HOWTO - Make a BrewPi Fermentation Controller For Cheap

[jwalkermed]

Here is one option.

Here is another.

A local Radio Shack might have them.

Cody

Thanks seems like my google searches were unsucessful. The wire was all too thin. but those amazon 18awg look like they will work fine.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Here is one option.

Here is another.

A local Radio Shack might have them.

Cody

Are there still radio shacks open? Every one out here is closed as of them going bankrupt last week and announcing they are selling most of their shops to Sprint.

 

[wbarber69]

I've inly seen one that's closing in my area and they are still open till all the stuff is gone. I racked up on resistors and capacitors yesterday 70% off.

 

[Baja_Brewer]

Are there still radio shacks open? Every one out here is closed as of them going bankrupt last week and announcing they are selling most of their shops to Sprint.

I believe corporate locations are closing but franchises have the option of staying open.

 

[CGish]

Are there still radio shacks open? Every one out here is closed as of them going bankrupt last week and announcing they are selling most of their shops to Sprint.

Two of the local ones are closing. We do not have a Fry's or anything else nearby. Now the projects I need just one more part for will have to wait a few days to a week rather than being able to run in town. Unfortunately, I cannot afford their prices for more than a part or two. Newark, Amazon, and places like that are just too cheap (comparatively). When I can get 10 - 100 of a part shipped to my door for what 1-2 cost at RS, there is something wrong with their business model. I am sad to see them go, but I think it was inevitable. They needed to transition to a web-base business several years ago, and now it is too late.

 

[wbarber69]

RadioShack messed up when they started selling phones and low grade a/v equipment. Remember when Tandy made all the parts that went into everyone else's receivers. You could get an Optimus branded component that matched part for part to its high end competitor for pennies on the dollar. Then they pushed the hobby electronics stuff to the back in the dark corner. Now all you see when you walk in is cell phones and chargers. And when you do need a single connector or a toggle switch they want 5-6 bucks for it. No thanks. But for real if you find one closing up get in there and clean them out. I saved 79 bucks and only spent 35. I got another soldering gun. Random pcbs. Hundreds of resistors and capacitors. And a buch of little hobby knock knacks I've had my eye on but never bought because they were too expensive. Like the 30 dollar umold plastic stuff, that I picked up for 6 bucks.

 

[SeanGC]

I plan on moving my Brewpi to another location. Anything I need to know regarding the webserver? I know I'll probably have to change the IP address.

 

[day_trippr]

That's pretty much the long and short of relocating a web server.
I can't think of anything else that should need doing...

Cheers!

 

[day_trippr]

I remember when RadioShack was relevant. It was decades ago. In fact I remember my last hard core engagement with the local 'Shack was back in 1977, when I designed and built a series of cable TV descramblers that used two specific adjustable coils from a 99 cent bag of a dozen quasi-random fixed and slugged parts.

It was definitely before the age of integrated electronics, and way before the era of essentially disposable electronics that most consumer products have become - from telephones through televisions.

There's a mindset that accompanied that paradigm shift that pretty much puts the notion of "building" or even "fixing" anything totally out of mind.
With that a fading concept, RadioShack became a glorified mall kiosk.
The cell phone thing was an act of desperation to become relevant that had no legs.

What's sad is they won't be missed by many...

Cheers!

 

[wbarber69]

Ha the good ole copper coil TV descrambler. Although I wasn't born yet in 77. I remember making one when I was about 10 or 11 it worked for a couple months then they started to upgrade the cable networks in my area.

 

[bayoujeeper]

Two things I'd be looking for:

- if you're powering the Uno via USB, there can be significant voltage drop on the 5V at the Uno, depending on the cable used (some aren't too bad but I've tested a couple of 18" cables that sucked pretty hard). Using a dedicated 9V wall wart to power the Uno will eliminate that problem.

- otherwise, power and ground distribution is important. The shift register - whether on a protoshield or a breadboard - should get power and ground directly from the Uno, and the LCD should get its power and ground connection directly from the Uno as well - and not from the shift register assembly. A "star" topology where everything connects at the Uno is better than daisy-chaining from the Uno through a breadboard or protoshield to the LCD...

Cheers!

