Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hey Peterosorio

Thanks for the explanation, its appreciated and understood. I don't know C++ all that well unfortunately. So I'll wait patiently

Thanks

http://www.libelium.com/new-ion-sensor- ... art-water/

the Waspmote seems interesting , heaps of wifi probes

Interesting probe. Any idea on pricing or lifespan?

yuck like a year if lucky :S


Life expectancy
If they are not subject to harassing environments Smart Water sensors may keep on functioning for periods of several months,
providing the required recalibrations are performed to maintain the accuracy demanded by the application. Tests carried out
at Libelium facilities have shown that sensors working for at least six months have not suffered an important variance in their
output and still provide an accurate output when calibrated.
However, the chemical processes given in the sensor measurement will finally end up the sensor life. In the case of the pH, ORP
and dissolved oxygen the depletion of the solution of both the reference and measurement electrodes and the wear of the
sensitive bulb or membrane are the principal reasons for sensor failure. In the case of the conductivity sensor, the polarization
of the electrodes (attenuated by the application of an alternating supply current but not completely avoided), the accumulation
of dirt in them and the wear of the platinum black layer are the most significant sources of damage.
We can summarize that both recalibration and lifetime of the sensor probes depend on three main factors:
• 1- Water environment: corrosive chemicals, salt, dirt, extreme temperatures, strong flow currents decrease the lifetime.
• 2- Usage: the more the probes are used the sooner they need to be changed due to the depletion of the substances used
as reference and measurement electrodes.
• 3- Time: event in perfect conditions and low usage the chemical reactions that take place in the reference electrodes will
stop working.
Owing to all that, the sensor probes will probably have to be replaced between six months and one year after they have
been deployed. The process of replacement is really easy as the probes as the probes may be easily unscrew using just the hand.

Looks great yu do fine work.

Sorry I could not help more daughter went to hospital and we went to help her.

I've joined the party to build a controller for my greenhouse aquaponic system as well. I'm still in the process of building the greenhouse (it's enclosed now but still need to eventually add siding and finish insulating the inside since it's passive solar heat in a northern cold climate). I have one IBC fish tank / bed up and running inside of it now, I have a second IBC fish tank that I have not tied in to the system yet and will eventually build several different growbeds/wicking beds in the greenhouse. I have ordered most of the parts that Chiumanfu had listed but I'm not adding the pH or DO sensors yet (I will probably add the pH eventually because I think I have an extra pH probe laying around that I ordered for my Apex controller for my saltwater tank that I haven't used for anything yet), personally I don't think I need the DO sensor so will hold off on that until the system is all up and running and I decide for sure if I need it or not.

I've been running Neptune's APEX Gold controller on my saltwater aquarium for a while. It's simple to set up and simple to program, but it is very limited to what it can do and to add additional sensors or additional outlets it is very expensive, (for example, it has one temp sensor default, in order to add a second one you need to order another module which costs about $85 - you want to add a third temp probe another $85...) so I decided to try building my own controller for the greenhouse.

I went with a knockoff mega 2560 rev 3 even though I don't know if I need all of the inputs, I just figured I would start there since I have no electronics experience... I can always buy an uno and convert it later if I decide I don't need as much power as the mega gives, but I was also concerned about the speed difference on the uno being too slow so figured the mega would be a better place to learn from.

Right now I have installed a DS3231 RTC and one DHT22 sensor. Eventually I will wire in three DHT22's (inside lower level of the greenhouse, inside upper level of the greenhouse and outside greenhouse... I thought it important for my system to measure both the ground level temp/humidity as well as the peak inside the greenhouse because I will have fans in the peak that will turn on and blow the hot/moist air from the peak of the greenhouse to 3" PVC plumbed in the ground in a trench covered in gravel to try and save some of the heat from the peak and use it to warm the gravel floor to help keep the greenhouse warmer in the winter rather than just losing heat out the roof, so I will use the DHT22 in the peak to turn the fans on and off as needed compared to the ground level temp in the greenhouse).

The last couple of times I was playing with the arduino I was trying to get the DS18b20 water temp sensors to work and struggled a bit, so last night I decided to go back to the test board and loaded the 1WIRE example and wired up two of the sensors so I could see that I have it wired correctly before I try to integrate it in to my sketch. I got it reading the two sensors to give me their unique identifiers and reading temps in the example so hopefully that means it will be easy to put it in my sketch now (I think I had something with the wiring incorrect before).

