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

[Flotto]

Hi guys,

so I've got my new multimeter...
At first: 100% in reef-pi is 0V on my circuit. I adjusted my PSU to 12.25V, which is passed through the MOSFET as long as no LED ist connected. As soon as I connect some LEDs, the Voltage behind the Mosfet starts to decline with the number of connected LEDs.
If I connect, for example, 84 LEDs theres a loss of 1V.

Additionally, reef-pis 100% for Lightning refers to 0V on the circuit.

This is tested with some 12V 3528 LEDs and both the IRFB3806 and the IRLB8721.

 

[Ranjib]

This would be for 2 different tanks.. So probably 2 different pi's...

Then you don’t need to change anything. They’ll have different IPs. If you are using adafruit.io integration , configure one of the reef-pi with a prefix to distinguish between feeds. You are likely to run in data limits with the free account though ,

 

[Ranjib]

Hi guys,

so I've got my new multimeter...
At first: 100% in reef-pi is 0V on my circuit. I adjusted my PSU to 12.25V, which is passed through the MOSFET as long as no LED ist connected. As soon as I connect some LEDs, the Voltage behind the Mosfet starts to decline with the number of connected LEDs.
If I connect, for example, 84 LEDs theres a loss of 1V.

Additionally, reef-pis 100% for Lightning refers to 0V on the circuit.

This is tested with some 12V 3528 LEDs and both the IRFB3806 and the IRLB8721.

The logic should be reversed due to how n channel mosfet works. What’s the output at 50 or halfway ?

 

[Flotto]

The logic should be reversed due to how n channel mosfet works. What’s the output at 50 or halfway ?

The non-reversed logic works correct for me. 0% is the darkest and 99% is the brightest.

I'm measuring the following values:
~0V with 0%
~4.8V with 1%
~5.5V with 10%
~8.1V with 50%
~9.6V with 75%
~10.8V with 99%
~0V with 100%

The voltage drops harder if I connect 600 LEDs to one MOSFET. Then with 99% there are only 9V left. But at this end, it could be that my cables are too thin for the amperes needed to fire up 600LEDs.

For me this is not critical, since I'm not going to fire up the LEDs at max. and not using more than 75 LEDs on one MOSFET. But the 100% = 0V is a bug in my opinion...

edit: Just upgraded to 1.0! Awesome work, Ranjib! Thank you very much - love it!

 

[Ryan115]

@Ranjib, Just changed over to 1.0.
Everything looks great. I am still on port 8080, which I am assuming is because I did not delete the .db file.
Is there anything else that I will be missing if I dont change the .db? I am just being lazy and dont want to have to rebuild all of my outlets, timers, telemetry, etc...

 

[Ranjib]

The non-reversed logic works correct for me. 0% is the darkest and 99% is the brightest.

I'm measuring the following values:
~0V with 0%
~4.8V with 1%
~5.5V with 10%
~8.1V with 50%
~9.6V with 75%
~10.8V with 99%
~0V with 100%

The voltage drops harder if I connect 600 LEDs to one MOSFET. Then with 99% there are only 9V left. But at this end, it could be that my cables are too thin for the amperes needed to fire up 600LEDs.

For me this is not critical, since I'm not going to fire up the LEDs at max. and not using more than 75 LEDs on one MOSFET. But the 100% = 0V is a bug in my opinion...

edit: Just upgraded to 1.0! Awesome work, Ranjib! Thank you very much - love it!

Voltage drop is expected, that’s something LEDs do. Just account for it in our final plan and use appropriate psu

 

[Ranjib]

@Ranjib, Just changed over to 1.0.
Everything looks great. I am still on port 8080, which I am assuming is because I did not delete the .db file.
Is there anything else that I will be missing if I dont change the .db? I am just being lazy and dont want to have to rebuild all of my outlets, timers, telemetry, etc...

Nothing.. theres no db /schema changes since 0.9, so you should be good. You can update your reef-pi bind address to "0.0.0.0:80" under Configuration -> Settings and reload, if you dont want to type ports

 

[Ryan115]

Nothing.. theres no db /schema changes since 0.9, so you should be good. You can update your reef-pi bind address to "0.0.0.0:80" under Configuration -> Settings and reload, if you dont want to type ports

Perfect...thanks again.
I never cease to be amazed at the the work that you have done and the support you offer on this "side project"

 

[Ranjib]

The non-reversed logic works correct for me. 0% is the darkest and 99% is the brightest.

I'm measuring the following values:
~0V with 0%
~4.8V with 1%
~5.5V with 10%
~8.1V with 50%
~9.6V with 75%
~10.8V with 99%
~0V with 100%

The voltage drops harder if I connect 600 LEDs to one MOSFET. Then with 99% there are only 9V left. But at this end, it could be that my cables are too thin for the amperes needed to fire up 600LEDs.

For me this is not critical, since I'm not going to fire up the LEDs at max. and not using more than 75 LEDs on one MOSFET. But the 100% = 0V is a bug in my opinion...

edit: Just upgraded to 1.0! Awesome work, Ranjib! Thank you very much - love it!

