Irrigation Control

Hi all,

I own a small landscaping company that is, of late, working on more and more top end residential work. I am after some information on C-Bus irrigation control.

I have completed all the C-Bus trainning but irrigation control was a subject that was not touched on, apart from timers etc.

Could any of you please asist me with info on this subject or point me in the right direction.

Thanks

Craig

 

The Colour C-Touch has an in-built irrigation controller.

You can also do it using schedules in a black and white C-Touch. The PICED software comes with an example showing this.

 

Thanks Darren for the help. I didn't see similar threads before but I have found several, Very helpfull. Thanks for you help.

 

Are you including rain sensors, temp, time of day ? Blind timers ?

 

I have not set up a irrigation system yet using C-Bus. At this stage I am looking to get as much information on hardware requirements and tips as possible so I can offer this type of arrangment to our high end customers.

So yes, the set of rain sensors would be involved as well.

Another question if anyine can help? Do you simply use the positive and negitive from the Cat5 wire to the valves from a relay or is there some hardware in between?

 

Without control parameters it is still a broad question with general answers.

You have two sides of this
- Water control
- C-Bus

Then you have
- weather sensors
- C-Bus input modules
- C-Bus output modules
- water valves

Obviously for it to be intelligent water management it needs to be able to avoid wet weather, extreme heat and delay action in periods of high soil moisture and extreme cold. Then if there are water restrictions it also needs to know the days of the week.

C-Bus will more or less monitor switches opening and closing. To those functions you can attribute logical definitions
- switch 1 closed = too hot
- switch 2 open = raining

and so on.

Once you have control over the meaning of switches then you can decide which part of the C-Bus needs to be involved. Such as switch panels, lux meters, thermostat units (some houses now how roof irrigation using tanked water which cools the roof and thus cools the house).

Once you are satisfied with the C-Bus element you can code C-bus to release valves with timers.

You can then also code C-Bus to stop if the soil gets too wet, through a sensor, so that it controls itself.

The water relays must be powered in the traditional way where C-Bus will act as an electronic gang switch. I don't know if water relays use Cat-5 wiring but I would personally prefer something which can handle more current over extended 'on' periods.

 

McGoo. If you are referring to using the C-Bus CAT5 wire to power your valves, the answer is definitely not. Th c-bus cable does have 24VDC but it also has clock pulses and is for connection to c-bus hardware only.

The supply for your valves would be via c-bus output modules, with switched 240VAC or some other voltage via a stand alone power supply.

HTH

Grant

 

Thanks for all your info. Brain fart on my behalf.

Just thought that there may have been a bit of C-Bus hardware that would be able to step down the voltage to 24v instead of having to add another layer of complexity (24v power packs and the wiring of them) to the system.

Cheers

 

Sorry Ashleigh I must not made myself clear. The 24v power packs are controlled via the relay. I thought that Clipsal may have a relay, or other hardware for C-Bus that can control the valves for the irriagtion system directly, instead of having the extra hassel of having to wiring up 24v power packs for each zone.

Sort of like a 8 channel relay, but instead of the output being 240v it would be 24v, for the likes of irrigation valves. Would just take out that layer of complexity that realy does not aid in keeping it simple. ( Make sence? )

Cheers

 

McGoo,

Your best bet would be to use C-Bus Voltage Free Relays, and if you want to mount everything inside a DIN-rail enclosure, it is possible to buy DIN-rail mounted power supplies, and 24volt ones are VERY easy to get your hands on.

Forget using plug-pack transformers, just buy a single DIN-rail transformer, mount it in your enclosure with the Voltage-free relay, and wire the 24v from the transformer into all channels of the VFR, and then just run your standard 4 or 7 core irrigation cable from the relay out to each solenoid valve.

If you want a diagram of what I'm talking about, and how to wire it all, let us know, and I'll draw a cheap and crappy one to give you an idea of it

Darpa

 

Hi Darpa,

Sounds like it is as good as it gets. All makes sense... Just one question, The 24v output from the transformer you said to wire into each channel of the relay, I take it you mean the mains supply to the relay.


Thanks for you help.

Cheers

 

Hey McGoo,

I hope my "Crappy diagram of the day" helps you out

Just click on the link below, and it will open an Acrobat PDF file showing a masic layout of how to wire a C-Bus relay to a 24 volt AC power supply, and then out to the solenoid valves.

And yes, I DO mean 24 (twenty-four) volt AC, because this is what standard irrigation solenoid valves operate from.

The ONLY 240v connection to the relay is to the control side (top left hand side of the unit), do not connect 240v to any of the other terminals on the relay.

Darpa

 

Many Thanks Darpa for the diagram, all clear now, sorry for the hassel.

Cheers

 

sorry for bring up an old thread, but I am curious as to the legalities arround wiring up the 24v side.

Does this mean that a sparky only needs to wire up the 240v side? and I can wire up the 24v side myself seing as it is Low voltage? Does this apply if the module is in the cabinet with other 240v switching modules?

 

This relay, in it's own enclosure with a socket outlet for plug in transformer to power the valves may be more suitable.
http://updates.clipsal.com/ClipsalOnline/Files/Brochures/W0000938.pdf

 

Indeed it is a far better product to be using for this application as all you need is the C-bus cable and the 24V AC, which as you mention is best provided for by a plug pack. For the record this product wasn't available in 2006 hence the other solution above.