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

[elysics]

Yeah you need another rpi (like anyone needs an excuse to have more than one) or some other way to host the software. For the most part you would not want to host it on the same rpi running reef-pi. Although with the rpi 4 you probably have enough horsepower to run it, there are advantages with keeping it separate. @Ranjib has put Prometheus into the reef-pi software to expose the data you just need a device to collect it and display it, most folks use Grafana to do that. I would say its a luxury and nice to have, but that other rpi device can be used to do other things to monitor reef-pi etc, nice to have and the charts are much nicer and configurable etc...:)

Yeah that's a shame. Have like 3 other projects lined up waiting for me getting my hands on not disgustingly overpriced pis. And the one i have is just a zero, probably don't want to strain it with more stuff.

 

[bishoptf]

Yeah that's a shame. Have like 3 other projects lined up waiting for me getting my hands on not disgustingly overpriced pis. And the one i have is just a zero, probably don't want to strain it with more stuff.

Yeah you do not want to add it to a rpi zero thats for sure. I happen to have a vm machine that I can also spin up vm's and that is what I use, you may want to think about an old desktop etc, although it uses a lot more power but I use both. I tend to use rpi's for things that need to connect to other stuff, octoprint, reef-pi, adsb etc...and for monitoring and server based stuff I have on another box, but a rpi 4 with plenty of memory could do the same for small scale stuff. Memory may be a limitation but for my VM I have lots of other stuff going on also, so a rpi wouild not have had the horsepower.

 

[Ranjib]

Yeah that's a shame. Have like 3 other projects lined up waiting for me getting my hands on not disgustingly overpriced pis. And the one i have is just a zero, probably don't want to strain it with more stuff.

Use a cheap intel Nuc for Prometheus and grafana instead of pi. It’s bit expensive but far better and available

 

[ColoredRock]

Use a cheap intel Nuc for Prometheus and grafana instead of pi. It’s bit expensive but far better and available

I know it might be a power consumption issue... but how many of us dont have a spare laptop or 3

 

[elysics]

I know it might be a power consumption issue... but how many of us dont have a spare laptop or 3

Yeah that wouldn't make economic sense where i am, electricity is rather expensive, was even before current events. I could buy a whole heap of overpriced pis for what i'd save in electricity. It's more of a principled don't buy from scalpers thing that is stopping me from doing that.

 

[bishoptf]

Use a cheap intel Nuc for Prometheus and grafana instead of pi. It’s bit expensive but far better and available

Hmm not sure cheap and intel Nuc go together, lol. :)

 

[bishoptf]

Yeah that wouldn't make economic sense where i am, electricity is rather expensive, was even before current events. I could buy a whole heap of overpriced pis for what i'd save in electricity. It's more of a principled don't buy from scalpers thing that is stopping me from doing that.

Yeah I get it, I am in the midwest and electric rates are pretty cheap, but that is not the case everywhere. Although there are some low powered chips that are not an RPI that would do the same thing, just needs to run linux and lots of options out there to do it. Heck the rpi clones that run debian or any flavor of linux would be fine in that case, that may be an easier path and they should be just fine. :)

 

[ColoredRock]

Raspberry Pi Boot from USB​

​

My understanding that it only works with Raspberry Pi 2B v1.2 and up My Reef-pi is running on Raspberry Pi 4 Model B Rev 1.2 ​

Anyone do this?

 

[marekd1]

Ranjib,

Thanks for the latest release. Just wanted to report that Dosing functions/events are not being reported under MQTT.

Is this something that can be addressed in the future?

 

[bishoptf]

Raspberry Pi Boot from USB​

​

My understanding that it only works with Raspberry Pi 2B v1.2 and up My Reef-pi is running on Raspberry Pi 4 Model B Rev 1.2 ​

Anyone do this?

I ran that way for awhile, it does work, but I ended up just going with a high endurance card.

 

[ColoredRock]

I ran that way for awhile, it does work, but I ended up just going with a high endurance card.

So .. just like my laptop post.. I have way to many sitting in a box..

Once flashed does it still need the SD card or will it boot with out it?

 

[bishoptf]

Depends on the model, here is a blurb -

This article primarily focuses on booting a Raspberry PI 4, 400 and Compute Module 4 from a USB drive. However, with a little trick, you can reap the same benefits if you own an older model such as a Raspberry PI 1, 2, 3 or Zero. The trick involves moving the root file system (/) to a USB drive and just leave the boot file system (\boot) on the SD card.

from here - https://www.pragmaticlinux.com/2021/12/directly-boot-your-raspberry-pi-4-from-a-usb-drive/

 

[ReeferLou]

oops :-( . I'll file a bug and test it out ASAP

So does the entire DOSING subsystem not work in the 5.2?

