A Word on Water

Irrigation Management - Ya Never Know What Might Happen (part 2)

Well, the alternative was a wireless modem.  This is a fairly recent mode of communication for a Maxicom system, which IMS has put into place on a handful of sites over the last couple of years.  This device is a way to contact a CCU when a telephone line is not available; our exact situation.

There was another complication to this problem in addition to the terminated phone line.  The wire path from the CCU, inside the building, to the irrigation controllers spread out through the campus was also shut down for the remodel.  This meant that there was no way for a CCU located in this room to be connected to the controllers.

A brief review of the situation:

• phone line terminated, but a wireless modem could address this
• wire path from the CCU to the irrigation controllers is inaccessible, there is no way to actually run water
• it's the middle of the watering season

Given this, we needed to do a little more than adding a wireless modem.  A new location for the CCU had to be found where the wire path to/from the controllers could be accessed.

The most sensible place, then, was to find a controller where the CCU and wireless modem could be installed.  Such a location meant there would be a readily accessible way to connect the CCU to the wire path, since the wire path is already connected to the irrigation clock.

The other necessary piece to the new location was a suitable enclosure for the CCU and wireless modem.  Keep in mind, these electronic devices are outside exposed to the elements and have to be housed in an enclosure, either metal or plastic.

In this case, there was an available enclosure already in place near an existing irrigation controller.  A power plug was already in place, too.  So, the necessary infrastructure was there.

It was now a matter of installing the CCU, connecting the wireless modem, connecting the CCU to the wire path, changing some software protocols at the central office and testing the new communication and...voila!  Within a 24 hours period, a multi-controller site which had lost all functionality was restored to normal operations.

It just required the right equipment and know-how to make it happen.