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I have a 10 year old 8 zone RainBird system that was working until about 2 weeks ago.
First off, zone 7 never came on when I started the system after the winter. It wasn't receiving power, and if I switched the zone 7 wire at the controller with zone 8, I could then turn on the 7th zone by turning on zone 8.
Then, all of a sudden, the whole system stopped working. I can still turn the zones on manually by turning the solenoids, but not through the controller. There has been no recent digging in my yard. I have done the following to troubleshoot:
1. Verified the water is on
2. Verified power to all zones (except zone 7) is between 24-28 volts at the controller using a multimeter
3. Verified ohms to all zones is between 30-60, except zones 1 and 5 (which register as a 1)
4. Tried to replace the controller with a new one by Orbit. But after hooking up 4 of the zones and realizing they still didn't work, I stopped.

I was trying to test zone 5 at the valve box and noted that I could measure 24 volts when the zone was turned on until I touched the solenoid wire to the hot wire and then the volts went to zero. (not sure if this is significant)

Any help on where to go from here would be appreciated.
Thanks