reef-pi :: An opensource reef tank controller based on Raspberry Pi.

[Tom Bishop]

Ok, I've tried a million ways, the problem is I can't get a macro to reliably control an ato. And it leads to the ato page freezing 99% of the time.

Not sure this will help but @Des Westcott did a lot of poking around with macros in the past, this post may have some good information in it if you haven't seen it yet - https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/r...ler-based-on-raspberry-pi.289256/post-7104116

 

[hubcap]

Man, this thread is huge.
I really want to get into this because I have experience making toasters into reflow ovens and thats fairly easy with the right gear and training.
But, man.......Almost 900 pages?

It might have already been addressed, but, is all the code you guys and gals make on github (or something similar)
To be blunt, I dont even want to start down this road if Im going to code. Ill do everything else.
Coding makes me mental.

rock on reefers.

-cap

 

[Tom Bishop]

Man, this thread is huge.
I really want to get into this because I have experience making toasters into reflow ovens and thats fairly easy with the right gear and training.
But, man.......Almost 900 pages?

It might have already been addressed, but, is all the code you guys and gals make on github (or something similar)
To be blunt, I dont even want to start down this road if Im going to code. Ill do everything else.
Coding makes me mental.

rock on reefers.

-cap

It's all Opensource and on github, but @Ranjib and others have published the software you just have to make the hardware or purchase one of the pre-built units...pretty much plug and play.

GitHub - reef-pi/reef-pi: An opensource reef tank controller based on Raspberry Pi

An opensource reef tank controller based on Raspberry Pi - GitHub - reef-pi/reef-pi: An opensource reef tank controller based on Raspberry Pi

github.com

 

[Ranjib]

Man, this thread is huge.
I really want to get into this because I have experience making toasters into reflow ovens and thats fairly easy with the right gear and training.
But, man.......Almost 900 pages?

It might have already been addressed, but, is all the code you guys and gals make on github (or something similar)
To be blunt, I dont even want to start down this road if Im going to code. Ill do everything else.
Coding makes me mental.

rock on reefers.

-cap

As Tom mentioned , everything is GitHub . You can find the starting guides on the very first page of this thread. For sustained help, start a build thread and we can help you on the way

 

[Tom Bishop]

Lookie what showed up from Blueacro today, Big thanks to @theatrus...

These are the viparspectra adapter boards that @Michael Lane designed, @theatrus had some built and I have some being built and own there way. Will be a couple of days before I get to test one of them but looks pretty good to me. Really appreciate @theatrus putting the order in and sending me some to kick around.

If anyone is interested in these boards reach out to me or @theatrus, I am short on JST connectors at the moment and need to order some but give me a PM if you are interested.

See this thread for all the details - https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/controlling-viparspectra-lights.698216/

 

[Lslusar]

Hello . Raspberry pi difficult to buy in our country. And long delivery. But I can buy orange pi today. Is it possible to use this board instead of raspberry pi?

 

[GaryE]

Hello . Raspberry pi difficult to buy in our country. And long delivery. But I can buy orange pi today. Is it possible to use this board instead of raspberry pi?

I'm willing to buy an orange pi and try it out. Can always use another board for playing with..

 

[Tom Bishop]

Since we have a question about macro's I know in order to call them from a timer they need to be marked reversible but I never fully understood why that was the case. Can anyone enlighten me as to why that is the only way that it will work?

Thanks

 

[Ranjib]

Since we have a question about macro's I know in order to call them from a timer they need to be marked reversible but I never fully understood why that was the case. Can anyone enlighten me as to why that is the only way that it will work?

Thanks

A timer, requires any an reef-pi entity (like ato, temperature, equipment etc) to act like a digital output (i.e. on/off) that can take two state, "On" and "Off" . Macros emulate this by running sequentially as their specification in "On" state, and in reverse order in "Off" state. Thus a reversible macro can simulate On/Off mechanism, making it controllable via timers.

I don't know if this makes sense or not, but its this trick in software that allowed me to integrate timers and macros.

 

[Ranjib]

Hello . Raspberry pi difficult to buy in our country. And long delivery. But I can buy orange pi today. Is it possible to use this board instead of raspberry pi?

I dont know actually. It might work as it is, without any modification, assuming the GPIO pin map is same and arm architecture is same. If that's not the case we might have to make some software changes either by building it specifically for orange pi (if the arch is different) or by allowing an alternate pin map(if gpio pins are different). Hard to say without trying out, but i think it should not be a lot of work to get it working, and if we are lucky, either zero or 3 builds will work as it is.

 

[Tom Bishop]

A timer, requires any an reef-pi entity (like ato, temperature, equipment etc) to act like a digital output (i.e. on/off) that can take two state, "On" and "Off" . Macros emulate this by running sequentially as their specification in "On" state, and in reverse order in "Off" state. Thus a reversible macro can simulate On/Off mechanism, making it controllable via timers.

I don't know if this makes sense or not, but its this trick in software that allowed me to integrate timers and macros.

Thanks, yeah I will have to read it a few time and see if it sinks in, lol. It works when labeled as reversible and in this case its an easy macro but I can see where making a complex one more fun thinking in reverse order.

 

[Jason Judd]

I dont know actually. It might work as it is, without any modification, assuming the GPIO pin map is same and arm architecture is same. If that's not the case we might have to make some software changes either by building it specifically for orange pi (if the arch is different) or by allowing an alternate pin map(if gpio pins are different). Hard to say without trying out, but i think it should not be a lot of work to get it working, and if we are lucky, either zero or 3 builds will work as it is.

