How Growers are Gaining Unprecedented Irrigation Visibility

Lumo smart valves are designed to deliver real-time data and unprecedented irrigation visibility to growers about their irrigations—how much water is flowing and for how long. We believed this data would be invaluable for helping growers automatically catch leaks and clogs without spending hours walking up and down their vineyards, and giving them the ability to irrigate with greater ease and precision.

But one thing we hadn’t fully realized was just how helpful the data would be for diagnosing other issues with growers’ irrigation systems. Lumo customers have already been astounded by the insights this data provides and by the issues they’ve uncovered as a result. 

A Few Quick Examples of Irrigation Visibility

We’re helping growers understand their irrigation systems to an extent they never have before. 

By measuring actual flow rates, comparing them against expected flow rates, and monitoring differences over time, we’ve been able to help growers learn more about how their irrigation system is actually performing versus their expectation. 

Lumo's Ops Center shows detailed information for every irrigation run

In one case, we were seeing huge spikes in flow rate, flagged it for a customer and suggested it might be an issue with his pressure tanks. The issue was quickly found and repaired by the pump company. 

In another instance, we were regularly seeing steep drop offs in flow rates a few hours into irrigation runs, notified the customer, and they were able to see that their pump wasn’t recharging their tank fast enough to keep up with the discharge rate. 

In a third case, a customer had unknowingly installed drip line irrigation with emitters already built in and then installed another set of emitters, which meant they were delivering twice as much water as they thought. The Lumo team immediately saw that the actual flow rate was far higher than what was expected and the customer was able to identify the issue, update their flow rate expectations, and shorten their irrigation cycles accordingly. 

Everyday Errors and Getting to Know Your System

On a more routine basis, we help viticulturalists and vineyard managers catch small things all the time—a valve that’s been left closed after a manual irrigation. A leak here. A break there. 

More generally, we’re helping them get more familiar with all the quirks of their irrigation system. Most farmers know their systems aren’t perfect and have issues of all different sorts from years of add-ons and repairs. 

But before now, they weren’t able to identify exactly what those issues were and they had no good way to understand exactly how it was affecting the volume of water they were delivering to their vines. 

Lumo is shining a light on irrigation systems and illuminating issues that before were hard to see and difficult to quantify. 

Introducing Flow Vision™

Both the Lumo team and our customers have been blown away by the level of precision and irrigation visibility that valves with built-in flow meters and wireless connectivity can provide. So much so, in fact, that we’re doubling down on building our product to provide real-time accountability and actionable insights. 

With Flow Vision™, our latest product improvement, Lumo users will now get full irrigation visibility into the flow rate during irrigations and will be able to access that information after the fact to identify issues and pinpoint exactly when they started.

Lumo's Flow Vision feature provides a visual reference for actual vs expected flow rates of irrigations

The flow rate information is displayed in a way that’s as helpful as possible for growers, both for managing the volume of water they’re delivering and for better understanding any and all issues with their irrigation system. 

That’s how growers are gaining unprecedented irrigation visibility into their systems and delivering water with greater precision than ever before. To learn more about Flow Vision™ and how to gain a deeper understanding of what’s happening with your irrigations, contact us at [email protected] or request a demo here.