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

[BenB]

I will give you example with my feeder testing. In order to make it work I had to use DOSER configuration option. This is fine from the function subset perspective but then the label on the Menu bar could not be changed to reflect say Feeder. So it would be nice if you could select the desired operational functions and assign devices Inlets, Outlets, Jacks, etc to a operational role. So just expand what you are already doing with Inlets, Outlets, Jacks but to the menu label.

Additionaly the ability to ad tabs will be welcome. Maybe in the setting tab that you can choose what kind of tab you like to ad.

 

[thoeffe]

ok so after several months i finally got around to doing a small reefpi setup just for ato only so far. I have the relay and outlets setup and wired. At this point I have basically a working single switch ato. But I have a few questions. The plan is to have this be an ato for both my 55gallon and my 20 gallon which are right next to each other. I have 5 float switches total and hope to have two in each tank and one in the rodi reservour. One will be for a backup incase the other switch gets stuck on. First question is how to get the automatic disable and alert to work under the ato tab on reef pi it doesn't seem to turn the relay off? Second question is how I should go about having the backup switch turn off the pump? Is there a way to set this up within the reef pi software or would I have to wire two switches in series. Right now I am experimenting with two switches and have this python script start at startup to assign the gpio pins as input which I know I can easily just add more pins to the variable. Thanks

import RPi.GPIO as GPIO
import time
GPIO.setmode(GPIO.BCM)
chan_list = [19, 26]
GPIO.setup(chan_list, GPIO.IN, pull_up_down=GPIO.PUD_UP)

 

[Ranjib]

Additionaly the ability to ad tabs will be welcome. Maybe in the setting tab that you can choose what kind of tab you like to ad.

The capabilities section under settings tab does this. Each capability is exposed as one individual tab. Capabilities (Tabs ) in reef-pi represent modularity.

 

[Ranjib]

ok so after several months i finally got around to doing a small reefpi setup just for ato only so far. I have the relay and outlets setup and wired. At this point I have basically a working single switch ato. But I have a few questions. The plan is to have this be an ato for both my 55gallon and my 20 gallon which are right next to each other. I have 5 float switches total and hope to have two in each tank and one in the rodi reservour. One will be for a backup incase the other switch gets stuck on. First question is how to get the automatic disable and alert to work under the ato tab on reef pi it doesn't seem to turn the relay off? Second question is how I should go about having the backup switch turn off the pump? Is there a way to set this up within the reef pi software or would I have to wire two switches in series. Right now I am experimenting with two switches and have this python script start at startup to assign the gpio pins as input which I know I can easily just add more pins to the variable. Thanks

import RPi.GPIO as GPIO
import time
GPIO.setmode(GPIO.BCM)
chan_list = [19, 26]
GPIO.setup(chan_list, GPIO.IN, pull_up_down=GPIO.PUD_UP)

in reef-pi, the ato should always turn off corresponding pump before being disabled. You can use the first sensor to control the ato pump (equipment target) and the second sensor to control a macro (target macro) thats in turn disable the first ATO. Macros are versatile and can do more. Theres a disable on alert checkbox under individual ato setup that can be used to specify a total pump time run, beyond which reef-pi will disable the ato, if used. Its hourly, and will only work at hourly limits and when auto-disabled you have to either wait for the next hour or recreate the ato to re-enable it immediately.

 

[Phildago]

I just hit my first major road block. I did some wiring today, plugged my pi 3 into the outlet and tried to login and got nothing. I tried shh, nothing. I tried plugging into the ethernet, still nothing.

That's when I logged onto my router to look for the ip, and it said the raspberry pi wasn't connected to the internet.

What could've gone wrong? What are my next steps in troubleshooting this?

 

[thoeffe]

in reef-pi, the ato should always turn off corresponding pump before being disabled. You can use the first sensor to control the ato pump (equipment target) and the second sensor to control a macro (target macro) thats in turn disable the first ATO. Macros are versatile and can do more. Theres a disable on alert checkbox under individual ato setup that can be used to specify a total pump time run, beyond which reef-pi will disable the ato, if used. Its hourly, and will only work at hourly limits and when auto-disabled you have to either wait for the next hour or recreate the ato to re-enable it immediately.

As for using macro I tried but couldn't find where I could tell it to detect the state of the secondary float to control the macro

Ok so if I am understanding you correctly, when I set frequency to 10 seconds, enable alerts, enable the disable on alert after 30 seconds, It is normal for it to shut off the relay after 30 seconds when I first enter in the settings for a new ato and to disable the ato status for an hour. If i reenable it under the existing ato and save the settings it is supposed to immediately shut off as the relay turns back on because an hour has not passed yet?.

 

[Ranjib]

I just hit my first major road block. I did some wiring today, plugged my pi 3 into the outlet and tried to login and got nothing. I tried shh, nothing. I tried plugging into the ethernet, still nothing.

That's when I logged onto my router to look for the ip, and it said the raspberry pi wasn't connected to the internet.

What could've gone wrong? What are my next steps in troubleshooting this?

