Wyze Sprinkler Controller - Smart weather-based watering with 8 control zones

Excellent!

Sprinkler controller pre ordered. I didn’t see any info on when they might ship, but I’m hoping someone will drop in this thread and give us an estimate.

I now have 3 products on pre-order.

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:+1:

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Hi Guys, this is exciting news. I do have a B-hyve controller, so it would an equal replacement. Therefore I am curious as to the additional features.

  1. You mention soil and moisture sensors and there is a line that says ‘list here’ that doesn’t work. What sensors would this work with?
  2. Who is offering the ‘plus’ part of the service? Are you just using weather from a service and the rest is coded internally, or is everything coming from this provider. My worry is that they may go out of business. With my bhyve it’s orbit, they are not going anywhere as they are fully established with tons of irrigation products and parts in all stores.
  3. Will you allow triggers of watering from either motion or camera sensors? Ex, if the camera sees a person in backyard, the sprinklers come on.

Thanks,

Michael

Welcome to the Wyze community @Michael96!
These are great questions! I’d suggest you post those here for @mike.s to answer.

  1. You mention soil and moisture sensors and there is a line that says ‘list here’ that doesn’t work. What sensors would this work with?
  • We fixed the link, but find it here!
  1. Who is offering the ‘plus’ part of the service? Are you just using weather from a service and the rest is coded internally, or is everything coming from this provider. My worry is that they may go out of business. With my bhyve it’s orbit, they are not going anywhere as they are fully established with tons of irrigation products and parts in all stores.
  • Most of our weather data comes from AerisWeather and we then use a network of local weather stations from Bloomsky to refine it even further.
  1. Will you allow triggers of watering from either motion or camera sensors? Ex, if the camera sees a person in backyard, the sprinklers come on.
  • We are working on an overhaul of our rules engine which may delay this type of feature a bit, but we will totally have it shortly after release!
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Can you talk in some more detail about how these third party soil moisture sensors integrate with the Wyze Sprinkler Controller?

It’s just like your existing controllers. The sensors simply block a watering from happening if it’s raining, but Sprinkler Plus is better because we not only look at current, but also the forecast. So while your sensors can stop a current rain… they won’t know if one is about to start. Wyze Sprinkler Plus does and can prevent you from wasting water.

But how do these sensors interface to the Wyze system? Is this a software interface? Electrical (hardware) interface?

The soil moisture sensors (versus rain sensors) are what really interest me. That’s what we really want to control. Looking at rainfall and temperature and humidity are only proxies to get at what we really want - soil moisture levels. These are essentially closed loop systems and the variable you want to close the loop on is soil moisture levels. Everything else is an approximation.

Never mind - I see the link at the bottom of the page that talks about the actual interface. :+1:

After watching the Wyze Smart Sprinkler Controller, I’m surprised Wyze didn’t go the extra step by adding a remote zone controller component. This would allow one sprinkler controller to control many zones rather than having to buy multiple sprinkler controllers and managing the device separately. What was the logic behind this?

Sprinkler Plus is not the all knowing god. There are many times that the forecast calls for rain in my area, my orbit will offer the 24 hour rain delay. But I also have a rain sensor on the roof which will actually tell the unit when it did rain. I have seen drizzles or nothing when it should rain.

But the key thing is the moisture sensors. This tells us how much we need to water and lets us better figure out the schedules.

My orbit has the weather and auto watering features. It has controls for telling it the ground type, etc. But I have found my own schedules to be much better for the grass and plants.

will you have a outdoor model

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its actually here. Surprise!

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I have 2 separate areas to run - can I use 2 controllers to cover my 12 zones and can they be on the same account?

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Oh no, not another subscription. Not that we can’t afford $10 a year, but come on, it’s just annoying. I’d rather pay $100 for a device without a subscription (and pick up the $100 rebate from the local water company). Missed opportunity there… oh well, keep up the great work Wyze!

Wyze guys, I know professional installers who do not like the fact that there is no rain sensor and that you have to buy a subscription to know if your system should be watering your lawn. I also know that you didn’t necessarily build this for the professional installs but it seems a little short sighted in my book and more importantly theirs.

it supports adding a rain sensor

I stand corrected. I for some reason missed that the first time I went through the product page.