Let me better explain, the system can provide, in one GPIO that we called (B), both the pulse to open the valve and the pulse to close the valve. Setting MIN and MAX will define the length of the START pulse and the END pulse (minimum 1 second), there will be just two pulses. Between those pulses there should be the activation of the GPIO (A) which controls the polarity and its deactivation after END pulse. The activation of the GPIO A should be synchronized manually with the GPIO (B). By manually I mean using the "wateringPlan" setting.

For example assuming you set relay of GPIO (B) with MIN=MAX=1:

1) Set GPIO (B) to start at 15:00 and duration 3 minutes on watering plan

2) Set GPIO (A) to start at 15:02 and duration 2 minutes on watering plan

will have this effect:

• at 15:00 GPIO (B) will pulse for 1 sec (opening the valve)

• at 15:02 GPIO (A) will be activated inverting the polarity

• at 15:03 GPIO (B) will pulse for one second (closing the valve)

• at 15:04 GPIO (A) is deactivated bringing the polarity back.

At least this was my understanding of your idea.

I'm not a big fan of the non-latching valves, I think they are intrinsically less safe than the other type.

Anyway as for your suggestion, I'm not going to say that they are not supported :).

The system can support pulses with minimum length of 1 second.

If I understood your idea correctly you should have:

1) One GPIO (A) controlling the polarity.

2) Another GPIO (B) controlling the valve activation.

3) To open the latching valve, activate the GPIO B for few seconds.

4) To close the valve, activate GPIO A , activate the GPIO B for few seconds, deactivate GPIO A.

Anyway there is a feature you can use. Let's say GPIO B is associated to relay1, if you go to Hardware setting and edit the line of relay1, you can modify the fields MIN and MAX and set them to 2. At this point if you set a pulse on relay1 for example of 40 seconds, the relay1 will be activated for 2 seconds, then deactivated, then after 38 seconds will activate again for 2 seconds.

This would still require manual synch of GPIO A and GPIO B which is not ideal.

I'm really starting to doubt that I'm going to solve this valve problem, I'm just stumped. So I'm taking a different approach... latching solenoids. Now before you say that hydrosys doesnt support them hear me out... from my research you can wire the latching valves with a dpdt relay to set the polarity. I could easily set one of the gpio's on hydrosys/rpi to be on/off to set the direction, it would be like a master control to the dpdt relay to set the polarity, I'm pretty sure this is easily achievable.

so the only thing I need to achieve is the pulse. When you set the polarity on the dpdt relay, you use another gpio to supply the pulse. I recall reading somewhere in the doco for hydrosys that the timing is only accurate to a few seconds...? so If i was to set a timer to say turn on for 1-2 seconds then off again, which is what is required for the pulse, would that work?

Thanks,

Will.

just to confirm, hydrosys4 doesn't support the latching type of solenoid? is there any way to wire it so that it does, maybe by using either the normally open and normally closed relay terminals?

I did another test. I have 3 of these Pope ones right now. I have put water through one of them, but not the other 2. With the 2 completely unused ones I can blow through them, just with my mouth, this is with the units powered off. I even turned the manual valve to off all the way and closed the bleeder water flow – I can still blow through them.

This doesn't seem correct to me - I would think that either power off or manual close or both I should not be able to blow through it.

The solenoid valve is a very simple equipment, exactly as you described.

The specification of the valve includes:

Voltage: Min, Max

Current: AC/DC, max consumption

Min Pressure: Min pressure to activate the valve

Max Pressure: Max pressure supported by the valve

Time: Time to open/close.

Type: non latching/latching

I do not recall other parameters.

According to your issue, I would check if the max pressure is in the range of the valve.

But I'd also double check that the valves are non latching, as you said "you wouldnt even know its off" that's quite strange...

Also check the obvious, is the electrical switch working properly?

Can you share the valve exact name/code?

Yes I did, as you say they all have directional arrows for water flow on them.

Am I using them correctly? Power on for flow, no power for block? There is nothing more complicated I have to do?

Hi Will,

did you check the direction? the valve has a direction for the water to flow. You should see a small arrow somewhere.

Hope this help,

Angelo