My reef-pi build freshwater style!

[Bigtrout]

Heres the tank im building the reef pi for:

 

[crusso1993]

I did post some but ill post again here.
I have a 75 gallon and I use DA Fspec 48 inch lights. Most freshwater lights look too yellow at 5 to 6.5k, these run about 8k, grow plants like crazy, and with the extra red and green leds, make the fish pop. I run 2 for the spread on an 18 inch wide tank, for a 55gallon you may get away with just one. They are not too terrible on the wallet, about $65 on amazon.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...FjAAegQIBxAB&usg=AOvVaw2pnTh30pVLy1YlqrJKALs_

Thanks a ton for the input! As it turns out, after some research on theplantedtank.net yesterday, I put this exact light in one of my saved lists on Amazon! Too funny!

 

[crusso1993]

Heres the tank im building the reef pi for:

Ahhhh, yes, I recognize those pictures now. As a matter of fact, I "liked" them when you originally posted them. Thanks for posting again!

 

[Bigtrout]

Thanks a ton for the input! As it turns out, after some research on theplantedtank.net yesterday, I put this exact light in one of my saved lists on Amazon! Too funny!

I used 2 of the 48 inch F-specs to replace a 4 lamp aquatic life fixture. It has good par, and im using half the wattage with alot less heat on the tank.
I bought the timers with them and programmed them so that between both lights I get a half baked morning noon and evening thing but its abrupt bang its on changes. I have looked at the circuitry, and will be adding the lights to reef pi to dim with reef pi. Each light has 2 channels, one channel is 16 blue led, the other 104 led(86 10k white, 9 red and 9 green). They are common cathode wired, but I found a breakoout board with a p channel mosfet that can be directly fed from reef pi pwm to dim. I will post more when I add them to my build. I plan on using 4 channels. A white, green,red channel, and a blue channel from each light. Unfortunately, they cant be seperated more than this very easily but being able to dim them will make the lights even better.

 

[Bigtrout]

Build progress update,
Almost finished with the power wiring on my build. Will have a working power controller and will be loading the reef pi software for configuration and some testing. Still have to figure out how im doing my temperature probe wiring.

 

[crusso1993]

I used 2 of the 48 inch F-specs to replace a 4 lamp aquatic life fixture. It has good par, and im using half the wattage with alot less heat on the tank.
I bought the timers with them and programmed them so that between both lights I get a half baked morning noon and evening thing but its abrupt bang its on changes. I have looked at the circuitry, and will be adding the lights to reef pi to dim with reef pi. Each light has 2 channels, one channel is 16 blue led, the other 104 led(86 10k white, 9 red and 9 green). They are common cathode wired, but I found a breakoout board with a p channel mosfet that can be directly fed from reef pi pwm to dim. I will post more when I add them to my build. I plan on using 4 channels. A white, green,red channel, and a blue channel from each light. Unfortunately, they cant be seperated more than this very easily but being able to dim them will make the lights even better.

Sweet! Looking forward to seeing seeing this add on.

 

[Diamond1]

Nice looking tank.

 

[Bigtrout]

Nice looking tank.

Thank you, when you get plant growth and fish population balanced, it takes care of itself. 20 percent water change and trim plants once a week. The big pain is cleaning the canisters once every 3 months, which is why im switching to a sump. When i built my stand I left room for a 40 breeder underneath, an extra 30 gallons of water wont hurt and the vallisneria grass could grow like crazy in the middle section, kind of like a freshwater "chaeto" filter.

 

[crusso1993]

Thank you, when you get plant growth and fish population balanced, it takes care of itself. 20 percent water change and trim plants once a week. The big pain is cleaning the canisters once every 3 months, which is why im switching to a sump. When i built my stand I left room for a 40 breeder underneath, an extra 30 gallons of water wont hurt and the vallisneria grass could grow like crazy in the middle section, kind of like a freshwater "chaeto" filter.

No doubt on the canister cleaning! I run two Filstar XP4's and do a rotating one each month cleaning.
What type of bio will you be running?