I have not attempted to connect my LCD screen yet, and I have an SD card but then decided to add the ethernet shield which includes the mini SD in it, so decided not to use the stand alone SD's. I also already purchased the relays and buck controller to manage the outlets and power sense, but have not done anything with them yet... at least initially I plan to just get it up recording data then add the rest later.

I am in the same boat as everyone else that there is more projects than time in the day, so I'm splitting my hours between work, working on my greenhouse, taking care of my 8 week old kid (first child), working on the controller, and keeping up with all of the other household chores and sleep. I have been alternating a couple hours a day between the greenhouse or the controller and can only work on either of them at the mercy of my wife and kid since she is still home with him all day long (for a few more weeks before she goes back to work...) she's typically ready to hand him off and take a nap or work on her household chores by the time I get home, so I only get a couple hours here and there to work on any of my projects right now.

@rininger85

I am a true newbie and recently took my first step at an Arduino control system myself. My post is here:

http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=27712&start=15#p543557

It has only one DS18b20 - raw, not of waterproof packaging. Point is, being new to everything, gardening, aquaculture and monitoring/control systems, I started with a WiFi connection for the data storage, post-processing, reporting, alarming and ultimately, systems feedback controls. I chose the new Arduino Uno WiFi board and connected it to a free Iot backend, ThingSpeak. It was simple and works great! My new sensors came in last night but it may be a few days until connected.

Greg

Greg, I'll jump over there and follow your build as well. I have not started a build specific to my controller although I've posted some about it on my greenhouse/AP build thread.

Hi all
I've been looking into making an Arduino temperature monitoring set up for my system for some time now & have been following this thread. However I only have limited knowledge of computers & zero knowledge of coding. So I was very interested when this KickStarter campaign came up :https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/iot-invention-kit/eslov-iot-invention-kit?ref=NewsDT1xOct0616
Just thought I should share. Any thoughts or ideas

It is hard to get started or learn without an underlying need, a simple task that you want to automate. When you do have one, you will find much help on this forum, Arduino's forum, github and simply Google. This may help too but less if you do not have a problem to solve and get your hands dirty first - IMHO.

Chiumanfu, I have what I need but coding is kicking my ass, would you be unto coding my system? just let me know what you think. I can send you what I am looking for and ofcource I would pay for the time you spend. I would love some help here.

Let me know

I'm just getting started in my adventure with Arduino and have pretty limited programming experience... to me really all you need is a project in mind for what you want to build, some time to do a little research and some time to plug wires together and test that it is doing what you expect it to do... you don't really have to know programming because most things seem to have examples available that you can copy and modify to your needs and you'll learn a bit of coding along the way as you read through the code and what it is supposed to be doing, and you'll learn electronics through trial and error and forums like this where people have a common goal to build somewhat similar projects. The hardest part is finding the time to sit down and read / tinker with the arduino (at least for me with an 8 week old kid at home).

On another note... I ran to Home Depot on my lunch today and picked up a project box to house the arduino system in and also a breaker box for the greenhouse and some electrical boxes to be able to start wiring the power up out in the greenhouse... if all goes as planned I'll have power hooked up to the greenhouse this weekend and be a little farther along with the arduino project too. I did solder the pins in to my serial monitor last night so hopefully I didn't screw that up too badly.

I've been looking for solid core 20 to 29 awg wire for the past few days to use for the longer runs I will have for sensors to reach their homes and back to the control box and I finally saw some at home depot... then I realized a 20 awg wire is so teeny tiny, I wondered what CAT6 wire was (because I have at least a couple hundred feet of it left)... oh guess what... CAT6 is a 24awg wire... that means it will work for the arduino breadboard connections... I guess I don't need to find wire anymore... a couple hundred feet x 8 wires in a CAT6 = I have enough wire to run around the greenhouse many many times... I might even get fancy and stop and pick up a couple packages of aquarium airline hose to use as a conduit / rub guard on the wire if I decide to strip them out and only run however many wires I actually need instead of the entire CAT6 cable.

Cat6 of course is nice. What about some of the old, 4-wire, sigle-strand copper wire? Would that work?

Greg

Thanks for the advice. Having allready bought most of the components from Ebay. I guess I'll just have to make time to work it out.

has anyone had problems with the accuracy of the DHT22's? I have three of them running right now all within 6" of each other (as I'm just testing things on the bench), the temperatures seem fairly close (65.5F, 64.8F, 64.9F) but the humidity readings are way off (61%, 41%, 4%). Do you have to calibrate these or are they just that inaccurate?