Timer Question

[ILoveControl]

Good day all,

 

There is something I am trying to understand and would like some clarification on. The question refers to the agent "Timers". I created a Timer: FlowerBeds, this timer has a time of 10 minutes. The logic for why I created this is often I turn the flower bed sprinklers on only to remember that they still on an hour later .

 

I want to start this timer on the programming event:

 

When FlowerBeds turns on (Flowerbeds being the relay for that solenoid)

Start timer FlowerBeds.

 

Thats pretty simple

 

I then go to the programming for that timer and I see there are two options which confuse me:

 

When timer stops and When time expires

 

Question 1:

Whats the difference between the two and what are they used for

 

Question 2:

Is it the correct location in programing to put logic:

When timer stops / expires

If FlowerBeds is On

Turn FlowerBeds Off

 

Question 3:

Am I doing this the right way w.r.t programming in C4?

 

Thank you for your time and looking forward to the responses.

 

[CFUG]

I'm sure you will get many responses all saying something a little different.  So, with that said, I encourage you to experiment on your own to learn how each command operates.

 

EXPIRE- Time runs out.

STOP- Time halts wherever it is told to stop.  Could be anywhere in the duration so plan for that "last second" of the duration and program accordingly.  I don't see a need for this unless you want to modify the watering duration outside of the SCHEDULE.

 

I would suggest you do nothing more than shut-off the valve on expiration.  No state check is nec..  Instead, set a VAR to do an override on the timer.  In other words, an action that turns on the water other than SCHEDULE will set the VAR high and bypass the timer START function which, in turn, would prevent a shut-off.

 

Does that help?

[Cyknight]

Largely reiterating the above

 

Q1 Expires is whenever time runs out - stop is when the timer is stopped, ie if it is a repeating timer, it will never stop by itself, if you want something to trigger when you manually stop a timer on a non repeating timer, you need to use stop.

 

Q2 Drop the IF statement, no need for it

 

Q3 Yes you are - just keep in mind that that timer in your current setup ALWAYS starts, so even if you WANT it to run longer, it won't

[ILoveControl]

Excellent thanks so much guys, I really appreciate it I now understand what the difference(s) are.

 

Thank you once again.