Hydros 4 outlet wifi question

[Oldss72]

Hello - I am considering adding a hydros control system to my tank. I have written out my wish list - but I have a question that I cannot find an answer for.

Can the wifi power strips control based on power consumption? Meaning if the power is over XX Watts, assume that there is a failure and turn of the power?

I am thinking of this as a low water level indication in my ATO bucket as I would like to keep my Tunze 3155 unit as it has been very reliable. I am thinking that when the pump is on the power should be higher than when it is simply monitoring the level - but if my bucket runs dry, I want to know it has run dry and I want my pump to shut off after say 5 mins of running. The Tunze 3155 I believe shuts the pump off after 10 mins and goes to an error state - which happens occasionally - but it would be nice to get a notification that the pump ran for 5 mins and the controller switched off the ATO.

I suppose I could add a water sensor to my ATO bucket for low level but that would require another Sense port - and with the setup I have at the moment - I have all the sense ports consumed.

Thanks!

 

[n2585722]

Hello - I am considering adding a hydros control system to my tank. I have written out my wish list - but I have a question that I cannot find an answer for.

Can the wifi power strips control based on power consumption? Meaning if the power is over XX Watts, assume that there is a failure and turn of the power?

I am thinking of this as a low water level indication in my ATO bucket as I would like to keep my Tunze 3155 unit as it has been very reliable. I am thinking that when the pump is on the power should be higher than when it is simply monitoring the level - but if my bucket runs dry, I want to know it has run dry and I want my pump to shut off after say 5 mins of running. The Tunze 3155 I believe shuts the pump off after 10 mins and goes to an error state - which happens occasionally - but it would be nice to get a notification that the pump ran for 5 mins and the controller switched off the ATO.

I suppose I could add a water sensor to my ATO bucket for low level but that would require another Sense port - and with the setup I have at the moment - I have all the sense ports consumed.

Thanks!

The wifi strips do not have any power monitoring, The wifi plug does if I remember correctly. But at this time the Hydros just monitors the wattage and will send an alert if it is out of the limits you set. I don't know if it will have enough of a power difference between the pump running wet and running dry to use this. If you were using the Hydros for ATO you would set a maximum on time and set run past max on time to off. Then the pump would only run for that amount of time before turning off. The other option is to put a water level sensor on your ATO reservoir that would go to dry just before it is empty. This will send an alert and you could set the output used for powering your ATO to use this input and make active when wet. Then the output will be on when the sensor is wet and turn off the output when the sensor goes dry. I think this will do what you want. You would just need the sense port and sensor to hook it up.

 

[Oldss72]

Thanks for the reply.

So you can get notifications of power usage with the smart plug - but can't create rules around it. - Ok.

Next question, I see various reports of wifi plugs disconnecting - do they fail to the current state when they disconnect, or fail off?

For example - I have a pump on the wifi plugs and it looses connection while the pump is running - does the pump stay on and possibly turn off when it reconnects if a state change occured during the disconnected time- or does it default to an off state until reconnected?

Thank you!

 

[n2585722]

Thanks for the reply.

So you can get notifications of power usage with the smart plug - but can't create rules around it. - Ok.

Next question, I see various reports of wifi plugs disconnecting - do they fail to the current state when they disconnect, or fail off?

For example - I have a pump on the wifi plugs and it looses connection while the pump is running - does the pump stay on and possibly turn off when it reconnects if a state change occured during the disconnected time- or does it default to an off state until reconnected?

Thank you!

The wifi power strips and plugs will stay in whatever state they are in if communication is lost except for a power failure. If power fails the wifi strips will go to the off state after they complete their boot up. They will remain off until the controller commands them on. Basically once they are paired with a controller they have to get a command from the controller before any output is turned on or off. I have not had a lot of issues with my wifi strips loosing communication but I do not use them to power ATO, AWC or dosing pumps. Those are powered by dive ports which are 12v power ports. The dosing pumps I use for ATO, AWC and dosing are 12v pumps. I have one Hydros and three Intllab pumps in use. I had to make my own power cables for the Intllab pump. The Hydors comes with a dive port cable. The cable will work on either pump though. Hydros also has a controller called the XP8 which has 8 AC outlet. That is it's only ports so you would want to use it in a collective with another controller or controllers with the inputs you need. I currently have 9 controllers in a collective. All inputs and outputs combined on those controllers are shared with the collective it acts like one large controller.

 

[JeffB418]

Thanks for the reply.

So you can get notifications of power usage with the smart plug - but can't create rules around it. - Ok.

Next question, I see various reports of wifi plugs disconnecting - do they fail to the current state when they disconnect, or fail off?

For example - I have a pump on the wifi plugs and it looses connection while the pump is running - does the pump stay on and possibly turn off when it reconnects if a state change occured during the disconnected time- or does it default to an off state until reconnected?

Thank you!

