ReefBuddy DIY Aquarium Controller $89

[neanderthalman]

Why wouldn't you just buy a Reef Keeper lite? They are $99!

 

Sometimes, that's not the point. Some of us like to DIY.

 

Plus, this looks to be better than a reefkeeper,

[ls7corvete]

Can incorporate it into other projects and reprogram as you like.

[Milamber]

I'm not quite sold on the looks yet. The RKL looks very polished and the base unit price is pretty sweet.

I think where this has huge potential is that if memory serves, it will be open source and hopefully heavily supported by other DIY'ers. I just hope that they can pump these out while there is still a big interest and people are available to offer help.

[Reggie]

Just saw this thread - wow!

 

Anyway, whenever there's time, I had an idea I suggested over at the neptune forum at RC. It's basically support for Twitter. I know that there's a twitter library floating around for arduino. Anyway, here are my suggestions:

 

Add support for Twitter.

 

I can see several adavantages to this:

 

1. An outlet or event can tweet it's status. An outlet can tweet that it is on, or a tweet can be sent if say Temp > 83.

 

2. Send commands easily. Just say: @mycontroller PUMP_1 OFF

 

3. No need for DynDNS since it just connects to your local network waiting for tweet commands. If it receives one, it sends back the answer.

 

4. No special software needed. As long as you have access to a browser or Twitter client (computer or phone), you can 'talk' to your controller.

 

5. Connect devices easily. If other devices have Twitter support too, they can be programmed to do something based on a tweet from another device. Maybe someday an Twitter enabled window opener will activate when pH is 7.8. . This is just an example but am just showing how creative you can become.

 

Of course, there should be some security built in like it can only accept commands from twitter accounts it follows, etc.

 

[jewbilee]

The twitter aspect is definitely worth looking into and something I've been thinking about. Should be very cool to program which is what I'm looking forward to most!

[Militant Jurist]

I like the twitter idea. I hate twitter, but I like that it would provide a way of monitoring and controlling your tank while away!

[Warehouse41Ant]

I like the twitter idea. I hate twitter, but I like that it would provide a way of monitoring and controlling your tank while away!

 

 

+1. If this had Twitter support I'd definitely buy one.

[ls7corvete]

any kind of internet uplink would be cool. You guys could start now with programming the code for it. You already know the chipest

[jewbilee]

The nice thing about twitter is that as long as the controller could access the internet, it could easily use twitter. And controlling via twitter be just as simple.

[Firewolf4]

Guys,

Let me get the 1st revision board done before delusions of grandeur. It's great ot hear all sorts of future refinements and enhancements, but lets get the 1st units out. I can only do so much while holding a real job.

[Militant Jurist]

Guys,

Let me get the 1st revision board done before delusions of grandeur. It's great ot hear all sorts of future refinements and enhancements, but lets get the 1st units out. I can only do so much while holding a real job.

 

I think we're just tossing out ideas in case they are the type of ideas you guys would later say "we wish we knew that when we were building it!"

 

Anyways, carry on. We just want to see the first model!

[doktorstick]

What is the new ETA?

[hcsceo]

Well currently the ETA is ASAP. We haven't set a date at this point as my first date was too aggressive and I didn't want to miss a second date. As soon as firewolf is done with the PCB design I'll cut it on my CNC and build three for testing (Firewolf, the programmer, and myself will get one). Since the testing was done on all the circuits when I built them originally I don't imagine we'll need more than a month to verify the PCB design is good. All three of us working on the project have demanding full time jobs and families to deal with. I get up at 6am to start my day and don't get to work on this project till nearly 10pm at night. I am very excited to release the designs to everyone and see what other ideas can be added to this. The reefbuddy.com website will be the place to put all the ideas into motion and add features and code requests for the official releases.

 

As far as reefkeeper lite goes. I in no way want to compete with any production product on the market. At $99 the reefkeeper lite is an exceptional value. To be honest I have a reefkeeper and am very happy with it. The one big thing reefbuddy will get you is Salinity right out of the box and hopefully a community of people designing many other plugins and software code. Our R&D team will become the community with the reefbuddy website serving as the hub of information for it. The big picture behind the open source is that it can be made to do sooo much more. This is a start of a product that can do home water testing, pool controls, pond controls, FW aquariums, christmas light controls, home automation, etc. The list is really endless. I choose reef controls as the basis of the project only cause I love reeftanks. However, anything that needs water testing, power controls, or switch controls can use this product. Also, with I2c you can make it do so much more. This project gets many people a basic box, keypad, screen and open source arduino compatible processor to do any project they see fit. The exciting part of this project is not how it will look when we release it but how it will look in two years or so once it is refined with options and features that the community comes up with.

 

Have a happy thanksgiving.

 

Steve

[jewbilee]

I'm really looking forward to developing some great software addons for this. Definitely a great way to put my CS degree progress to good use!

[doktorstick]

Thanks Steve. I asked because I finished my LED build and started searching for DIY controller ideas since that is my next project, but seeing the direction you are heading, I want to use it at as base provided it didn't fall into vaporware.

 

It looks like then the time is first gated by Firewolfe and then about +1 month... so conservatively February.

[thewire]

very nice project...thank you for the work!

 

Are we able to purchase from you or DIY ourselves?

