We just returned from the American Society of Irrigation Consultants (ASIC) annual conference in Monterey, CA. It was a great opportunity to see some of our loyal users, and to also show off the software to others who have certainly heard about Land F/X, but have not yet seen all that it can offer to an irrigation designer.
The ASIC conferences are known for having great food, relaxed social events, and inspiring speakers. We were quite impressed with the keynote speaker, Robert Glennon, of the University of Arizona. His speech was a great call to action, with startling statistics such as: Atlanta's near exhaustion of their water supplies, the dramatic cracks and sinkholes emerging where groundwater supplies are rapidly diminishing, and the complete lack of market controls on our dwindling water supplies. He urged us to recognize the absurdity of flushing 90% of our potable water down the drains, and to explore more non-potable irrigation technologies.
Below is Jeremiah Farmer, CTO, at our ASIC table:
Land F/X will not be attending any expos in May.
This will provide some much needed time to update all of the tutorials, videos, and documentation on the website. Be on the look out for current videos to help you with learning this invaluable software.
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Success Story
Every month, Land F/X highlights a success story from one of our valued clients. This month we are featuring Sun City Landscapes Inc, owned by Louie Polish and Al Luchterhand. Many thanks to Carl Kuhns, RLA, ASLA, for submitting this.
Carl made the switch to AutoCAD about 13 years ago, and briefly tested out LandCADD in 1993, but gave it up since it was "a pain" and he "didn't use it very often." Thanks to the automation features and design tools that Land F/X provides, he has been our client since 2007, and regards LFX as a program which he would "be lost without." Land F/X has helped his efficiency by "automating counting, labeling, and other busy work tasks." This time savings production is essential, because of the high number of Builder and Commercial projects Sun City does every year.
The project pictured below is a great example of the benefits of Land F/X. Carl completed it "in about two and a half days, including all of the field work. Without Land F/X, at least another full day would have been needed."
Click Here to see Full Size:
Carl's favorite feature of Land F/X is "the final step - making a plant legend with counts - because it saves hours," leaving more time for the designer to implement their unique touch to the project.
As great as the software is for Carl's workload, the Land F/X support team is the best out there. A memorable experience occurred when "One day the system was down, and after nearly three years of using the program, I was almost lost, but a five minute phone call to Katie F. saved the day (and my sense of humor)."
If you would like to be featured in an up and coming Success Story, feel free to contact Katie.
Announcing FREE Design F/X
Land F/X is beginning to beta test our new Design F/X software with civil engineers and architects. Design F/X includes great features and time savings functions for Details, Graphics, CAD tools, Site Builder, and Reference Notes. It is useful for multidisciplinary firms such as architectural and civil engineering disciplines.
Read the documentation here to learn more about Design F/X. Let our support team know if you would like to test Design F/X, and we will give you FREE licenses to try out.
Last week, Dave created a tutorial for how to use Design F/X. You may watch it below:
Design F/X Video
New Features
We have recently made some updates to our irrigation Mainline Sizing routine.
Some improvements include:
1) correcting the friction loss calculations for looped mainlines
2) easy usage, especially with multiple loops, or loops within loops
3) the ability to create a Manual Flow Zone. This is imperative for the cases where you either:
i) need a section of mainline sized at less than the total flow
ii) Or, in golf course design, where each fairway may have different demands, leaving the outer feeder mainline to be sized at full flow.
Watch the demo video on Flow Zones and Mainline Sizing here:
Flow Zone Video
To see a list of all our new updated features, click here.
May Webinar Schedule
May 7th, Friday at 10AM PST:
Dave will present the Planting Plan Process.
Learn the process to develop a planting plan with Land F/X. Learn the Preferences, how to add plants to your project, placing plants into the drawing, labeling plants, editing and revisions, and Plant Schedules.
May 14th, Friday at 10AM PST:
Dave will present Conceptual Landscape and Planting Plans.
Conceptual Graphics begin at a very diagrammatic level, get further defined with Site Development, and the Planting gets clearly defined on a conceptual level with the Landscape Concept Plan.
May 21rd, Friday at 10AM PST:
Dave will present the Reference Notes system.
Reference notes can be used to do everything from inserting a few simple notes, to a meticulously detailed hardscape plan, to highly accurate cost estimating.
May 28th, Friday at 10AM PST:
Dave will present a General Overview/Getting Started.
Are you new to Land F/X, or are you a current user that wants to back up and review getting started aspects? Dave will discuss the things you need to know to ensure you have covered all of the bases to make sure Land F/X runs smoothly. Topics will include the important initial Preferences that need to be reviewed, layer color and plotting, drawing setup, and starting a project and adding data.
To sign up for the webinar events, just call us and ask to speak with Katie, or send her an email, and let her know which webinars you would like to attend.
If you ever miss a webinar, you may watch any previous ones here, just click on the topic that corresponds.