Need a hand with Breakout box

[Yates273]

So I installed my breakout box and attached a float to my external skimmate container. This works flawlessly as soon as the float lifts the skimmer turns off. My problem is I wanted to hook up a simple button named “food” that is normally open so I hook up to break out box and wrote on outlet if food closed then on just to see if I can trigger switch to work. When I press the button nothing happens. Any ideas

 

[garbled]

How did you wire the switch? Also, if you just "tap" the switch, it will only remain closed for a very short time, maybe not enough to notice? Try holding it for a second or two.

Note that on the breakout, your float should be between say, 1 and ground, and then your new switc should be between 2 and also ground.

 

[Yates273]

Here is my BOB. Each wire has a separate ground.
I held button for 20 seconds and nothing happens on dashboard. VO for food stays open. I even hooked up a toggle switch to see amd still nothing. As far as I know wires can go anyway on either side of Bob amd button

 

[garbled]

I guess that's what I don't understand.. In the back of that, all the black wires 1-6 should all connect together and go to G on the apex itself. They do, right?

 

[Yates273]

Yes they do unlike the Neptune BOB where all the wires have to go to one ground screw,
this box allows me to use each individual clip for ground.

 

[garbled]

Do you have a multimeter? Check conductivity between black 1 and black 2? Add the tiles for all your switches to fusion, and just use a jumper wire to check each one. Maybe you wired the pin for 2 to 3 or something?

It's unlikely a switch is dead, but like I said, a simple jumper wire is an easy test.

 

[SuncrestReef]

You need to rename your virtual output so it doesn’t have the same name as your switch. The Apex doesn’t like duplicate names.

Keep in mind there’s a delay of between 30-60 seconds when looking at the Fusion dashboard, so it may not show the switch status update unless you hold it for that long.

Try adding a timer on your virtual output to keep in on after a brief push of the button:

[vFood]
Set OFF
If Food CLOSED Then ON
Min Time 005:00 Then ON

 

[Yates273]

Ok one other thing. I just held button down for 48 seconds amd the switch went from open to closed. That is way too much of a delay

 

[Yates273]

I renamed VO feed button but when writing code do I use if feed button on then off or do I use the if food on then off? Sorry if these seem like stupid questions but I am still new to this BOB and programming

 

[garbled]

It might not really be that long. Try connecting to your apex locally instead of fusion, to see if you get a different result. Fusion might not update as quickly as a local apex will. You can also check the log to see if holding it for say 1 second is enough to generate a log entry.

 

[SuncrestReef]

Ok one other thing. I just held button down for 48 seconds amd the switch went from open to closed. That is way too much of a delay

I just explained above that Fusion has a delay when updating the screen. The Apex recognizes the button press immediately and any programming reacts immediately, but you just won’t see it on the dashboard until its next refresh.

Enable the Log option on your virtual output so you can review the Output Log to know the exact times the switch was pressed.

 

[Yates273]

That’s what is happening. I will add code to my powerheads just to make sure but I am noticing a delay after button is pressed on fusion so I think everything working. How to I access the log to see it is enabled?

 

[SuncrestReef]

I renamed VO feed button but when writing code do I use if feed button on then off or do I use the if food on then off? Sorry if these seem like stupid questions but I am still new to this BOB and programming

In my example above, I rename the virtual output to “vFood”, but left the button named “Food”.

In your virtual output program, refer to the button name:

[vFood]
Set OFF
If Food CLOSED Then ON
Min Time 005:00 Then ON

 

[SuncrestReef]

Click this icon to access the Output Log:

 

[SuncrestReef]

You might want to brush up on my Apex Programming Tutorial series:

Articles by SuncrestReef

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Yates273]

Man I appreciate the help here but right now my feed button is showing on but the food tile for the Bob never shows closed which is suppose to trigger when to shut off powerheads, no? This is also taking into consideration the delay.

 

[Yates273]

I want to thank you all for your help without you guys I would have had trouble figuring this out. I am far from being computer savvy but learning everyday. I got it working now
It was all in my coding and how I named the VO.