June 28, 2023

My Orbit 57114 irrigation controller

First let me give two black stars to Orbit. There are two totally different units, both designated "57114". The clarification is as follows: Who would have dreamed that this outfit would sell two totally different controllers with the same designation? I have a WT2X unit and had the manual for the WT2 and was getting pretty confused and irritated. They should be punished.

Here is the manual for my WT2X unit:

Set up the unit

My unit is capable of controlling 4 valves (the call them "stations"), but I only have one valve connected, as you might expect to staion 1. It is June in Tucson, temperatures are 110 degrees (or higher) and my plants don't seem to be getting water.

The unit has two AA batteries (cells) and they are long since dead. No doubt after the batteries died we had a power outage and this thing lost its program. So in go two new cells. No leakage or damage from the old cells thankfully.

The unit has two "programs", A or B. I will use A and ignore B. B seems to be for situations where you want to be watering less frequently that once a week. Program A lets you set up a week and repeats the same week over and over.

Set Date and Time

Set the dial to Time/Date (at the lower right). Press the recessed RESET. You set in order:

You use +/- to change the value, then enter when you like it. You can use next if you don't want to change anything. I was confused when "20 06" was displayed for the year (don't ask me why) but this is year 2006.

Manual Operation

This doesn't do what I expect or want. It triggers whatever programs you have set up, overriding their start times.

I just want something that "turns on the valve right now!" with no BS or overhead. You can sort of get that as follows: 

Set the dial to Auto
Press Manual
Press Next three times
Use +/- to set a duration in minutes
Press Enter to make it so
After doing this, I learn that I have pipe problems. This will require digging in hot weather. Some manual watering will be in order until I can get busy with all of that.
Have any comments? Questions? Drop me a line!

Tom's Home repair pages / [email protected]