A new complex is commissioned on the manufacturer’s default recipes. They are safe, conservative and wrong for your house — and the only way to improve them is a season of logged data.
What the first season is actually for
Screen closure timing, morning ramp rate, the humidity band the crop tolerates before disease pressure rises — none of this is knowable in advance for a specific structure on a specific site. The first season records it. Which means the controller must be logging from day one, at a resolution fine enough to be useful later: per minute, not per hour.
A complex without a year of logged climate data is a complex you have to re-learn every time an agronomist leaves.
The three changes that pay
Screen closure moved earlier
On the Samarkand complex, closing the energy screen eleven minutes earlier on clear nights cut heat demand measurably without touching the morning temperature target.
Morning ramp slowed
A gentler ramp reduced condensation on the crop and cut the fungicide programme by two applications across the season.
Irrigation tied to radiation sum
Switching from a clock to a radiation trigger removed two of the three drain-percentage excursions the first season produced.
What to insist on at handover
A controller that exports its own history in a readable format, and a written note of every setpoint as commissioned. If the automation supplier cannot hand you the data, the second season starts from the same place as the first.
