iSpindle - DIY Electronic Hydrometer

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Thanks for the input!
Going to do some testing tonight and see if I can find any bad connections or broken traces.
 
Okay, so I did some more troubleshooting.

Figuring I wanted to eliminate one component at time I started at the battery.
As I stated earlier I get about 3,65V from the battery and that held true today as well. The battery is a 3,7V 3500mAh battery so I marked down the battery as okay.

Next I wanted to verify the charging controller, I google up the pinout for the TP4056 charging controller taking you guys previous advice I soldered some leads directly to the battery-in pins so that I could eliminate any broken traces or bad soldering on the mainboard. Taking a multimeter to the pins I measure the expected 3,65 on the batter input-pin but only 2,34 on the to-circuit-output-pins. I resoldered all the pins on the charging controller figuring it might be a bad solder but had the same result when measuring.

So is the concluding that the TP4056 charging controller is broken?
 
I am thinking about making one of these, and have a question. I saw a cheap d1 mini / esp8266 board with built in battery and charging capability on amazon here.

Seems like that would greatly simplify this project by eliminating needing to have a separate charging breakout board and shorting issues that people are having, correct? At that point, all that's left is the temp probe, gyro, and sled (which can be improvised).


Has anyone tried it?
 
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I have an issue, my ispindle configured and calibrated without any dramas but only sends one of two readings to Uidots.

I've seen this reported on the Net but I've no clear idea how to fix it, can you point me in the right direction?

thanks all.

AAmcle
 
It may work, but you would be blazing your own trail as far as vessels and drawers to make it work physically. Also, it appears that the gyro pins would not physically line up for an easy attachment like in the original D1 Mini.

Also, it certainly won't work with the PCB shield. D1 minis are so cheap, I'm not sure it would pay to re-engineer.
 
Well, looks like @lightnin9 and I had the same idea at the same time. I ordered a pair of them from AliExpress, will give this a go whenever they get here. Will probably write the code from scratch and use Blynk or something similar for instead of the ispindel firmware.
 
I could not find it on the github page, but does anyone know of a possibility to upload the readings to google sheets?
 
Hey guys. Great thread. I'm going to take some time to read over this stuff over the next few days. I'm an electronic engineer working at an electronics factory in South Deerfield, MA. I love the idea of this project and excited to contribute to it. Ultimately my goal is to get some nice clean (English) documentation to make this a bit easier and less fiddly. I'm going to work on capturing the schematic and PCB layout in KiCAD (open source design tool) so that anybody else that wants to can hack on it. Looking forward to working with you all on it.
 
Hey guys. Great thread. I'm going to take some time to read over this stuff over the next few days. I'm an electronic engineer working at an electronics factory in South Deerfield, MA. I love the idea of this project and excited to contribute to it. Ultimately my goal is to get some nice clean (English) documentation to make this a bit easier and less fiddly. I'm going to work on capturing the schematic and PCB layout in KiCAD (open source design tool) so that anybody else that wants to can hack on it. Looking forward to working with you all on it.

Hi Chris, I'm Electronic Engineer too, and understand a little German, I can help you but this project is Open Source, so we don't need to hack it...or what do you mean about it?

Here you have English documentation:
https://github.com/universam1/iSpindel/blob/master/docs/README_en.md
 
Oh, haha, yeah lost in translation I suppose. By "hack" I really mean "Modify/change/customize" to your own needs/desires.

I've gone through the first 6 pages so far. Lots of super smart folks working on this project. Basically, my goals are to make building these super simple. Find a tube that will work, then design a PCB that'll fit that tube perfectly and have battery clips for the battery, so that you don't need to solder wires to the battery or 3D print any sleds.

Since I have access to super high speed SMT placement equipment at no cost, I'll of course want to design it for SMT parts. But I'll eventually make a second design that's all thru-hole for people who want to make their own that don't have access to a million dollar assembly line for free lol

I suspect though that once I get through all 23 pages of this, I'll find somebody who's already done this. I see that Mikmonken has designed a PCB in EAGLE already. Looking forward to checking that out.
 
I've gone through the first 6 pages so far. Lots of super smart folks working on this project. Basically, my goals are to make building these super simple. Find a tube that will work, then design a PCB that'll fit that tube perfectly and have battery clips for the battery, so that you don't need to solder wires to the battery or 3D print any sleds.

If you follow along here, I suspect you'll find something like what you were thinking:

https://github.com/universam1/iSpindel/issues/154

Robert
 
I am thinking about making one of these, and have a question. I saw a cheap d1 mini / esp8266 board with built in battery and charging capability on amazon here.

Seems like that would greatly simplify this project by eliminating needing to have a separate charging breakout board and shorting issues that people are having, correct? At that point, all that's left is the temp probe, gyro, and sled (which can be improvised).


Has anyone tried it?

Well, looks like @lightnin9 and I had the same idea at the same time. I ordered a pair of them from AliExpress, will give this a go whenever they get here. Will probably write the code from scratch and use Blynk or something similar for instead of the ispindel firmware.

