Building my own controller

[justinm001]

Hey all.
I'm building my own controller to control my brewing and fermenting processes. I'm still a bit new to the brewing but have made a few and have a decent 3 keg brewing system all built. When brewing i keep getting sidetracked and need a timer and system to monitor the brewing process and tell me what to do

I'm thinking on an LCD display that tells me what its doing and also tells me what to do next. I'll have a couple 120V 10A relays(for fermenting heating and cooling) and 240V 40A relays for heating elements, a few temp sensors. Any other hardware i should consider?

I'm going to use a custom controller that runs off wifi and has web interfaces so i can import a brewxml and write the instructions.

There's been a ton of controllers about to hit the market, but i haven't found any decent ones that actually have been released and aren't outrageously expensive.

 

[alphaomega]

Maybe Strange brew elsinore?

 

[justinm001]

I have a couple developers that work for me (own small IT company) so we might just build one from scratch. I'm not sure what else i could control and monitor

 

[alphaomega]

Well, if you're in IT, then you should know the cost of development. You should also know that you really should have a pretty firm grip of your requirements before starting development.
There is a wide spectrum between no assistance and fully automated brewing. Depending on how far you want to take it and how general or specific to your setup you want to do it, the project can be anywhere from trivial to massively complex.

Start out small and specific and add features as needed. Just make sure you choose a platform that will allow for some 'growth' and is reasonably easy to develop for.

If you have room to add a few more sensors and actuators, nothing wrong with starting out with just a temp sensor and a relay.

 

[justinm001]

Thanks that's my plan. We started our development for a basic system just for the brewing portion, Obviously this is super low priority for the developer so i'm hoping it will get done in the next month or so.

We have most of the hardware so are able to start building the device, the current electric system is in a super large box with switches and everything, so im hoping I'll be able to make it more manageable using simple plugs, maybe 3-4 small boxes with room for "expansion modules"

Does anyone use any electric valves for draining? I use a few of the 1/4" pvc valves (nominally closed) for my aquarium and they work great, but not sure if there are affordable large valves that can handle the heat. It would be nice to be able to open valves in the kegs where items are gravity fed if possible.

 

[alphaomega]

For sparge water, solenoid valves could be good (there is a seller on ebay called valves4projects that has nice cheap ones).
For wort, motorized stainless ball valves are probably better (semi cheap from China).
If you don't have to gravity feed, you might be better off just using pumps instead.

Though, I really think that you should hold off with that kind of automation until you are confident with what you need. A gravity fed 3 tier system really does not need that much automation. A thermostat for the HLT is good. If you want to improve on that, a RIMS setup for the MLT.
You really shouldn't need much automation there.

 

[aphanson17]

I'm excited to see what you come up with. I'm currently collecting parts for my build. I'm planning something similar. It's going to be a 3 tier system running from a spark core with a web interface. An automated HLT and MT is what I'm starting with and then I'm going to do the boil on my propane burner.

 

[aphanson17]

Any updates on your progress?