 

[Ranjib]

Ranjib,

Thanks for the latest release. Just wanted to report that Dosing functions/events are not being reported under MQTT.

Is this something that can be addressed in the future?

Absolutely. This is just something i overlooked, not an intended thing. I'll add it in the issue tracker and get it done before the next release. Thank you for reporting it

 

[DWKDiver]

FYI, to further clarify my 12v DC doser pumps not working with 5.2 revision:

The dosing graphs show the dosers amounts as normal.
The 12v DC pumps do NOT run.

So it appears everything is working, but in fact I got no dosing at all for days. Reverting back to 5.1 revision fixed the issue. If you run 5.2 revision, CHECK YOUR DC PUMPS TO MAKE SURE THEY ARE RUNNING!

 

[Moises Longhi]

FYI, to further clarify my 12v DC doser pumps not working with 5.2 revision:

The dosing graphs show the dosers amounts as normal.
The 12v DC pumps do NOT run.

So it appears everything is working, but in fact I got no dosing at all for days. Reverting back to 5.1 revision fixed the issue. If you run 5.2 revision, CHECK YOUR DC PUMPS TO MAKE SURE THEY ARE RUNNING!

Hi! Here I am using 12v dc pumps, and they are working perfectly, I use them with the PCA9685 controller connected to a board with 4 MOSFETs that control the 4 dosing heads.

 

[Coolhack]

Got a question, I just upgraded to reef pi 5.2, everything went well except that the reef pi UI keeps restarting every 9 to 10 seconds. The pi doesn't restart, just the UI. Only changes made were a second float switch was added, protein skimmer was added at the refugium plug spot, name changed and trimmers deleted. Another change was I enabled Adafruit.io, that is where things took a turn for the worse. I can access the UI from another phone or computer, but only for like 10 seconds before it reboots the interface is unavailable until reboot time has ended then it's available for 10 seconds and then it isn't available. So what's up with that?

 

[elysics]

FYI, to further clarify my 12v DC doser pumps not working with 5.2 revision:

The dosing graphs show the dosers amounts as normal.
The 12v DC pumps do NOT run.

So it appears everything is working, but in fact I got no dosing at all for days. Reverting back to 5.1 revision fixed the issue. If you run 5.2 revision, CHECK YOUR DC PUMPS TO MAKE SURE THEY ARE RUNNING!

I just had a similar issue but in a weirder way. 2 of 4 pumps attached via l298n boards to the same PCA9685 board worked perfectly fine, the other two didn't and then suddenly did a couple hours later, continued to work only intermittently for presumably several days. There was no signal coming out of the PCA9685 ports of the latter two pumps some of the time, not when switched out with a fresh PCA9685 board either. And it wasn't the l298 boards, switched them up and the error stayed with the signal lines. Went through all the wiring with a multimeter and just got more confused, in the end i downgraded to 5.1 and it worked again

Yeah i noticed when my dKH was at 5.5 :/ But at least the only corals showing STN are weeds anyway

 

[ReeferLou]

I just had a similar issue but in a weirder way. 2 of 4 pumps attached via l298n boards to the same PCA9685 board worked perfectly fine, the other two didn't and then suddenly did a couple hours later, continued to work only intermittently for presumably several days. There was no signal coming out of the PCA9685 ports of the latter two pumps some of the time, not when switched out with a fresh PCA9685 board either. And it wasn't the l298 boards, switched them up and the error stayed with the signal lines. Went through all the wiring with a multimeter and just got more confused, in the end i downgraded to 5.1 and it worked again

Yeah i noticed when my dKH was at 5.5 :/ But at least the only corals showing STN are weeds anyway

I now the Reef-Pi only has the 2 PWM outputs jacks available. Is the issue related those two hardware timers (GPIO18 & GPIO19)?

 

[elysics]

I now the Reef-Pi only has the 2 PWM outputs jacks available. Is the issue related those two hardware timers (GPIO18 & GPIO19)?

No, thepi internal PWM0 and PWM1 are attached to my fragtank light, no pumps. (you can change the pins they run on btw, they have a couple alternate pin assignments) All of currently 4 pumps are attached to the same PCA9685 PWM driver which is attached to the pi over I2C, two pumps worked only ittermittently, two others worked all the time. No idea why.