Garden irrigation in Ampio UNI

  • Document number: PO-172-EN
  • Version: 1.0
  • Date of publication: July 27, 2022

Garden irrigation in Ampio UNI

  • Document number: PO-172-EN
  • Version: 1.0
  • Date of publication: July 27, 2022


What we mean by garden irrigation here, is maintenance-free garden management from the Ampio UNI app. In this guide, you will learn how to properly configure and use different sections of garden irrigation.

How does water irrigation work?

In order to get to the irrigation settings in Ampio UNI, go to the ACCOUNT tab and open Garden irrigation. If you have not configured garden irrigation before, the list will be empty. Before you add your first section, let’s first focus on how exactly the sections work. In garden irrigation you can create any number of sections, which work independently from each other. Then, each section can have any number of actions added, and each of the actions' operational time is specified in minutes. Actions are triggered one by one, starting from the first one on the list, only when all the conditions for triggering a section are met. After the prescribed time, the first action is switched off and the next Action from the list is activated. Let’s create the first section by clicking on the + symbol in the top menu bar in Ampio UNI. Give the section a name and confirm with OK.

Conditions for triggering a section

Once the section is created, hours and days will be shown as basic conditions to be set for activating specific sections.

These are the basic parameters that will let you plan your garden watering. You can expand the list of conditions by choosing the + symbol from the top Ampio UNI menu bar. We can use objects for that, which are available in our Ampio UNI application. This is also why, if you have the right measuring equipment, you should discuss adding readings from the measuring devices to the app with your installer, so that you can use them later for garden irrigation.

There are the following types available:

  • Rain sensor

If the signal from this sensor is active, watering will not start at the assigned time in the chosen section.

  • Temperature sensor

Here, you have the option to read temperature measurements and set a minimum temperature at which garden irrigation will be set about. If you set the temperature to 18°C, garden watering will only start, if the temperature reaches, or exceeds 18°C.

  • Humidity sensor

After adding a humidity sensor, you can set a percentage value of humidity, under which your section should be activated.

  • Time

By adding another time condition, you can activate a given section twice a day. Apart from a specific hour, you can also make garden watering dependent on the sunset and sunrise.

  • Timed rain sensor

If you would like to make garden irrigation dependent not only on the current weather conditions, but also on whether it had been raining a couple of hours prior to the planned watering, you can use the timed rain sensor. You can check if the sensor was active over a certain period of time in the last couple of hours. The period of time in which this can be registered is the last 12 hours.

Adding actions

Once the conditions are configured, you can go to the ACTIONS tab. Here, you can add objects that will be responsible for garden irrigation. By each of the objects there will be a slider with which you can set the watering duration - from 1 to 60 minutes. Objects are activated according to their order on the list. As soon as the object on top of the list finishes its operation, the next one gets activated for a specified period of time. If 60 minutes is not enough for watering a selected object, you can add the same object again and prolong the irrigation time.

Sample configuration

Click to enlarge and open in a new tab.

The figure above presents an automated schedule of garden irrigation, which will be activated under the following conditions:

  • twice a day
  • every day at 12 o’clock
    and
  • 10 minutes after the sunset,

if

  • it is not raining and it has not been raining in the last 10 hours for more than 2 hours on end,
  • the temperature is higher than 18°C and
  • humidity is below the set value.

As soon as thr conditions are met, the lawn will be watered for 17 minutes, then flowers for 40 minutes and, at the end, the garden for 24 minutes. The whole process will take 81 minutes in total.

Main irrigation screen

Having configured the first section, you can go back to the main screen by clicking on the arrow with a floppy disk in the top left corner. Your irrigation settings have now been saved. Now you can create another section. Dividing your garden into sections is useful when you want to make specific sections' watering dependent on different conditions, or use the same objects but with varying frequencies dependent on specified conditions. If your water source is efficient enough, you can also create a couple of sections with the same conditions, but different objects active - then watering will be performed simultaneously.

In the main screen, you can also manage each of the sections independently:

  • play - start watering manually
  • stop - stop watering manually
  • toggle - the status of a given section (you can switch it off once the watering season has ended and switch back on next year)