 

[Bigtrout]

The intake will dump and go thru a 17"×11"×3" inch thick 15ppi poret block, then an identical block of 30ppi poret, then up thru all the ceramic rings from all 3 canisters(to seed my bio from the canisters). When i do the switch i will throw the canister sponges in the empty section for 2 weeks until the poret gets its bio action going. Maintenance will be once a month rinsing the 15ppi block and every couple months the 30ppi. Alot easier than tearing apart canisters, especially the big sun sun which is as big as a 5 gallon bucket.

I run one of each of the sizes of sun suns, testing with a bucket I have about 550gph of total flow now, shooting for 500-700gph thru my sump. Will be nice to have an overflow and one large return spray bar vs. 3 intakes and spray bars and I can hide my heaters in the sump. Ill put a temp probe in the sump, one in the display and possibly one in ambient air so reef pi could alert me on a furnace and or A/C failure.

Lol, talk of poret blocks and such has to have these reef guys cringing. Something about nitrate factories. My nitrates run around 10-15ppm as long as the plants are growing like weeds. My buddy runs a 75 gallon reef and has a cow when I show him how I take care of my FW planted. Hes watching my reef pi project to see if he wants to dive in. Must be doing something right, havent lost a fish in 6 months, and that one died in a spectalular gourami fight.

 

[Diamond1]

Sounds like a solid plan on the sump. Are you drilling or using a HOB for the overflow?
So how long before you decide to come over to the salty side of life?

 

[Bigtrout]

Since the tank is established, near a wall, im going HOB, with reef pi ATO level sensing set up to shut off my return pump if something goes haywire. I did calculate the sump return volume and overall sump volume so that if something fails it cant overflow anyway. But the ato could be a failsafe so the return pump doesnt run dry.
My reef buddy says he could drill with tank 1/4 full, id only do that if i had a spare 75 gallon sitting there.
As far as salt, perhaps in the future I may venture there, been doing freshwater for over 20 years.

 

[crusso1993]

The intake will dump and go thru a 17"×11"×3" inch thick 15ppi poret block, then an identical block of 30ppi poret, then up thru all the ceramic rings from all 3 canisters(to seed my bio from the canisters). When i do the switch i will throw the canister sponges in the empty section for 2 weeks until the poret gets its bio action going. Maintenance will be once a month rinsing the 15ppi block and every couple months the 30ppi. Alot easier than tearing apart canisters, especially the big sun sun which is as big as a 5 gallon bucket.

I run one of each of the sizes of sun suns, testing with a bucket I have about 550gph of total flow now, shooting for 500-700gph thru my sump. Will be nice to have an overflow and one large return spray bar vs. 3 intakes and spray bars and I can hide my heaters in the sump. Ill put a temp probe in the sump, one in the display and possibly one in ambient air so reef pi could alert me on a furnace and or A/C failure.

Lol, talk of poret blocks and such has to have these reef guys cringing. Something about nitrate factories. My nitrates run around 10-15ppm as long as the plants are growing like weeds. My buddy runs a 75 gallon reef and has a cow when I show him how I take care of my FW planted. Hes watching my reef pi project to see if he wants to dive in. Must be doing something right, havent lost a fish in 6 months, and that one died in a spectalular gourami fight.

Sounds like exactly what I would do. So, obviously, we're either both geniuses or nuts... or a little of both! Lol
I've been looking into Bio-Home filter media. Either the Ultimate or Ultra type. It's out of Europe (England I think) and is supposed to be some incredible stuff. In case you haven't heard of it, you might find it worthwhile to check out.
Here is a link to the US distributor;
https://greatwaveeng.com
It's not cheap, granted, but I have yet to see or hear anything but great reviews and comments about it. I was actually thinking of swapping what I'm running now (combination of Seachem Matrix, ceramic rings and some bio-balls) over to the Bio-Home media. If I decide to change to a sump I'll definitely be swapping it out. (After it is seeded of course.)
Oh, and salty guys don't cringe, they just get saltier! Lol

 

[Bigtrout]

Finished the power wiring, tested it. Everything tested good.
I wired my outlets all Normally Closed as a failsafe if the reef pi does not boot up.