[Firewolf4]

Guys,

thank you all for your patience. I'm jamming away on the board as time permits however for my RL job, this is when they expect everything to be done yesterday. It's having me work 13 on 1 off, 12-16 hour days. They expect this to last only a few more weeks. The PCB layout is progressing with the new MPU and we've been clearing up some small issues. I'll give more updates as soon as I can,

 

Russ

[gwenhastings]

Hi All,

count me if for 2 kits, will solder thru hoie quite happily(am in 50s and ill,so hands not steady enough and eyes not sharp enough for SMD anymore, thanks for thinking about thru hole for folks like moi(just did a sanguino breakout board in 1 hour)). And I wont be using it for aquarium/reef control but will be using it for Hydroponic flood table management and nutrient mixing via dosing pumps instead.

 

really neat solution for many hobbies.

 

 

kind regards and thanx for all your efforts

gwen

ps is your software guy aware of DuinOS? FreeRtos.org on the arduino platforms.. current alpha version supports I2C(and runs on the 644P also).. 1wire not working but in a few weeks hopefully.(ie not threadsafe) and as soon as your software releases, I will be attempting to make a DuinOS version of same and rewritten for Hydroponics Management and control.(check the duinos postings in the forums for the 644P support instructions).

 

RTOS makes things like Hydroponics/Mushroom culture/Artificial Reef Management(?) and other timer/probe data reading dependent tasks conceptually a LOT easier to deal with architectually in software.

[hcsceo]

Thanks gwen for the information on your project idea. I think this controller will fit your bill perfectly. I'll talk to the programmer about the DuinOS. 1wire is a huge part of our project and the current build of Arduino is working fine for us at the moment. The 644p hasn't been a challenge in the existing software and all our old code has moved over without issue (we did have to make a few pin assignment changes).

 

Looks like Firewolf has updated everyone on his progress. Can't wait to see the PCB!!

 

Steve

 

 

Hi All,

count me if for 2 kits, will solder thru hoie quite happily(am in 50s and ill,so hands not steady enough and eyes not sharp enough for SMD anymore, thanks for thinking about thru hole for folks like moi(just did a sanguino breakout board in 1 hour)). And I wont be using it for aquarium/reef control but will be using it for Hydroponic flood table management and nutrient mixing via dosing pumps instead.

 

really neat solution for many hobbies.

 

 

kind regards and thanx for all your efforts

gwen

ps is your software guy aware of DuinOS? FreeRtos.org on the arduino platforms.. current alpha version supports I2C(and runs on the 644P also).. 1wire not working but in a few weeks hopefully.(ie not threadsafe) and as soon as your software releases, I will be attempting to make a DuinOS version of same and rewritten for Hydroponics Management and control.(check the duinos postings in the forums for the 644P support instructions).

 

RTOS makes things like Hydroponics/Mushroom culture/Artificial Reef Management(?) and other timer/probe data reading dependent tasks conceptually a LOT easier to deal with architectually in software.

[Whacked]

The nice thing about twitter is that as long as the controller could access the internet, it could easily use twitter. And controlling via twitter be just as simple.

Ohboy! Just what I need, a appliance that can access the internet.

 

"Honest honey! I have no idea how the lesbian midget circus sex video got on the computer. It must have been my reef tank!"

 

Seriously tho, this board sounds simply awesome. My soldering skill are non-existant but if its going to be more than a RKL,... I gotta look into this more

[gwenhastings]

Hi Firewolf,

patience hell.... I am sitting on pins and needles.

 

BTW what program are you using for PCB creation? Eagle? Freeware? and how many layers is the board winding up to be? I was hoping to get the board layouts even before the kits available so I can get expresspcb.com running on this(or olimex.com) so I can get a couple up quickly.

 

warm regards

gwen

ps any board BOM available yet so I can start accumulating parts? ie for my app I dont need a keyboard LCD as I am hooking all controllers to a reloaded Linksys NSLU2(with debian 5.03) and loading my own firmware.

 

 

 

Guys,

thank you all for your patience. I'm jamming away on the board as time permits however for my RL job, this is when they expect everything to be done yesterday. It's having me work 13 on 1 off, 12-16 hour days. They expect this to last only a few more weeks. The PCB layout is progressing with the new MPU and we've been clearing up some small issues. I'll give more updates as soon as I can,

 

Russ

[Austinsminireef]

This is a super exciting thread to read and I can hardly wait to see what your final product will look like. Congratz on all your hard work guys! Im looking forward to putting one of these together.

[gwenhastings]

Hi Steve,

are you going to support 2 EC probes or one(I noticed you are supporting 2 ph probes) 2 ec probbes would make it possible to have one controller do it all in my application(why I want to order 2 reefbuddys as I had 2 EC monitoring points in my application.(I still want 2 boards/kits however

 

gwen

[gwenhastings]

you probably know of this link already...

http://www.seeedstudio.com/wiki/index.php?...Open_source_Kit

 

 

gwen

[Firewolf4]

Hi Firewolf,

patience hell.... I am sitting on pins and needles.

 

BTW what program are you using for PCB creation? Eagle? Freeware? and how many layers is the board winding up to be? I was hoping to get the board layouts even before the kits available so I can get expresspcb.com running on this(or olimex.com) so I can get a couple up quickly.

 

warm regards

gwen

ps any board BOM available yet so I can start accumulating parts? ie for my app I dont need a keyboard LCD as I am hooking all controllers to a reloaded Linksys NSLU2(with debian 5.03) and loading my own firmware.

 

The program being used is Diptrace. I hope to have a partial BOM ready by Monday ( pins and needles not included) The board will be a 2 layer board as this gives simplicity of manufacturing and I hate hidden traces, blind vias, etc.