Garden Sentry 12V - Part 6

 From Part 6 yesterday we are now doing some modifications and tidying up the wiring.

Decided to move the unit down the support post a bit further away from the sensor to reduce the likelihood of top overspray triggering the sensor.

I moved the spacer block down half the length of the block.

Got rid of the wire nuts that are good for prototyping and twisted, soldered with heat shrink.

I'll go out later this evening and setup the unit in the front yard.

Looking at the simple circuit one gets the impression that the switched sensor output is only suitable for low current loads like LED's. The rated output is 50 watts which at 12V is 4 amps. The irrigation coil current is 0.48 amps or 480mA (see next photo) so there should issues with overloading the sensor output plus the duty cycle is very short - less that 10 seconds.

Irrigation solenoid coil current @ 12V.

Back soon...