Thank you for the kind words . I am glad you liked the 1.0 UI. Let me know if you have any feedback. I'll suggest tinkering with LED psu's a bit. one thing I have learned with reef-pi developments, particularly on the electronics side is individual component will never give you a holistic idea about how the overall assembly/circuit will work. This is due to the subtle differences of various compnents and their critical parameters (vds, rds , heat dissipation etc etc..) . Its better to get a inefficient or half baked yet fully functional circuit going first. Then optimize the whole thing for performance or stability , that way you'll figure out all the big missing pieces and all the bad stuff in one shot or without multiple pass .. where sometime u'll be stuck due to one or more missing parts.
keep us posted on the LED stuff. Though I use and recommend Kessil, I absolutely want reef-pi to support all DIY LED builds. This is a critical piece to build an affordable reef tank (lights are one of the cost center)

 

[Ranjib]

Perfect...thanks again.
I never cease to be amazed at the the work that you have done and the support you offer on this "side project"

Thanks for the kind words. I have always been pretty active in opensource. It’s only after my son was born that I decided to jump in reefing and then focus all my opensource work to build a usable and affordable controller. I still don’t think it’s a lot of software work to be frank, it’s the electronics and hardware side that takes a lot of time, probably also because I’m new to this

 

[Flotto]

I'll suggest tinkering with LED psu's a bit. one thing I have learned with reef-pi developments, particularly on the electronics side is individual component will never give you a holistic idea about how the overall assembly/circuit will work. This is due to the subtle differences of various compnents and their critical parameters (vds, rds , heat dissipation etc etc..) . Its better to get a inefficient or half baked yet fully functional circuit going first.

I already have everything on my table, except blu and red LED stripes. Perma Proto Board, 20 MOSFETs, 100m of wires, 12-15V adjustable PSU and - of course - some LEDs.

 

[dburg30]

Then you don’t need to change anything. They’ll have different IPs. If you are using adafruit.io integration , configure one of the reef-pi with a prefix to distinguish between feeds. You are likely to run in data limits with the free account though ,

Ahhh, but to connect from outside your home LAN, need different ports.

 

[sector9]

I updated this morning to 1.0 and now I am having issues logging in. I did clear the cache as well as try several different browsers. I can get to the log in screen and once I try to sign in it goes right back to the login screen. I see that other users have had similar issues after upgrades. I tried restarting my pi ant then ended up downgrading back to 0.9.1 but I am still having the same issue. Any suggestions? My next step will be to delete everything including the database and start from scratch on 1.0.

 

[dburg30]

And I dont get the point of the .io integration..

 

[Ranjib]

I updated this morning to 1.0 and now I am having issues logging in. I did clear the cache as well as try several different browsers. I can get to the log in screen and once I try to sign in it goes right back to the login screen. I see that other users have had similar issues after upgrades. I tried restarting my pi ant then ended up downgrading back to 0.9.1 but I am still having the same issue. Any suggestions? My next step will be to delete everything including the database and start from scratch on 1.0.

the port number has changed from 8080 to 80. So, reef-pi web UI address is now just the IP of the pi, like: http://10.0.0.10 (assuming 10.0.0.10 is the IP)

 

[Ranjib]

I updated this morning to 1.0 and now I am having issues logging in. I did clear the cache as well as try several different browsers. I can get to the log in screen and once I try to sign in it goes right back to the login screen. I see that other users have had similar issues after upgrades. I tried restarting my pi ant then ended up downgrading back to 0.9.1 but I am still having the same issue. Any suggestions? My next step will be to delete everything including the database and start from scratch on 1.0.

did you change username or password? the default username and password is set to reef-pi/reef-pi.

 

[Ranjib]

And I dont get the point of the .io integration..

like why its there? or why we need different prefix for different controllers?
Regarding the first, why adafruit.io integration is there: so that we can persist telemetry data even when reef-pi is rebooted. the in-controller dashboard/metrics gets reset everytime reef-pi is restarted. Also, in the beginning there was no in-controller dashboard, adafruit.io was the only way we could get a dashboard of temperature or anything...

 

[dburg30]

like why its there? or why we need different prefix for different controllers?
Regarding the first, why adafruit.io integration is there: so that we can persist telemetry data even when reef-pi is rebooted. the in-controller dashboard/metrics gets reset everytime reef-pi is restarted. Also, in the beginning there was no in-controller dashboard, adafruit.io was the only way we could get a dashboard of temperature or anything...

Yea, why it was there. I get it now, so you will still have history. I have a seneye so I guess I never looked into the io part since it keeps a log.. Thanks for the explanation. Makes lots more sense now.

 

[Ranjib]

Another I am hoping from the adafruit.io integration is to get alert when the controller is down for some reason. Adafruit.io has triggers, which can send email notification based , I was looking forward to use that feature to send me alerts when reef-pi is down, since I wont get any alert from reef-pi itself in that case.
But for some reason, email triggers in adafruit.io never worked for me.. I still dont know why.. as a result I have never talked about it.. but since you asked.. this was a reason for adafruit.io integration as well. An external monitor/alert is always a full proof way to detect system issues

 

[Ranjib]

I already have everything on my table, except blu and red LED stripes. Perma Proto Board, 20 MOSFETs, 100m of wires, 12-15V adjustable PSU and - of course - some LEDs.

Do you need 20 mosfets? I would assume you only need 1 per channel.. so if you are dividing the leds in 4 channels, you need 4 mosfets