Thanks for the suggestions! I rewired the power and grounds, and wired directly from uno instead of on the protoboard, but unfortunantly it is still happening. I notice it only happens on heat (Using a small lasko 101 heater). I think I have a 9v wall wart I need to locate and try that once my current brew is done fermenting.
I thought I saw in one of these threads someone using a couple of capacitors on their breadboard to aid with power. is this something I may need?

 

[day_trippr]

You definitely want to have a couple/few capacitors (between .1uf to 1uf) across power & ground on your bread board or protoshield, especially near the shift register. I used radial leaded .1UF caps on my builds, they're the blue epoxy coated thingies in these pics:

Cheers!

 

[bayoujeeper]

I soldered in the CAPs and still no luck.. Still get a garbled LCD when the relays trigger.. Guess I need to dig out my 9v wall wart and see if powering the arduino helps.

 

[SeanGC]

I followed the steps to password protect my brewpi page, since I'm looking to access it remotely, and I got a 500 internal error. :/

 

[day_trippr]

/var/log/apache2

Look at access.log and error.log, hopefully there'll be a clue there somewhere...

Cheers!

 

[bayoujeeper]

You definitely want to have a couple/few capacitors (between .1uf to 1uf) across power & ground on your bread board or protoshield, especially near the shift register. I used radial leaded .1UF caps on my builds, they're the blue epoxy coated thingies in these pics:

Cheers!

Well.. I have the caps soldered in as well as a 9V wall wart powering the uno and I still get garbled characters when the relays trigger on and off. I have to power it all down and bring it back up to clear it.
Any other suggestions?

 

[bayoujeeper]

Also, I followed a different wiring diagram (post 1174, page 118 of this thread) that has 10k resistors at pins 11,12, and 14 of the shift register, and yours does not, not sure if that matters or not..

 

[day_trippr]

fwiw, those pull-ups are superfluous as at some point Elco invoked pull-ups inside the AVR on those pins.
I don't have them on any of my builds...

Cheers!

 

[doomy86]

I have the same problem like you bayoujeeper..

I added decoupling caps, switched power supplies and changed relay modules. I tried very short wires from and to the shift register and the problem is still there.

What kind of load is on you relay? Im just switching a aquarium heater.

I think if there is no solution i will replace the relays with SSRs.

 

[gfisher99]

g) gfisher99 - lovely setup. May I ask what the inner size of that box is, that seems like the perfect balance between keeping things compact yet manageable.!

Hello there, the box I used is a Cantex 8x8x4 that I got at Home Depot. Interestingly enough, I cannot find them on their site anymore, exactly, but this is very close. May just be an old picture.

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Carlon-8-in-x-4-in-Junction-Box-E989N-CAR/100404099

Let me know if you have any questions.

Greg

 

[SeanGC]

I finally got my brewpi running, but the range in which the chamber is cooling/heating is much greater than other charts I've been seeing online.

I believe it's due to my set up, but I just wanted to clarify.

I have a commercial kegerator that can fit three sanke kegs that I ferment in. I have the heater next to the fermenter (it's a large space heater), and both are positioned to the far left of the chamber. I have the temp probe for the beer taped to the opposite side of the fermenter.

Since it's taped, I'm assuming the ambient temps affect it a bit more, which is why they rise/drop so suddenly.

Here's a picture of my most recent ferm schedule.

Does this look alright?

 

[thekraken]

I have the heater next to the fermenter (it's a large space heater), and both are positioned to the far left of the chamber. I have the temp probe for the beer taped to the opposite side of the fermenter.?

I would get rid of the large space heater and get the smallest space heater I could find or try one of those reptile heaters or heating mats or something else much lower wattage ( <=200W ). The large space heater is way overkill for this. Brewpi is hard coded to heat and cool for a minimum of 3 minutes, that's why you get those swings.

Also, you could try taping some foam, insulation, bubble wrap packing material or something over the temp probe to insulate it from the fridge temps.

Finally, have you checked your probes for calibration? Some one else could chime in here but your beer temp vs fridge temp looks strange to me.

 

[SeanGC]

The fridge probe is further away, in the center, so the reading would always be cooler cause the stainless steel is getting heated primarily. I'll take a picture of it later when I get off from work.

