u/AdNo9356

I have a Rain Bird sprinkler system that worked perfectly two days ago. Today, I tried running all zones from the app using a quick run (10 minutes per zone). The app/controller says irrigation is active, but none of the sprinkler zones actually turn on.

Here’s what I’ve tested so far:

1. Water supply appears to be on.
2. I manually opened one valve in the underground valve box by twisting the solenoid, and that specific zone DID turn on and spray normally.
3. That seems to confirm:
   -water pressure is good
   -pipes are fine
   -valves themselves can mechanically operate

However:

1. No zones will activate from the Rain Bird controller itself.
2. No zones activate from the app either.
3. I power-cycled the controller and also hit the reset button. No change.

I opened the controller panel:

1. All zone wires appear connected at the terminals.
2. There is an unused orange wire near the “M” terminal (master valve), but I don’t think my system has a master valve because manually opening one valve only activated that single zone.

Then I opened the underground valve box:

I found a white wire that had slipped out of a blue wire nut very easily.

I also noticed several valve wire pairs:
-black/white paired with red
- black/white paired with orange
- black/white paired with green
-I also found two loose black/white wires and I’m now hesitant to reconnect anything because I don’t know what originally went where.

At this point:

1. Plumbing side seems okay
2. Electrica /wiring issue seems likely
3. I suspect a common wire issue but don’t want to randomly reconnect wires and damage something

Questions:

1. Does this sound like a common wire failure?
2. Could the loose white wire explain all zones failing simultaneously?
3. How should the common wires typically be grouped in a Rain Bird valve box?
4. What’s the safest way to identify where the loose black/white wires belong?