Quick update on the above: bought two of them, and the USB ports broke off both IMMEDIATELY. Seems others have also had this problem. Re-purchasing them, will epoxy them to reinforce the very weak soldering.
 
Quick update on the above: bought two of them, and the USB ports broke off both IMMEDIATELY. Seems others have also had this problem. Re-purchasing them, will epoxy them to reinforce the very weak soldering.
Ouch. That's a real bummer. Whenever we solder things that a human will touch we always recommend that the component be of a "thru-hole" variety. We like to say "Imagine a gorilla plugging and unplugging a cable from that." when we speak with designers. Definitely a good idea to add some epoxy to that SMT only USB port.
 
Ok in case anybody is a little confused about what parts do what and where to find them, I put together a nice little summary on my website. http://www.echrisdenney.com/2019/03/01/ispindel-project-post-2/

But now I see the "most-in-one" board that shoo found on Amazon and now I'm rethinking what to use...

Ahh well, you learn more with my bill of materials anyway.

For what it's worth, I still am not 100% sure of what vessel the most-in-1 breakout board version will fit in. It won't fit in a standard soda bottle preform. Pretty sure it'll fit in one of these, but who know. I'll keep people updated.
 
Has anyone had luck using their iSpindle in a stainless conical? I worked up two of them and made it through testing /calibration with 7 strengths of sugar water with a 10 second refresh rate. Filled up my two half barrel brewtechs with the days brews, set them to a 30 minute refresh rate, and threw them in. From that point on, I've been unable to confirm any communication. My wireless AP is only about 15 feet away, through one wall and the fermenter wall. I know for certain that they were turned on, and the last readings I had showed 4.2+ volts when they were floating in sanitizer. Seems strange to me that they both died right after changing to 30 minute refresh rates and putting in the fermenter. The only thing I can assume is the stainless interfering but I've read several other people reporting no issues using them that way. Any thoughts?
 
Has anyone had luck using their iSpindle in a stainless conical? I worked up two of them and made it through testing /calibration with 7 strengths of sugar water with a 10 second refresh rate. Filled up my two half barrel brewtechs with the days brews, set them to a 30 minute refresh rate, and threw them in. From that point on, I've been unable to confirm any communication. My wireless AP is only about 15 feet away, through one wall and the fermenter wall. I know for certain that they were turned on, and the last readings I had showed 4.2+ volts when they were floating in sanitizer. Seems strange to me that they both died right after changing to 30 minute refresh rates and putting in the fermenter. The only thing I can assume is the stainless interfering but I've read several other people reporting no issues using them that way. Any thoughts?
This is from the iSpindel FAQ page
  • Can I operate it in a stainless steel container? Is it possible to get through the faradic cage? To achieve a sufficient WLAN signal strength you can do the following things:
    • Break open the faradic cage. This is possible by electrically separating the lid from the pot. Can be achieved by applying a silicone sealant between the two parts.
    • Use a passive antenna. Use a shielded cable that is stripped from both ends (i. e. Lambda/4), where one side ends in the pot, exactly 3.2mm. This is transmitted passively from the inside to the outside and vice versa. A good example can be found here: http://hobbybrauer.de/forum/viewtopic.php?p=208782#p208782
    • Install a wifi range extender next to the barrel to increase the signal level.
 
Ok in case anybody is a little confused about what parts do what and where to find them, I put together a nice little summary on my website. http://www.echrisdenney.com/2019/03/01/ispindel-project-post-2/

But now I see the "most-in-one" board that shoo found on Amazon and now I'm rethinking what to use...

Ahh well, you learn more with my bill of materials anyway.

I can now officially say: don't go with the all in one, at least not that particular model. Bought a third one (free after refund), and that one broke as well, even with me being ultra ultra careful with the port. A quick look reveals that the port is glued on, and whatever was used to do the gluing is totally junk. Shame, would have been a really convenient solution.

Update: I gave it one more go (hey, why not), and good news! A liberal application of hot glue on and around the port takes care of that problem pretty nicely. Port is rock solid. Game on!
 
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Quick update on the above: bought two of them, and the USB ports broke off both IMMEDIATELY. Seems others have also had this problem. Re-purchasing them, will epoxy them to reinforce the very weak soldering.

The USB broke off my Wemos D1 yesterday.. luckily there were through holes, they just didn't seem to be soldered. So I clipped the port in place and soldered it back in. I don't have a tip fine enough to solder the actual usb pins on it, but it seems to be making solid contact since it worked (was able to communicate with it in the Arduino serial monitor). I'll be soldering (re-soldering?) these ports on any future Wemos I mess with.
 
I never had problem with my USB but I do have wemos backups as they are cheap, for USB especially micro and C hot air is best probabably, depends how many pins are there.
 