There's multiple versions of the 4 port wifi strips out there now, for BOTH versions, if you lose WIFI but NOT power, the outlet will remain in the same state as it was last left in. Now the difference between the 2 versions if you lose power: older version: if you lose POWER and wifi, the outlets will all come back up as OFF until it receives a wifi link to hydros. The newer version: if you lose POWER and wifi, the outlets will RETURN to the state that they were when they lost power. There is no easy way to know which wifi strip you have until you have one in hand. Old versions, the power button will stay on if all outlets are turned off, the new ones the power button will turn off if all outlets are turned off. As for the single wifi plug, I dont know how that one works, I believe its like the old wifi strips.

 

[JeffB418]

Also I recommend using a XP8 or drive ports for mission critical components. Wifi strip connectivity varies based on users home network setups. Personally mine have been bulletproof but I upgraded my home network around having many devices. But others have varying success based on their network or even home configuration.

 

[n2585722]

There's multiple versions of the 4 port wifi strips out there now, for BOTH versions, if you lose WIFI but NOT power, the outlet will remain in the same state as it was last left in. Now the difference between the 2 versions if you lose power: older version: if you lose POWER and wifi, the outlets will all come back up as OFF until it receives a wifi link to hydros. The newer version: if you lose POWER and wifi, the outlets will RETURN to the state that they were when they lost power. There is no easy way to know which wifi strip you have until you have one in hand. Old versions, the power button will stay on if all outlets are turned off, the new ones the power button will turn off if all outlets are turned off. As for the single wifi plug, I dont know how that one works, I believe its like the old wifi strips.

Jeff I guess all of my wifi strips are the older version. Again I have not needed once since the XP8 came out.

 

[JeffB418]

Jeff I guess all of my wifi strips are the older version. Again I have not needed once since the XP8 came out.

Yeah the newer version came out in a batch starting about 8 months ago. Around the time users were posting concerns why their power LEDs were turning off, but still working. That was part of the update on those units and helps differentiate units. The newer units write the outlet status to memory and retain it indefinitely.

 

[Oldss72]

Thanks all for the reply. I was imagining my setup would be an X4 controller with an XP8 + a 4 bar wifi or two.

I am thinking that I will measure Temp, Rope leak on my sump, ATO high level (eg sensor fails high on my tunze to shut off power if the water level gets too high), and Skimmer cup high sensor with the 1 probe and 4 sense ports.

I am imagining if I get the XP8 for my sump heaters (2 outlets), return pump, skimmer, algae scrubber & GFO pump - that consumes 6 of the outlets on the XP8.

I was going to use a wifi 4 bar for my lights (Radions x2 ) and powerheads (x2) in my display upstairs so that I can have power management on the lights and have a feeding/water change mode for my powerheads. It would be nice to have an additional 4 bar wifi to use for water change preheating/mixing/ect and long term it would make sense to have redundancy on my RO/DI unit via a solenoid/high level switch so that I don't potentially have water on the floor - though that is not a huge issue since my ro/di container is next to my sump pump and any water that spills just ends up in there.

My dosing pump is BMT01 - which I have never had a failure on, so I think that would be left off the Hydros.

Thoughts?

 

[n2585722]

Yeah the newer version came out in a batch starting about 8 months ago. Around the time users were posting concerns why their power LEDs were turning off, but still working. That was part of the update on those units and helps differentiate units. The newer units write the outlet status to memory and retain it indefinitely.

Now I know, thanks for correcting me on that. More than likely they would get the newer one now unless it is a dealer with a low turnover rate for the controller which is possible.

 

[n2585722]

Thanks all for the reply. I was imagining my setup would be an X4 controller with an XP8 + a 4 bar wifi or two.

I am thinking that I will measure Temp, Rope leak on my sump, ATO high level (eg sensor fails high on my tunze to shut off power if the water level gets too high), and Skimmer cup high sensor with the 1 probe and 4 sense ports.

I am imagining if I get the XP8 for my sump heaters (2 outlets), return pump, skimmer, algae scrubber & GFO pump - that consumes 6 of the outlets on the XP8.

I was going to use a wifi 4 bar for my lights (Radions x2 ) and powerheads (x2) in my display upstairs so that I can have power management on the lights and have a feeding/water change mode for my powerheads. It would be nice to have an additional 4 bar wifi to use for water change preheating/mixing/ect and long term it would make sense to have redundancy on my RO/DI unit via a solenoid/high level switch so that I don't potentially have water on the floor - though that is not a huge issue since my ro/di container is next to my sump pump and any water that spills just ends up in there.

My dosing pump is BMT01 - which I have never had a failure on, so I think that would be left off the Hydros.

Thoughts?

I use my Hydros collective to control my RODI uint which is in the garage 35ft from where the tank is located. My ATO, AWC and dosing pumps are also in the garage. Click on my Build Thread Contributor banner in one of my post and go to page 7 where the Hydros screenshots and settings are discussed from the beginning when I started using it. I moved things over from my other controller a few things at a time. Also as things changed in the firmware and app I would change things on my system and I would go through the changes on that build thread.