HOWTO - Make a BrewPi Fermentation Controller For Cheap

[Bigdaddyale]

He's got his own vocabulary

"electrocity" being one of them

 

[srice]

I've been running a brewpi for a few years and love it. For some reason it crashed and I am in the process of rebuilding it. All seems to be going OK until I get to the point of reprogramming my arduino. When I head to http://dl.brewpi.com/brewpi-avr/stable/ - I get a bad link message from brewpi. OK, I head over to GitHub and see a comment in the readme that all arduino files were yanked months ago. Am I out of luck? Is the file for an Arduino Uno still hanging around somewhere?

 

[kaljade]

I've been running a brewpi for a few years and love it. For some reason it crashed and I am in the process of rebuilding it. All seems to be going OK until I get to the point of reprogramming my arduino. When I head to http://dl.brewpi.com/brewpi-avr/stable/ - I get a bad link message from brewpi. OK, I head over to GitHub and see a comment in the readme that all arduino files were yanked months ago. Am I out of luck? Is the file for an Arduino Uno still hanging around somewhere?

Luckily for you day_trippr kept a copy on GDrive so you can download it here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showpost.php?p=7850341&postcount=6648

 

[Thorrak]

I've been running a brewpi for a few years and love it. For some reason it crashed and I am in the process of rebuilding it. All seems to be going OK until I get to the point of reprogramming my arduino. When I head to http://dl.brewpi.com/brewpi-avr/stable/ - I get a bad link message from brewpi. OK, I head over to GitHub and see a comment in the readme that all arduino files were yanked months ago. Am I out of luck? Is the file for an Arduino Uno still hanging around somewhere?

I think what you need is here:
https://github.com/BrewPi/firmware/releases/tag/0.2.10

 

[zgja2]

I had this problem a lot until I bought a quality micro-SD card, like Sandisk.

So check your SD card and make sure there's no corrupted blocks.

How do i check for corrupted blocks?

 

[stlbeer]

How do i check for corrupted blocks?

Disclaimer: I am not a Linux guru, but this is what I did to resolve the corrupt file system on my Pi.

You'll need to run a fsck on the sd card. This can be done by mounting the card as a secondary drive in a known good system. I did this a while ago and don't have the specific commands I used for fsck.

 

[farmskis]

Any ideas on why my homemade brewpi quit keeping the fridge and beer at temp? Here is what I notice. The relay will click to start the fridge but then it immediately turns off, then will try again. I have also noticed that it says searching for peak occasionally at the bottom of the lcd. Freezer works if I plug it in to regular uncontrolled outlet so I believe the issue is on the brewpi somewhere. It has worked great for the last 1.5 years. I was running in beer constant mode.

 

[pocketmon]

Any ideas on why my homemade brewpi quit keeping the fridge and beer at temp? Here is what I notice. The relay will click to start the fridge but then it immediately turns off, then will try again. I have also noticed that it says searching for peak occasionally at the bottom of the lcd. Freezer works if I plug it in to regular uncontrolled outlet so I believe the issue is on the brewpi somewhere. It has worked great for the last 1.5 years. I was running in beer constant mode.

Check your sensor.
The only condition that BrewPi decides to ignore the minimum time constraints and stop cooling/heating is disconnection of temperature sensors.

There might be some other possible reasons, like un-reiable hardware, bad kitten, evil aliens, and etc. You just have to figure out.

 

[day_trippr]

Agreed, get into the BrewPi management gui and display the log.
See if you have a probe frequently disconnecting/connecting...

Cheers!

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Still going i see, good! Been super busy with Baby 2.0 and havent had any time to brew lately, soon i hope!

 

[dotps1]

Thanks everyone for all the work on this post (I haven't read all 180 pages), I thought i'd share some of my experiences with it. I used an Orbit Outdoor Sprinkler enclosure, it had a socket built in. So I was able to piggy back off that and eliminate some wires coming out of it. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000VYGMF2/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

I also made a page of just the LCD panel to run on a 17" display on top of my keezer, and my raspberry pi boots to kiosk mode to that php page (I can share the code for that if you'd like).

tonight or tomorrow i'm hoping to add the public page, I'm not real sure how to do that part yet.

thanks again everyone!