I can now officially say: don't go with the all in one, at least not that particular model. Bought a third one (free after refund), and that one broke as well, even with me being ultra ultra careful with the port. A quick look reveals that the port is glued on, and whatever was used to do the gluing is totally junk. Shame, would have been a really convenient solution.

Update: I gave it one more go (hey, why not), and good news! A liberal application of hot glue on and around the port takes care of that problem pretty nicely. Port is rock solid. Game on!

Aaaaaaand we're back to bad news. The vials that I got aren't even close to waterproof. Lame.

At this point, I think I'm going to give up on the all-in-one idea, as the PCB version up on PCBway seems way easier to put together and I have other uses for the all-in-one breakout boards anyway.
 
Got mine all put together last weekend, and finally got it in a batch. I use brewersfriend for recipes/etc. and they also have an integration with tilt and ispindel. Pretty cool.
Some takeaways:
1. I did water & OG method of calibration, using the online formula calculator. I learned that it's a good idea to take the resultant polynomials and google their chart to make sure they make sense. I don't know why, but they don't automatically show up on that page like it seems that they do for some of you. Anyways, the 3rd order poly actually went negative before getting back to 1.00SG, which of course makes no sense. So I went with the 2nd order, which looks much more realistic.
2. I'm fermenting in a spike CF10 conical, about 20 feet away from my garage Wifi AP. No issues getting signal. I know some have asked this question (and I had the same ? myself before I tested it) - so happy to report it works fine. If you have issues, you could pick up a cheap router on craigslist and install dd-wrt and make a cheap repeater. I have one of those laying around as a backup, but looks like it's not necessary.
3. If you're using brewersfriend, remember to set the iSpindel formula gravity unit to Plato. I had it set to SG and had to remove and re configure my iSpindel after brewersfriend took my gravity measurement (1.05) and multiplied by 4 to get a gravity of 1.004 - doh.
 
I am using the iSpindel with my grade 10 science class as a STEM project.

Below is one that one of the group's built. They redesigned a sled so it fits the xxl petling properly.
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1554347052094.jpeg
 
Got mine all put together last weekend, and finally got it in a batch. I use brewersfriend for recipes/etc. and they also have an integration with tilt and ispindel. Pretty cool.
Some takeaways:
1. I did water & OG method of calibration, using the online formula calculator. I learned that it's a good idea to take the resultant polynomials and google their chart to make sure they make sense. I don't know why, but they don't automatically show up on that page like it seems that they do for some of you. Anyways, the 3rd order poly actually went negative before getting back to 1.00SG, which of course makes no sense. So I went with the 2nd order, which looks much more realistic.

3rd order polynomial makes sense only when at least 3 data sets are available.
 
Hi, for iSpindel there are two options:

With XXL Pet, you use a a 3D printed sled and a small PCB to add a Wemos D1 mini, it's a microcontroller with Wifi, a Tilt sensor MPU6050 and a battery charger TP4056
With XL Pet, same as the other but without sled and a bigger PCB to fit into that PET, last version of PCB is 4.0

This two different models are working well.

There is on internet a lot of sleds and some PCB's.
I've made mine with XXL, I do my own PCB versions and I'm trying Brewspy app, very nice to work with
Next step I will try XL model
 
I looked at the 4.0 version, and for some reason it's $19 instead of $5 for the 3.2.

I couldn't find a clear difference between them, so I went with the cheaper one.

I can't believe there aren't more people putting these together, it really seems like a great project.

Thanks for the suggestion about BrewSpy. I need to look into that. Currently using Fermentrack.
 
I looked at the 4.0 version, and for some reason it's $19 instead of $5 for the 3.2.

I couldn't find a clear difference between them, so I went with the cheaper one.

I can't believe there aren't more people putting these together, it really seems like a great project.

Thanks for the suggestion about BrewSpy. I need to look into that. Currently using Fermentrack.

Difference is because PCBWay has a special price for boards with less than 100x100 mm, and 3.2 version has 31 x 100 mm but has small TP4056 battery charger that has no protection for battery.
Revision 4 has 30.7 x 123.24 mm and has corrected TP4056 with 6 pin, that have battery protection and other good upgrades
 
Battery protection meaning physicall protected by the longer board, or electrically protected?
 
Electrically, TP4056 with 6 pins have a special IC for protecting battery electrically: DW01-P.

The DW01-P battery protection IC is designed to protect lithium-ion/polymer battery from damage or degrading the lifetime due to overcharge, overdischarge, and/or overcurrent for one-cell lithium-ion/polymer battery powered systems, such as cellular phones.

TP4056 with 4 pins, is smaller and doesn't have this IC. For protection I recommend TP4056 module with 6 pins
 
Seems I might be in trouble. I bought the 6 pin version of the TP4056, but the 3.2 PCB. Can I make it work, or should I order the 4.0? Also, the 4.0 is longer, does that mean it won't fit in the XL Petling?
 
No, I think it's shipped already, but if it's the wrong thing it's the wrong thing. I'll order again. Thanks for letting me know! I hate that I have to order 5 of them, but oh well.
 
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