What are people's opinions of using heating mats/belts as oppose to the space heater? I'll also be doing this in a danby fridge for the next brew. I was stuck using the larger fridge since my other fermenter is tied up with a lager right now.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

I remember when RadioShack was relevant. It was decades ago. In fact I remember my last hard core engagement with the local 'Shack was back in 1977, when I designed and built a series of cable TV descramblers that used two specific adjustable coils from a 99 cent bag of a dozen quasi-random fixed and slugged parts.

It was definitely before the age of integrated electronics, and way before the era of essentially disposable electronics that most consumer products have become - from telephones through televisions.

There's a mindset that accompanied that paradigm shift that pretty much puts the notion of "building" or even "fixing" anything totally out of mind.
With that a fading concept, RadioShack became a glorified mall kiosk.
The cell phone thing was an act of desperation to become relevant that had no legs.

What's sad is they won't be missed by many...

Cheers!

Back when Sharper Image stores were relevant

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

The fridge probe is further away, in the center, so the reading would always be cooler cause the stainless steel is getting heated primarily. I'll take a picture of it later when I get off from work.

What are people's opinions of using heating mats/belts as oppose to the space heater? I'll also be doing this in a danby fridge for the next brew. I was stuck using the larger fridge since my other fermenter is tied up with a lager right now.

You dont need that large of a heater to heat the inside of a fridge, if you think about they are like maybe 10-15 square feet of space.

The Lasko Personal Ceramic heaters you can get for 15 bucks right now on Amazon are the best bet still. Nows the time to buy them too, their price is 50% of what it normally is because its Winter.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003XDTWN2/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

That should help because as others stated your heating way too fast.

 

[day_trippr]

Just how many cubic feet is this chamber - and where is it located wrt the expected ambient air temperature range?

I ferment in a 17cf top-freezer unit - I'd guess the fridge section is ~ 14cf - located where the lows can reach the mid-40s. I use a 40w appliance bulb in a cheap ceramic base with an 80mm fan blowing on it. I have no problems maintaining a post-fermentation/dry hop temperature ~ 68°F which is the warmest my beers ever see.

As for the belts blankets and/or pads, I ferment in 6.5 italian glass so I generally shy away from any heating or cooling methods that aren't uniformly applied to the vessel...

Cheers!

 

[dirtybear7]

Hi All,

For some reason I thought these i2C/SPI LCD backpacks (http://www.adafruit.com/products/292) from Adafruit would work for hooking up the LCD to my Brewpi system. They do work when wired to an Arduino using a test sketch, so I know they work. They just don't receive/display any data when using Brewpi. I'm using 13, 11, 10 for the pins. Any suggestions??

 

[SeanGC]

I'll move it away from the larger heater for now, and work on purchasing a lasko. Moving it further away should help with how fast it heats up.

I'm looking to go as high as 85 degrees with this beer. It's a saison using ECY08, which is very heat tolerant.

 

[day_trippr]

Hi All,

For some reason I thought these i2C/SPI LCD backpacks (http://www.adafruit.com/products/292) from Adafruit would work for hooking up the LCD to my Brewpi system. They do work when wired to an Arduino using a test sketch, so I know they work. They just don't receive/display any data when using Brewpi. I'm using 13, 11, 10 for the pins. Any suggestions??

Unfortunately, I2C/SPI LCD modules won't work with BrewPi, which expects a 4x20 4-bit parallel LCD on the other side of an 8-bit shift register to work.
The BrewPi AVR LCD driver code is hard-wired in this manner; there's no getting around that without modifying the code.

See this thread for one way to add an LCD to BrewPi...

Cheers!

 

[johns]

Just a quick update.
I have been away for a while and am trying to resume the installation of this project, but there have been too many roadblock relating to the software. I am just not that comfortable with Debian systems. The hardware seems straight forward enough, but its the software that screws me up.

The PHP thing has me totally tripped up. Dont know what to do. Now I am thinking about buying it off of the brewpi website, but Elco has not gotten back to me. Not really sure why but I just wanted to know if that new brewspark has installation directions.

Maybe I will just go back to the STC

I will try to figure it out over time as like a side hobby, but right now I think I am spending way too much time on this.

