Found Cockatiel

Did you lose your cockatiel? If so, one of the Manors co-owners has found it. Contact me at the phone number on the right sidebar and I will put you in touch with the person who is caring for it.

Rainfall

Since I measure the rainfall we receive here at the Manors with my rain gauge and track it with a spreadsheet, it is very easy for me to graph the daily rainfall amounts for the season and post it to the Internet. Click on the image above to enlarge the graph, which was current through 10:00 AM, July 20th.

UPDATED Oct. 1, 2010

I've continued to update this graph on a regular basis and you can view the latest version by clicking here.

Rainfall totals by month:

May 2010 - 4.5 inches
June 2010 - 4.0 inches
July 2010 - 4.85 inches
August 2010 - 0.45 inch
Sept. 2010 - 4.37 inches

WOW Cable & Internet Service

I'm sorry to report that my efforts to bring WOW Cable & Internet Service into the Manors have been in vain. Easement agreements were drawn up but the Board of Directors for the Meadows Homeowners Association have so far declined to sign the documents. Therefore, I've just been informed by WOW's Director of Operations for SE Michigan that we have lost our place in their queue of 2010 expansion projects.

Without the Meadows easement agreements, WOW is unable to bring their cable infrastructure into the Manors. Even if the Meadows Board changed their mind tomorrow, it would be 2013 at the earliest before WOW could have us inserted into their expansion plans.

If you decide to switch from Comcast to a satellite television service, please note that you must submit an Alteration/Modification Request prior to having your satellite dish antenna installed and that there are restrictions on where your antenna may be mounted. Please read Article III of this document for more details.

Sprinkler System Changes

Today I read all of our irrigation water meters and revised all of the sprinkler system settings. A second watering cycle was added in the middle of the day and all of the overnight cycle start times were moved earlier (some as early as 9:30 PM) so they all finish before 6:00 AM when the pressure in the Shelby Twp. system begins to drop. To view the revised sprinkler system settings, click here.

Between April 21st and today, all of the meters feeding the sprinkler system have delivered 3,678 units of water (367,800 cubic feet). At $2.873 per unit, that comes to $10,576 worth of water, which is about one-third of our 2010 budgeted amount for municipal water. Over those 75 days the system actually watered about 51 times, due to the rain sensors, a couple of weeks of every other day watering, etc. So basically, it costs the Association about $207 ($10,576 divided by 51) each time we run all of the zones in the Manors. With a second watering cycle, our daily cost becomes about $400.

Based on our water consumption to date, I did some calculations to determine how many days we can afford a second watering cycle:

$33,000 - 2010 Budget line item for municipal water
($10,567) - spent to date (one cycle per day)
$22,433 - line item balance
($12,740) - projected spending through Sept. 30 (one cycle per day)
$9,693 - available for second daily watering cycle

$9,693 will fund 47 actual days with a second daily watering cycle, so we should have enough budget to water twice a day for the next 6 to 7 weeks, if necessary.

In 2009, we watered for 20 weeks (May 21st through Oct. 7th) at a cost of $33,000. On Jan. 1, 2010, Shelby Twp. increased our water rate by 9%. To make matters worse, this year we had to start watering on April 21st because of the warm and dry spring. But with careful monitoring and some stingy watering during the past 10 weeks, it looks like we can afford to water 23 weeks this year (up to the traditional Sept. 30th shut-down date) with the more expensive water and still come in at the same total cost as last year.

I'm sure you've noticed lately that the Shelby Twp. water pressure has been very low between the hours of 6 to 9 AM and from 6 to 10 PM. The heads on our sprinkler system requires a minimum water pressure of 35 PSI to operate properly and provide sufficient overlap.

UPDATE: Using a pressure gauge to measure the actual pressure being maintained by the Shelby Twp. water system, I observed that it was below the 35 PSI minimum from 8:00 PM through 10:30 PM on July 6th, bottoming out at 27 PSI around 9:00 PM. At 6:15 AM on the 7th, the water pressure was even lower at 20 PSI and it didn't reach 35 PSI until 9:00 AM. It reached the normal pressure range of 50+ PSI at noon.

With the revised watering schedules I have tried to avoid watering during those low pressure time periods, but it is impossible to do so on Controllers 1 and 2 (serving addresses on Lexington South and Central Park North). That is due to the fact that all zones on these two controllers are hooked up to the same water meter and must run sequentially for 13.5 hours to complete one cycle.

June 2010 Newsletter

Co-owners should have received their June 2010 newsletter in this past week's mail. Click here to read a scanned version of it:

• Front Page
• Back Page

I wish it would rain!

"I Wish it Would Rain!" was a 1967 hit by Detroit's Temptations and I've been humming that melody a lot lately.

Because of the abnormally dry spring, this year we had to start watering the lawns on April 20th, which was a full month earlier than 2009. Since then, we have received 9.3 inches of rainfall in my backyard rain gauge, 60% of which fell over four separate dates: May 2, 11, 13 and June 5 (click on the chart above for a better view of all of the rainfall I've measured from April 20th through July 3rd).

Lately, the rainstorms seem to pass either to our north or south, leaving us with hardly enough rain to skip a watering cycle. The National Weather Service records at their Detroit Metro Airport location show an official rainfall total over that period of 11.6 inches, 2.3 inches more than we've received here in Shelby Township.

Because of the early start this spring and Shelby Township's recent 9% increase in water rates, I've been closely regulating our watering frequency and lengths to keep us within budget. As of July 2nd, I have increased the watering duration by 20% on all zones to get us through the current and forecasted hot and dry spell. I also moved the starting times earlier so that the last zones will finish by 6:00 AM, which is when the water pressure begins to drop.

I am hoping to avoid adding a second watering cycle for as long as I can, particularly since the Township has asked everyone to voluntarily avoid watering their lawns between the hours of 6:00 AM and 9:00 PM. UPDATE: second watering cycle was added July 5th (read this post for more information).