 

[farmskis]

Agreed, get into the BrewPi management gui and display the log.
See if you have a probe frequently disconnecting/connecting...

Cheers!

Thank you for the recommendation! I did take a look at the logs and noticed the two temp sensors in the chamber meaning the beer and chamber temp or disconnecting. I then remove the beer temperature sensor from the thermal well and noticed it was a little wet inside the thermal well as well as the sensor. I then let that dry out and it seemed to correct the disconnecting of the two sensors and I was getting temperature readings back in order. So I went for a test run to see if that corrected the issue and noticed that when the temperature was warm and it was trying to cool it would not cool. So I then checked the relay and noticed that the relay on the cool side was not working. The red light on the relay was showing it was receiving the signal but it was not closing the relay. The hot side relay works just fine. When I set the temperature in the chamber to be increased it kicks on the heater and warms up just fine. Would a relay not functioning cause the waiting for Peak and for the brewpi to not work properly since when trying to cool it senses there is no temperature cooling happening in the chamber?

 

[gezzanet]

so my first hardware failure in 3 1/2 years. I had a dark lager with 2308 going strong. so strong that it bubbled out of the airlock and filled my thermowell. ( yep i had it too low in the lid) -thought i had drowned a probe.
Turned out the probe was fine and just needed a rinse but the relay failed a couple of days later and would not turn on . just switched it out and up and running again.
So probes seem to be robust and relays arent bad for the price.
3 1/2 years isnt bad for a replay costing a couple of bucks.

 

[farmskis]

so my first hardware failure in 3 1/2 years. I had a dark lager with 2308 going strong. so strong that it bubbled out of the airlock and filled my thermowell. ( yep i had it too low in the lid) -thought i had drowned a probe.
Turned out the probe was fine and just needed a rinse but the relay failed a couple of days later and would not turn on . just switched it out and up and running again.
So probes seem to be robust and relays arent bad for the price.
3 1/2 years isnt bad for a replay costing a couple of bucks.
View attachment 550291

Interesting... My probe got wet as well and works perfectly after drying out. Except the relay now is the issue, won't turn on the cold side of things. I recall with the wet probe (unknown it was wet at the time) it was cycling the relay more often so I believe that may have caused the relay to stop working. I have yet to replace the relay but I assume I will replace it and all will be back to normal. Temps all read fine and it seems to want to cycle the relay at the correct times. Plus it works for heating the chamber just fine.

 

[gezzanet]

Thanks. Ill have to have a look at this as the new relay is now playing up. Ill swap out the probe that got wet and see how I go

 

[gezzanet]

Swapped the probe and all back to normal. Time to put a beer down. [emoji106]

 

[RayZab]

So I’ve been using the brewpi loaded on a laptop with Debian and an uno for a few years now. I have an interesting case where I get the following error message on the brewpi sometimes where the brewpi doesn’t interact with the uno, however the uno is still maintaining temperature (but won’t following the loaded temperature profile). Interestingly, I’ve noticed this only happens right when the fridge is being turned on. My laptop, fridge and heater, and uno (wall wart), each are connected to a power strip. Has anyone seen this issue before, and know how to fix it?

 

[kaljade]

I vaguely recall shielded USB cables and consistent power supply being the main causes of this, so if you have the latter worked out, it may be the former?

 

[stonebrewer]

In Linux you can run the badblocks command to check for corrupted disks. Google it for syntax...Cheers!

 

[bscuderi]

Nerded out with my brewpi a little bit and added a camera and an led strip to my brewpi. Add this to the list of things that’s completely unnecessary but kind of a awesome. Cause a lot of times I’d brew and then leave town and wonder if my beer started. Other times I’d wonder if airlock activity had stopped before I crash cool. I know airlock activity isn’t exact but it would give about as much peace of mind as I could get without being physically present to do a hydrometer reading which I usually don’t do anyways except right at kegging time for a FG measurement. Pressing the light on button runs a python script that turns the light on for a minute to watch the camera and then turns it off so the beer isn’t in the light. As a secondary benefit I don’t have to open my chamber and let out all the cold air just to check on it.