I'm in the same boat. I just burned out my raspberry pi and finding that there's no rpi to be found without price gouging. Does anyone know where I can pickup a rpi without needing to buy the 4 for $150? My old B+ cost me $35...

 

[GaryE]

I'm in the same boat. I just burned out my raspberry pi and finding that there's no rpi to be found without price gouging. Does anyone know where I can pickup a rpi without needing to buy the 4 for $150? My old B+ cost me $35...

I went a couple weeks ago to a few sites that sell them and put myself in on the "notify me" deals, I was able to stock up.. picked up 2 Zero 2 W's and two Pi4 2gb all in one week..

I also have an ancient Raspberry PI clone called a Roseapple Pi. I fired it up this AM and am getting it updated so I can test Reef-PI on it. Should be interesting.. It runs a debian release and I believe it to be pin compatible with the RPi GPIO..
We shall see..

 

[GaryE]

Did some updates on one of my controllers this week.

Old setup

after a lot of head scratching and burning myself with the soldering iron...

Much cleaner.. still can't get one of my temp sensors working though. I think I know why...

 

[Mikeneedsahobby]

Hey guys,

I've been away for quite a while. But my 2 reef pi's continue to run without any hiccups. Perfecto!

I just updated one of them from v4.1 to v5.1. Upgrade went almost too easy.

I wanted to ask if there was someone I could copy to control a brushless motor. My perilistic pump is using a brushless motor. My wife complains about how noisy it is. I'm running it like a normal motor but I can't control it's speed like a normal motor. It's 100% or 0%. If I could slow it down it would be quieter.

If not no worries. I'll get her ear plugs.
And thanks again!!!

 

[Ranjib]

Hey guys,

I've been away for quite a while. But my 2 reef pi's continue to run without any hiccups. Perfecto!

I just updated one of them from v4.1 to v5.1. Upgrade went almost too easy.

I wanted to ask if there was someone I could copy to control a brushless motor. My perilistic pump is using a brushless motor. My wife complains about how noisy it is. I'm running it like a normal motor but I can't control it's speed like a normal motor. It's 100% or 0%. If I could slow it down it would be quieter.

If not no worries. I'll get her ear plugs.
And thanks again!!!

Do you have a link for the pump ? Can you use pwm or a hardware based speed controller to set the speed manually ?

 

[GaryE]

I also have an ancient Raspberry PI clone called a Roseapple Pi. I fired it up this AM and am getting it updated so I can test Reef-PI on it. Should be interesting.. It runs a debian release and I believe it to be pin compatible with the RPi GPIO..
We shall see..

It runs, but it chokes on the i2c, drivers and I get a 404 error on the UI.


2022/01/27 05:59:58 ERROR: Failed to initialize i2c. Error: open /dev/i2c-1: no such file or directory
2022/01/27 05:59:58 Initializing DB for drivers bucket
2022/01/27 05:59:58 ERROR: failed to initialize drivers. Error: can't build hal pin 8: embd: your host ": ARMv7 Processor rev 1 (v7l)" is not supported at this moment. request support at https://github.com/reef-pi/embd/issues
2

I'm not sure how to initialize i2c on this board as it's 7 years out of production and the company that made is out of business..

 

[Mikeneedsahobby]

Do you have a link for the pump ? Can you use pwm or a hardware based speed controller to set the speed manually ?

I think this will help. First image is the motor. 2nd image is the adaptor board this connects to in the reef pi (Mike Lanes doser adaptor.

Currently the red and white wires are routed to pin 6 +12V on the 6P6C of the adaptor. The black wire is routed to pins 4 and 5 to give me twice the current capacity through the ULN2803A. Green and yellow are not connected. Pins 1-3 are used for a 2nd brushed motor. I no spare connectors in the box available. If I need to run new wires from the reef pi to the doser box then I need to cut into the cases.

I think what I should do is route the black wire to pin 4. Use pin 4 as on/off equipment. Leave the red wire on pin 6. Connect the white wire to pin 5. Use this as the doser pin and that would allow speed control through the PWM. i can leave the green and yellow wires unconnected.

Is this correct? I would lose the extra current capacity I currently have. The motor is rated to 12V 10w. So 0.8a.

 

[Tom Bishop]

Just got one of my lights working with one of the new Viparspectra boards from @theatrus had made up, looks like at least the one I am using is working fine. I did have some issues trying to get the pca9685 setup and working on 5.1. I reverted back to 4.3 but I need to go back and see if it was me or a bug, but had no luck getting pwm to work, most likely a mis configuration by me but need to circle back on that. It was a new setup so there were lots of possibilities but appears to be working now.

 

[theatrus]

I think this will help. First image is the motor. 2nd image is the adaptor board this connects to in the reef pi (Mike Lanes doser adaptor.

Currently the red and white wires are routed to pin 6 +12V on the 6P6C of the adaptor. The black wire is routed to pins 4 and 5 to give me twice the current capacity through the ULN2803A. Green and yellow are not connected. Pins 1-3 are used for a 2nd brushed motor. I no spare connectors in the box available. If I need to run new wires from the reef pi to the doser box then I need to cut into the cases.

I think what I should do is route the black wire to pin 4. Use pin 4 as on/off equipment. Leave the red wire on pin 6. Connect the white wire to pin 5. Use this as the doser pin and that would allow speed control through the PWM. i can leave the green and yellow wires unconnected.

Is this correct? I would lose the extra current capacity I currently have. The motor is rated to 12V 10w. So 0.8a.

Took me a minute to realize the Kamoer motors have the brushless driver in them. I somehow assumed they didn't

This can also help. In theory, you can control just the blue wire with a PWM and leave the pump powered. Its likely to work like most fan BLDC drives and just stop on a zero volt PWM input.