Hello,
just got an irrigation system put in with a Rain Bird ESP-me controller. I have 4 zones with zone 4 set up for a future veg garden so it's not in use. The controller is programmed to run 5 minutes every day starting at 8 am. The issue is this: I noticed that it goes on 5 minutes in zones 1 thru 3 and then back another 5 minutes zones 1 thru 3 and another 5 minutes for the 3 zones. It is programmed to run 5 minutes so why is it really runnig 45 minutes in total?

This is very puzzling to me. I reset the controller twice and programmed it all from scratch but still runs a total of 45 minutes.
Any help with this is greatly appreciated.

 

Welcome to the forums.

It's very confusing to me too as it shouldn't be repeating the watering cycle like that. If you just had it installed maybe you can run it by the installer.

Possibly it's a controller issue.

 

The installer swears that it shouldn't do that, but it does. A friend suggested that I only have zone 1 programmed (under set watering start times) to run at 8 am and to have zones 2 and 3 off. And to keep the 3 zones programmed with 5 minutes under set station run time.
I'll post what happens. Thanks for replying.

 

Re-reading the manual and based on my friend's suggestion, I see that the SET WATERING TIMES is to program the starts times of a PROGRAM (or PROGRAMS) and NOT the zones. I had 2 and 3 thinking them as zones but the controller took them as programs 2 and 3. After 1 ended, program 2 would start and then 3. That's why it would run 3 times.

It is running fine now as I wanted it. Thanks for the reply.