Do you have a build thread? If raspberry pi is going out of network then its something to do with network setup or router/gateway being flaky, something beyond reef-pi. But this can definitely be addressed. When I used to run reef-pi controllers in my Comcast /xfinity home network it used to be a common problem, so much so I deployed a nightly cron job to just restart wifi network on every pi. For the last one year, I have google wifi network that segregates the IoT devices in their own network, and that has fixed it.
There are many otherways to workaround this problem (like deploying some hourly script that checks for network and then restart it when needed), you can try those, as well as finding out whats happening exactly and solve it at the root

 

[Ranjib]

Ok so if I am understanding you correctly, when I set frequency to 10 seconds, enable alerts, enable the disable on alert after 30 seconds, It is normal for it to shut off the relay after 30 seconds when I first enter in the settings for a new ato and to disable the ato status for an hour. If i reenable it under the existing ato and save the settings it is supposed to immediately shut off as the relay turns back on because an hour has not passed yet?.

yes thats precisely what i meant. For double safety, test it out with your build

 

[Phildago]

Do you have a build thread? If raspberry pi is going out of network then its something to do with network setup or router/gateway being flaky, something beyond reef-pi. But this can definitely be addressed. When I used to run reef-pi controllers in my Comcast /xfinity home network it used to be a common problem, so much so I deployed a nightly cron job to just restart wifi network on every pi. For the last one year, I have google wifi network that segregates the IoT devices in their own network, and that has fixed it.
There are many otherways to workaround this problem (like deploying some hourly script that checks for network and then restart it when needed), you can try those, as well as finding out whats happening exactly and solve it at the root

I'm afraid that the board somehow broke. Like a capacitor or resistor fell off when I put it away or something. It's so odd. It's not the network for sure because everything else was working perfectly. Even the ethernet wasn't working since I have a pi 3.

 

[Ranjib]

Happy new year everyone :-)

 

[Ranjib]

Too much tech talks..
Zoa/Lords are fighting for real estate

During last week's water change, i broke a large chunk of red dragon colony :-/ . Otherwise its doing good,

The pico tanks are humming along,

Gpniopora, I think its being stung by the challice underneath.. i am thinking of relocating it, but dont know where

Ricordia :-). gorgeous as always

 

[Bigtrout]

Too much tech talks..
Zoa/Lords are fighting for real estate

During last week's water change, i broke a large chunk of red dragon colony :-/ . Otherwise its doing good,

The pico tanks are humming along,

Gpniopora, I think its being stung by the challice underneath.. i am thinking of relocating it, but dont know where

Ricordia :-). gorgeous as always

Im about to install a big sump on my FW planted and its hard knowing I could easily go SW at anytime after that.

Pics like this DO NOT help!!! Lol

Very beautiful!!!

 

[burningbaal]

Hey all,
I've got a ML goby hat and a just might a no name black box (used) that in trying to set up here. The dimmer boards are showing 4 wires: an on/off, a +12v, a PWM, and a GND. How do I wire these into the goby? I'm pretty sure I can just go directly to the "light 1" just since this is pwm and not analog, but not sure which wire to put where.

Also, should I put the power cords in the adj or is it okay to just dim to 0 and leave them powered on?

 

[AbjectMaelstroM]

Hey all,
I've got a ML goby hat and a just might a no name black box (used) that in trying to set up here. The dimmer boards are showing 4 wires: an on/off, a +12v, a PWM, and a GND. How do I wire these into the goby? I'm pretty sure I can just go directly to the "light 1" just since this is pwm and not analog, but not sure which wire to put where.

Also, should I put the power cords in the adj or is it okay to just dim to 0 and leave them powered on?

Is there a knob or just an on/off switch? Both?

This may be similar to the way Viparspectra lights work, where we have gnd-pwm-12v-on/off. Not sure if your drivers are 5v or 10v PWM, but the way Vipars work, the GND and PWM from HAT Light1 will work for dimming, that's the easy part. Then the driver needs to be told to turn on or off, this is done by essentially shorting 12v and on/off when you turn the knob on your light fixture. The way I and some others have tackled this in ReefPi was to use the ULN2803 on the HAT, to toggle a 12v relay (as a switch) to turn on and off the driver; this needs to be repeated per channel, per fixture....so for a single fixture you would need 2 channel relays (for 2 fixtures a 4 channel relay etc).

 

[burningbaal]

There is a switch and the knob has an "off detent".
Pwm to gnd ranges up to 9.8v and down to less than 1v.

 

[Urtoo]

Beal, I think you need one of these:

PWM Converter for Mars Aqua by ML Reefkeeping on Tindie

Control Mars Aqua LED lights with PWM

www.tindie.com

The Govy converts to 0-3.3v and the converter takes those and multiplies it to 0-10v for the dimming function.

 

[burningbaal]

Beal, I think you need one of these:

PWM Converter for Mars Aqua by ML Reefkeeping on Tindie

Control Mars Aqua LED lights with PWM

www.tindie.com

The Govy converts to 0-3.3v and the converter takes those and multiplies it to 0-10v for the dimming function.

I think you're probably right. It was throwing me off because the dimmer board labels are a little unusual

 

[burningbaal]

What if I buy new drivers... They're pretty cheap, right? Maybe I can buy a pair of drivers that take the 3.3v pvm directly?

 

[NeonRabbit221B]

Quick question. Building a separate reef-pi to do a 12V LED strip and 4 dosing pumps. I have wired several together but have never used the PCA9685 and upon reviewing the lighting guide I got very stumped at the "pin 12 on the PCA9685" but it is clearly hooked up to Pin/jack 6. I can't get my setup to work and was wondering if this is a factor. Can someone possibly explain this?

 

[Schreiber]

Quick question. Building a separate reef-pi to do a 12V LED strip and 4 dosing pumps. I have wired several together but have never used the PCA9685 and upon reviewing the lighting guide I got very stumped at the "pin 12 on the PCA9685" but it is clearly hooked up to Pin/jack 6. I can't get my setup to work and was wondering if this is a factor. Can someone possibly explain this?

I assume that it's referring to physical pin 12, which is routed to LED 6. Here's the pinout diagram for the actual PCA9685 chip. What section in the lighting guide are you referring to? I couldn't find it.