Cut out where im gonna mount my ethernet jack for the temp sensors.

Have to be careful, nowhere can I find a color code for my DS18b20 which have red yellow and white wires, diffwrent than all ive seen online. So will test after reef pi is booted with one sensor.

Its all ready to load Reef Pi and Test!!!

I have alot of room in the case but im adding another 8 channel relay , 4 mosfet breakout boards for my lighting pwm, and a ph board.

The 5v wall warts may get swtiched to meanwell rs-15-5 5v 3a hardwired power supplies

 

[Diamond1]

Looking good.
I've had different ds18b20 sensors with different color wires red, yellow and blue or red, yellow and black. Both kinds the red was hot the yellow was data and the odd color was ground. Might be a good place to star if your just going try testing them.

 

[Bigtrout]

That was going to be my guess...but i found this on a website...a way to test:

To check the DS18B20 with a multimeter, choose the "diode testing" mode, and put the positive testing lead to the white wire (GND) of the sensor. The voltage between white wire (GND) and the red wire (VDD) should be around 0.59V ~ 0.63V; the voltage between white wire (GND) and the yellow wire (DQ) should slightly lower, around 0.49V ~ 0.55V.

I figured id post this in case it helps

 

[Bigtrout]

Reef Pi loaded, working on configuration and testing!

 

[Bigtrout]

Ok the ds18b20 color codes on mine were vcc=red, gnd=white and data=yellow, these were nice cables, high temp silicone insulation, and even shielded. They had nice double crimps too. I used ethernet jacks since I had them laying around and all the tooling to make them up.

Tested the temp sensors, they were within .1 of a degree of each other and most times read the same temperature. Testing in my aquarium against my itc1000 with an ntc thermistor that was calibrated, the temp sensors were within .2 F, so the temperature sensors were a big success.

Named outlets and equipment for my power controller. Turned them on...i see lights on the relay, no clicks...get out my meter...dang...the relays arent working...whats wrong...im tracing voltages from the pi hat, im looking on the relay board testing at component level...the octocouplers are working on the input end...
This board has a jumper between vcc and jd-vcc if you want to power the relays seperately from the input stage...pulled the jumper to put my meter on...and VOILA no metal in the dang jumper..so the relay end was getting no power...

Other than that the power controller tested good!

I just want to thank everyone. FINALLY playing with the software, this is great, just what im looking for!

So I have a working Temp controller and Power controller as of now.

Waiting for more parts, next stage, pwm controlling my 2 DA FSpec beamswork lights. And after that adding a PH board. Until then I will be playing with the software a bit.

When its all said and done, I will have a pretty complete freshwater planted tank controller with 3 temp sensors, 8 controlled outlets, PWM dimmed lights, ph monitoring and ATO sensors used as a failsafe for a HOB overflow when I install my sump. And all this will send me alerts as well. All for less than 200 dollars. SIMPLY AWESOME!

Thanks Ranjib for great software.

And the hat Mike Lane designed has everything most people would want on one board ready to go. Thanks Mike! So far everything on the board has tested good!

 

[Ranjib]

It is one of the main goal of reef-pi, to make controller affordable, and it definitely involved the hardwork/effort put in by the builder him/herself and the great community support that is available here in reef2reef. I am glad and thankful to everyone involved for making this a reality

 

[Bigtrout]

Let the reef pi run all night, just monitoring tenps and dummy testing my outlets. Not a hiccup and all seems well.
The ITC1000 reads a steady 77.2F
The temp sensors have been steady at 77.22 and 77.33 respectively. Im actually impressed at how steady the aquaeon pros are keeping my tank.
Since they are solid state, and are keeping my 75 gallon within a .1F temp variance, I am going to let them be the control with reef pi doing temp monitoring, and set it up as a failsafe, to turn off the heaters if they fail in the ON position, and alert me if the temps get out of range.

Waiting for parts to start my lighting build, and messing around with adafruit IO. once im done with the lighting, my reef pi controller will get mounted inside my stand.