BrewPiLess. BrewPi on a single Wifi board.

[Mattrox]

I have been following the thread on HBT and built up this.

It allows the precise temperature control of the BrewPi without the need to set up a raspberry pi/PC.

You still get PID control which is accessible from your computer/phone connected to your wifi network.

I'll post more when I get onto my computer tonight at half-time.

Go Crows.

 

[Mattrox]

Here is a link to read and some pics of the web interface.

http://vito.tw/brewpiless/

 

[Mattrox]

Required Hardware:

1x ESP8226 Wifi board (D1 mini is popular, I used the D1)
1x Two way Relay Board
2x DS18B20 sensors (I used 3 to monitor the room temperature as well)
1x 4.7K resistor. (Resistor is between the + and data line of the DS18B20 Temp Probe)
1x Power supply to ESP8266. (I use an old samsung phone charger)

Optional
20×4 I2C LCD
[KY-040 Rotary Encoder module

I plan to add these later.

 

[kaiserben]

Good stuff.

Am I right in thinking that software on your computer/phone is what tells the relays when to switch? (so you'd need to keep a PC on, or keep a switched-on phone within wifi range?)

 

[malt junkie]

Good stuff.

Am I right in thinking that software on your computer/phone is what tells the relays when to switch? (so you'd need to keep a PC on, or keep a switched-on phone within wifi range?)

The control of relays is on the board, as is the web server, your computer/phone is for observation/setup of fermentation. Your phone/computer only needs a browser, you could quite literally change ferment temp from anywhere in the world if you wanted to.

 

[Mattrox]

Good stuff.

Am I right in thinking that software on your computer/phone is what tells the relays when to switch? (so you'd need to keep a PC on, or keep a switched-on phone within wifi range?)

In this version the whole thing is on the wifi board. No need to have a computer running for the controller to work. The computer/phone is used to control the user interface. These web pages are stored on the wifi board too, it controls everything.

 

[kaiserben]

Ah, so the D1 does all the processing as well as the wifi stuff? For $6.95 that's pretty good.

I currently use my own thing using a RPi operating in the same way yours does. And I have the parts to build another with a Pi Zero.

EDIT: continued ... but this is even cheaper and looks like it can do all the same cool stuff.

 

[Mattrox]

Ah, so the D1 does all the processing as well as the wifi stuff? For $6.95 that's pretty good.

I currently use my own thing using a RPi operating in the same way yours does. And I have the parts to build another with a Pi Zero.

EDIT: continued ... but this is even cheaper and looks like it can do all the same cool stuff.

The sacrifice of not having the computer/rPi is the nice graphs and web accessibility. But it does have the precise control. Data is logged by pushing it to an external service. I have not looked at this yet.

I'm toying with this as a way of running multiple brewpi setups without setting up multiple instances.

Plus it has been a good learning exercise.

 

[Mattrox]

Oh, I should add that the LCD screen option has not been debugged as far as I know.

But as a black box with the web interface it works.

In the next week or 2 I'll box it up and test it out to actually heat and cool.

 

[fdsaasdf]

So I grabbed a cheap d1 mini board and loaded this up. Very easy to deploy. I now just need to map the pins from the example board to my d1 mini, and then try and remember how to solder neatly...

Has anyone else been playing with this?

I would like the brewpiless to log to something on the local network, I have a server running 24/7 but not sure of the easiest way to set this up.

 

[malt junkie]

In this version the whole thing is on the wifi board. No need to have a computer running for the controller to work. The computer/phone is used to control the user interface. These web pages are stored on the wifi board too, it controls everything.

actually the original BrewPi ran with or without server you just needed to muck about with a rotary encoder.

 

[fdsaasdf]

actually the original BrewPi ran with or without server you just needed to muck about with a rotary encoder.

sorry, but the original BrewPi ran on a Pi, which is a single-board computer with significantly more computing power than an arduino board

 

[malt junkie]

sorry, but the original BrewPi ran on a Pi, which is a single-board computer with significantly more computing power than an arduino board

Maybe you should go read the Brewpi boards, the arduino did all the switching and could run without the Raspberry.

 

[terragady]

How is the temp control made here? Is it PWM or just ON/OFF? Can it control a power of cooler and heater or just 1/0 signal?

 

[malt junkie]

Fermenting doesn't need fancy PWM, especially when your cooling most of the time. Your going to say well Poland is ******* cold. So are American winters!! Brew in an old fridge with a reptile heater (30-40w). Once fermentation kicks off the yeast produce a little heat of their own.

The above controller uses beer temp and chamber temp to predict (with an algorithm) when heating or cooling is required, accurate (so they tell me) to 0.1°c.

 

[terragady]

OK got it well actually I am in Norway now for years and it suppose to be even colder than Poland but it isn't!! We do not even have much snow, only yesterday it covered a little with white dust. I hope it's coming!!

 

[mr_wibble]

How is the temp control made here? Is it PWM or just ON/OFF? Can it control a power of cooler and heater or just 1/0 signal?

Well PWM is just on/off too, just really fast.

 

[malt junkie]

Well PWM is just on/off too, just really fast.

you can try that with your fridge compressor first!! :blink:

 

[Moad]

This is awesome, cheap and compact control. Thanks for the heads up

 

[malt junkie]

This is awesome, cheap and compact control. Thanks for the heads up

I have some shields in the post. Might end up with a spare. Then again with my soldering skills I may need to order more. Will post when I have one operational.