery timer-it was new so I just assumed batteries would be ok.


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Josh wrote:I've had these for a couple of years now with no issues. I change the batteries every year regardless or if I'm going away for an extended period I change them. I would like to change to the wifi unit some time, would be a great way to monitor watering with your plants.
How often do you water on the timers for Ken?? I do 10mins in the mornings and 10 in the evening but thinking I may reduce it a bit say 7 in morning and 6 in the evening plus add a midday 2 min water (especially with the hot weather). Interested to hear what other do.

Josh

I water 5 minutes in the morning @ 7 am only
if the temps are over about 40 deg i will turn them on manually in the arvo for 5 minutes as well, but that is rarely,

Ken

Good topic Ken.

I use a battery powered water timer too.
Only from a single tap.
Not without its risks.

Timers have broken on me as well and just yesterday I came home from a small vacation to realise I had narrowly avoided disaster.
One of the tap connections had popped rendering the sprinkler useless!

Had I arrived home a day or even half a day later it would have been tragedy.
Several trees had signs of stress but none will be terminal.

Thankfully this "blow out" must have happened towards the end of my trip.

Ken, what voltage are the solenoids?

..

Boics wrote:Good topic Ken.

I use a battery powered water timer too.
Only from a single tap.
Not without its risks.

Timers have broken on me as well and just yesterday I came home from a small vacation to realise I had narrowly avoided disaster.
One of the tap connections had popped rendering the sprinkler useless!

Had it arrived home a day or even half a day later there would have been tragedy.
Several trees had signs of stress but none will be terminal.

thankfully this "blow out" must have happened towards the end of my trip.

Ken, what voltage are the solenoids?

24 Volt. low voltage so safe to just run thru the garden beds

Ken

I also run an automatic watering system with the 24V solenoid valves.
For those who may be deterred by the setup work, this year I found one of these little beauties - Ezyvalve4. Cost me a smidgen over $100.
It is a 4-valve solenoid manifold setup in it's own self-contained waterproof container. Not a bad price considering it contains 4 solenoids, and able to run 4 channels from controller.
Makes life very easy with regards to plumbing and wiring, and is somewhat portable.
Regards

I run a single output battery unit that waters everything for me, including the veggie garden, 15 mins in the morning most of the year and 15 mins in the late afternoon during summer. I still end up doing some hand watering as well after some particularly hot days ie. The 41° we had on Friday

wrcmad wrote:I also run an automatic watering system with the 24V solenoid valves.
For those who may be deterred by the setup work, this year I found one of these little beauties - Ezivalve 4. Cost me a smidgen over $100.
It is a 4-valve solenoid manifold setup in it's own self-contained waterproof container. Not a bad price considering it contains 4 solenoids, and able to run 4 channels from controller.
Makes life very easy with regards to plumbing and wiring, and is somewhat portable.

ezivalve.jpg

Regards

thanks what a great device
http://www.antelco.com/metric/fittings/ezyvalve4.html

If building a new system or redoing and older one, that would be a no brainer

Ken

Funnily enough I went out this morning to find one of my timers not working it's not one of the ones pictured above. I had to add a line a while back for some collected trees and the green shed was out of the ones I usually use. I bought a similar one rather than go somewhere else to get the same one. Lesson learnt. I'll replace it with the same as above now as I've not had any trouble with them.

Josh.