BrewPi - Fermentation control

[Online Brewing Supplies]

Any control or monitoring via the net is better than driving 1.5 hours to stick my finger in the wort.
I am looking for a system that will work sort of out of the box, then I can develop to suit my needs, if it has wifi and I can control from there via what ever then thats what I will do.
I need the temp control more than the monitoring but need both if that makes sense ?

 

[Mardoo]

Do the BCS products meet your "out-of-box" need?

http://www.embeddedcontrolconcepts.com/

 

[vykuza]

Being as I am not Tech nerd, I will ask :
I have need of being able to monitor two fermenters from a far (150 Km) via the net.
Can I set this system up so I can see whats happening temp wise by the net and can I set it up so I can ramp my cooling or heating via wifi ?
Of course I realise I need peripherals etc but if it can be done with this simple set up I am keen.
BTW I have two Rasp PIs sitting doing nix .
Nev

Absolutely Nev - you can just present the web server running on the Raspberry Pi to the internet (as opposed to your home network) as others have done to show off their setups. You might want to do it more securely, though a VPN if you're worried about it being tampered with. Or create a .htaccess file to password access to the page altogether.

 

[Online Brewing Supplies]

Do the BCS products meet your "out-of-box" need?

http://www.embeddedcontrolconcepts.com/

I looked at these but after they failed to respond to emails twice I gave up.

 

[brewinski]

Eventually the logging gets looked at less as time goes by. In my experience, and I am a total techno geek

Mostly the Pi becomes the tool to set the arduinos. So my advice is that they are great at temp control, don't get too concerned with the logging, unless you are totally forgetful about how you achieved the last brews temp control.

As was reported elsewhere, once the commands are sent to the arduino the Pi can be turned off, and the arduino will continue unabated.

 

[Online Brewing Supplies]

Temp logging is essential in my case as it is required for repeatability and possible fermentation fault finding.
Is the log in the form of text or can it be graphed and printed ?

 

[neo__04]

Adding in a few answers here where i can.

Yep the web side of the brewpi can be accessed from anywhere. Just put it behind a pasworded website and only you have control.
Pretty sure someone on this forum was doing that. Except they had it as viewing only. So no one can change it.

The graphing side of things, i havent tried to save myself, but it would be as simple as taking a screenshot of the website and saving the graph as a jpg. It shows quite clearly the beer temp, fridge temp etc. You could save the file as golden ale etc for your own reference.

If you follow the parts list on homebrewtalk it has everything you next, except the box and 240v plugs. Ebay would be cheap for them too i imagine.

The raspberry pi uses the same cable as a htc/samsung phone, so most ppl might have a charger lying around. I have my arduino powered by usb via the raspberry pi. So only one power supply needed.

Arduino uno can be had for $10-12, Rasbpi, i have the first version, cost me $28. Should be able to get a first version fairly cheap.

All the other parts from ebay china. You may have to wait but they will be very cheap.

Maybe i should do a little premade bulk project and make up the whole controller, with temp probes etc. Could be interesting

 

[Online Brewing Supplies]

Maybe i should do a little premade bulk project and make up the whole controller, with temp probes etc. Could be interesting

I am sure there would be a lot more users if you did.

 

[neo__04]

Hmm, i might do some costings over the weekend and see how cheap i could get it all done for.

I also made myself a 1/2" id stainless tube thermowell to suit the temp probes. Could make them up for the kit too.

Im away in bendigo for the weekend but ill do some costings sunday night and see how cheap i can make it

 

[Online Brewing Supplies]

Whats the probe Diameter, The Dallas I have are only 6mm without the heatshrink.

 

[gezzanet]

You can buy premade from brewpi. Elkoe is the guy who did all the code and build. Only 1 chamber at this stage on the premade.
The homebrewtalk thread has over 2000 posts now about how to do it on the cheap. Also covers Multi chamber hacks and remote viewing.

Easiest is to buy premade.
Next buy a pi (plus SD card, wifi dongle if not hardwired to LAN, power supply), usb cable to arduino, an arduino, 3 temp probes (2 If you're not interested in ambient) a 2 channel relay, a power supply, a project box to put it all in, a thermowell.
A little more difficult. No pi but load debian wheezy on an old pc and run it instead of the pi.
Cheap but can be very time consuming and frustrating but when it's running its fantastic.

 

[neo__04]

Temp probe diameter is probably around that 6mm mark.

I just had some 1/2" stainless tube lying around, thats why i used it.
Could easily be made with smaller tube

 

[brewinski]

If you are Unix savvy, the csv of each graph/data is saved in the brewpi folder structure

Drag that into excel (or open office on Linux) and graph your heart out

I'm not sure, but you can likely reload older brews in the brewpi web interface. To look at what happened.Citation needed

And of course you can deffo reload settings and re run temp profiles that worked well.

 

[Online Brewing Supplies]

Unix unsavy but nice to know where they are.
Nev

 

[gezzanet]

You can download the current brew and your past brews in csv format from the web interface

 

[mudd]

Think I need to get mine together. Should be pitching a new batch next week

 

[Online Brewing Supplies]

I am going to order my relays soon so I will ask the questions now
If I want to have the option of switching on a pump and either heat or cool the ferment depending on the ambient temp how many relays do I need , remember I need this option on two fermenters.
I am thinking that if I have the pump and cool on one thats covered and if I heat it just another similar loop . Not quite sure how it needs to be wired but thats not important now.
Nev

 

[neo__04]

I won't say how many relays you might need, but I'll just say I used a 8 relay board for my setup as its all I had. It was like $2 on ebay

 

[zeggie]

You can buy premade from brewpi.

I've looked on the website and can only see combos of parts required. Is it possible to buy a premade/preassembled brewpi? I don't like messing with electricity...

 

[vykuza]

I am going to order my relays soon so I will ask the questions now
If I want to have the option of switching on a pump and either heat or cool the ferment depending on the ambient temp how many relays do I need , remember I need this option on two fermenters.
I am thinking that if I have the pump and cool on one thats covered and if I heat it just another similar loop . Not quite sure how it needs to be wired but thats not important now.
Nev

You can use four SSRs for two fermenters (heat and cool for each). If you only want to run the pump when cooling, then I would just wire it inline with your cooling relay. Just stay under your power draw limits and don't skimp on the SSRs.

Out of the box the BrewPi kit supports four SSRs. I think you can add another arduino to the kit to get more, but you're going to have to bust out your soldering iron. I'd probably just buy another kit and run them separately.