 

[CadiBrewer]

I'm upgrading my fermenter to a stainless conical. Rather than going with glycol or some other chilling method, I am in the market for a glass door refrigerator. I want the ease of the refrigerator over glycol, plus I like the look in my brewery of having the stainless conical in a lighted glass door refrigerator.

My current conundrum is how do I get temperature probe cords inside, and more importantly, how do I get a power cord inside for a small space heater? Anyone have any luck doing these? With my current chest freezer (which will become my lagering chamber) I have a collar so I easily ran the cords into the chamber.

 

[Bigdaddyale]

I'm upgrading my fermenter to a stainless conical. Rather than going with glycol or some other chilling method, I am in the market for a glass door refrigerator. I want the ease of the refrigerator over glycol, plus I like the look in my brewery of having the stainless conical in a lighted glass door refrigerator.

My current conundrum is how do I get temperature probe cords inside, and more importantly, how do I get a power cord inside for a small space heater? Anyone have any luck doing these? With my current chest freezer (which will become my lagering chamber) I have a collar so I easily ran the cords into the chamber.

There is enough room to drill a hole and install a rubber grommet on the compressor hump of my mini fridge.

 

[HDiesel]

I'm upgrading my fermenter to a stainless conical. Rather than going with glycol or some other chilling method, I am in the market for a glass door refrigerator. I want the ease of the refrigerator over glycol, plus I like the look in my brewery of having the stainless conical in a lighted glass door refrigerator.

My current conundrum is how do I get temperature probe cords inside, and more importantly, how do I get a power cord inside for a small space heater? Anyone have any luck doing these? With my current chest freezer (which will become my lagering chamber) I have a collar so I easily ran the cords into the chamber.

I have a small fridge with a glass door I got from Sam's club. All of my probe cords and the power cord for a small blow dryer run between the door and frigde just fine.

 

[CadiBrewer]

Thanks for the feedback. I'll find a fridge and assume I can make something work after I have a chance to look at it.

 

[tgourley01]

Brewday was approaching and I had to fire up the fermentation chamber.
Unfortunately I had a corrupt filesystem on my pi 2 so I had to rebuild it.
I rebuilt it on a pi zero wireless. ($5 at microcenter)
So far so good! (using arduino controller)

The shutdown script should be part of the standard build. I'll be looking into adding that once my chamber is empty.

 

[bscuderi]

Brewday was approaching and I had to fire up the fermentation chamber.
Unfortunately I had a corrupt filesystem on my pi 2 so I had to rebuild it.
I rebuilt it on a pi zero wireless. ($5 at microcenter)
So far so good! (using arduino controller)

The shutdown script should be part of the standard build. I'll be looking into adding that once my chamber is empty.

Share the steps for the shutdown script. I hate going in via ssh to do a simple shutdown in case I have to turn it off.

 

[kaljade]

Share the steps for the shutdown script. I hate going in via ssh to do a simple shutdown in case I have to turn it off.

Say please [emoji6]

 

[bscuderi]

Say please [emoji6]

Haha where are my manners. Please of course haha. I found this

from subprocess import call
call("sudo nohup shutdown -h now", shell=True)

I’m assuming something like this in a python script called from a web button in my admin.php?

 

[YSIbio]

Been using my legacy BrewPi for about two years now with great results. Recently, my freezer stopped turning on when the SSR would activate. I found that the outlet to the freezer was only measuring 56V while the outlet to the heater was measuring a solid 120V. My first thought that it might be a grounding issue so I checked the wiring schematic on the DIYBrewPi Wikia and noticed that I was missing the ground from the SSR to the outlet. Interestingly, that ground is not on the original schematic at the beginning of this thread, which is what I used to wire my BrewPi. So, I'm not sure if it's even that important to have that ground. Regardless, it did not fix the problem when I added the ground. I still have 56V on the freezer outlet. Any ideas on how I can fix this problem?

 

[CadiBrewer]

Which ground are you talking about, the ground from the arduino that connects to the temp probes and the relay board, or the ground that comes in from your house power? Don't connect your house power ground to the relay board.

I suspect that your relay board or if in fact you are using an ssr, your ssr is bad. You can swap your freezer with the heater and reconfigure your devices and see if your freezer kicks on.