Kinda sucks, because I have already gotten all the hardware for it, just cant figure out the scripts and install of the software. Ohh well

 

[dirtybear7]

Unfortunately, I2C/SPI LCD modules won't work with BrewPi, which expects a 4x20 4-bit parallel LCD on the other side of an 8-bit shift register to work.
The BrewPi AVR LCD driver code is hard-wired in this manner; there's no getting around that without modifying the code.

See this thread for one way to add an LCD to BrewPi...

Cheers!

Thank you for the info. Any chance that the BrewPi AVR LCD driver code is contained within one document, maybe this one, DisplayLcd.h? I'm guessing it would be easier to just desolder and use the method in the link you provided.

 

[day_trippr]

You might actually be in luck here.

Inspired to at least check the brewpi.com site to see if anyone had successfully modded the AVR code to enable an I2C or SPI - connected LCD, I found some promising threads.

http://forum.brewpi.com/discussion/1146/i2c-lcd-display-again]
http://forum.brewpi.com/discussion/385/i2c-lcd-displays

There are others.

If it's worth doing some digging and hex file uploads and perhaps pin-swapping some connections to the Uno to see where this particular rabbit hole leads, at least you know someone else did it first

Cheers!

 

[dirtybear7]

You might actually be in luck here.

Inspired to at least check the brewpi.com site to see if anyone had successfully modded the AVR code to enable an I2C or SPI - connected LCD, I found some promising threads.

http://forum.brewpi.com/discussion/1146/i2c-lcd-display-again]
http://forum.brewpi.com/discussion/385/i2c-lcd-displays

There are others.

If it's worth doing some digging and hex file uploads and perhaps pin-swapping some connections to the Uno to see where this particular rabbit hole leads, at least you know someone else did it first

Cheers!

Sweet!

 

[wbarber69]

Just a quick update.
I have been away for a while and am trying to resume the installation of this project, but there have been too many roadblock relating to the software. I am just not that comfortable with Debian systems. The hardware seems straight forward enough, but its the software that screws me up.

The PHP thing has me totally tripped up. Dont know what to do. Now I am thinking about buying it off of the brewpi website, but Elco has not gotten back to me. Not really sure why but I just wanted to know if that new brewspark has installation directions.

Maybe I will just go back to the STC

I will try to figure it out over time as like a side hobby, but right now I think I am spending way too much time on this.

Kinda sucks, because I have already gotten all the hardware for it, just cant figure out the scripts and install of the software. Ohh well

Did you try using the install instructions on the brewpi wiki? If you're using a raspberry pi it's as easy as updating and installing a couple dependencies then running a single install script. It's nearly as easy on Debian, but they actually have a totally manual install walk through that will have you do exactly what the script does, just by hand. If you care to make it a bit easier you can modify the install script to not run one package designed specifically for the pi and it will run the unattended install just like it does on the pi.

 

[johns]

Thanks for the info. I have been using the brewpi docs and have been getting nowhere. I will try the wiki page and hope to have some luck.

Updates to follow.

any info on the brewpi spark? it looks like its for mashing and fermenting.

 

[bayoujeeper]

I have the same problem like you bayoujeeper..

I added decoupling caps, switched power supplies and changed relay modules. I tried very short wires from and to the shift register and the problem is still there.

What kind of load is on you relay? Im just switching a aquarium heater.

I think if there is no solution i will replace the relays with SSRs.

Doomy,
I added caps, rewired my LCD shift Register, powering the arduino with a seperate PS, etc and still having the issue. Actually I think I have narrowed it down to when it kicks the fridge on and not the heater. My heater is one of the small Lasko 101 ceramic heater.
I am not sure what else to do at this point..
This is what it looks like after running for a while..

 

[Borisfa]

After install RTC, everything is ok!

 

[Borisfa]

Happy to see your LCD is still solid.

If the RPi is definitely dead (the green activity led never blinks) the first thing I'd be checking would be power. The next would be to start pawing through /var/log/syslog to see if there's a hint therein.

Cheers!

My Brewpi freeze again.

Look log file.

What it means?

View attachment 1424622875890.jpg

 

[Borisfa]

More infos

 

[Borisfa]

Sorry

View attachment 1424623014124.jpg