Question
QUESTION: I ahve 5 zones in my system.  When I set the control dial to "set program start times" It only displays zones 1,2,3,4 then goes back to zone 1.

When I set the control dial to "set station run times" it displays all 5 zones.

When I set the control dial to "set pump operation" it shows all 6 zones as "on"

Any idea why I don't see zone 5 when I am trying to set the program start time?

ANSWER: Hey Ray, I hope this helps. You are getting confused on the start times. The start times are for the whole program, and not for the individual valves. That is why you only can put in up to 4 start times. Let me explain. Example: You set your station run times for station/valve #1 for 10 minutes, #2 for 10 minutes, #3 for 10minutes, #4 for 10 minutes, #5 for 10 minutes, #6 for no minutes. You set your "first" start time (start time 1) to start at 7:00 am. The controller, at 7:00am, looks at station/valve #1 and says okay, there is 10 minutes programmed in to station#1, so it turns station #1 on for 10 minutes. At the end of the 10 minutes, it goes to station/valve #2, and sees if there is any time in valve # 2. Okay station/valve #2 has 10 minutes programmed, lets run station/valve #2 for 10 minutes. At the end of that 10 minutes, it goes to station/valve #3 and runs it for 10 minutes and so on and so on, until it gets to station/valve #6 and sees that there is no time programmed, and will stop running any valves. If you put in another start time, lets call it the "second" start time (start time 2) at 2:000pm. The same thing will happen at 2:00pm. It starts with station/valve #1, and runs station/valve #1 for 10 minutes, then it goes to station/valve #2 and runs it for 10 minutes, and so on and so on. Your second start time at 2:oo pm, doesn't just run valve #2, like you think you are programming it. Think of your start times, as your "first" start time, your "second" start time, your "third" start time, and your "fourth" start time. These are not in anyway, related to the station/ valves. Second example: Set station run time for station/valve # 1 to zero minutes, set run time for station/valve #2 to zero minutes, set run time for station/valve #3 for 10 minutes, set run time for station/valve#4 for zero minutes, set run time for station/valve #5 for 5 minutes. Set start time #1 (first start time) for 8:00am. At 8:00am, controller will automatically skip station/valve #1 and #2, and start with station/valve #3, run for 10 minutes, skip station/valve #4, and run station/valve #5 for 5 minutes. I hope this makes things a liitle easier, on how your start times work. Let me know if I can be of anymore help. Thanks and have a great day.

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: You are right, I was confused about what the start times meant.

We have water restrictions odd/even days.  I know how to select EVEN days then I want to select every other even day.  So, an example is 2,4,6,8,10.  I want to soak the lawn with water on the 2,6,10 skipping the 4th and 8th?  As you know, setting it for every Tuesday and Friday over the summer will result in some months Tuesday is an even day other months it is an Odd day.

Answer
Hey Ray, I hope this helps. I believe on this controller, you can set it to run every 4th day. Now at the beginning of the month, depending on if it is 30 or 31 days, you might have to adjust it again to every 4 days, starting it on the day you want it to begin (2,6 or 10). This should work out well for you. Thanks and have a great day.