Test run with my home made Brew controller

[Tytonegro]

Hi there,

Some time ago I posted on my plan to make a brew controller for a single pot RIMS setup.

That post lives here:

http://aussiehomebrewer.com/topic/80257-single-pot-small-automated-brewing-system-design/

My prototype is coming together and recently I did a test run. I made a 10 liter batch of beer with a multi-step mashing scheme. At this stage my controller is basically a temperature controller (PID controller) with pump control, but the final version will be programmable so you can use it/adapt it for various recipes or applications.
The total outline of the controller is now being converted from paper to a C-program for the controller. The hardware works fine and so far everything looks good I think.

Have a look for yourself on my blog or on YouTube where I posted a 16 minute video on this test brew.
If you don't have time to watch that, my blog summarizes it mostly.


My blog lives here: http://www.merlinmakes.cato-projects.org/?x=entry:entry140912-140325

And my video report on YouTube :

Curious to hear you comments/ideas.


Cheers,

Tomas

 

[lael]

That is really cool! Have you seen the Brauduino? Similar sort of idea, with timing etc already coded. Source code is available if it helps. What controller are you using?

Those capacative buttons are niiice. How do you do them?

 

[Tytonegro]

Yes I have heard of the Brauduino, but I find it difficult to find complete info on it.
The original was from an Italian guy ( savio thecnic?), but also I come across a name Steve Mathos? Also related is ArdBir another open source project.
If you can point me to a website/forum/place where info is collected for those projects, that would be welcomed... I found various dead links... ;-(


Apart from that, when you use an Arduino board, you still need to have other boards for power control, display, user, interface and the like. That is why I started all over and developed my own board for a Microchip PIC processor which I program in C.

The capacitive touch buttons are a standard feature of the processor (AVR have something similar) and they work through the 2-3 mm plastic cover as you can see.

After doing some other projects, I learned that good thinking ahead is the way to go. I wanted as much as possible integrated on one board, to lower production and assemble costs (and for me personally the hassle of mounting it). Making a good looking front panel is another thing. That is how I came to this design, which combines these factors. I'm quite happy with it so far.

I'm still thinking how to continue, making it open source, selling kits or complete controllers.... who knows.


You are brewing electric lael? What is your set up?

 

[Edak]

What you will find is that matho was first in the game. I also developed my own system at the same time but matho made his code and schematic public and I didn't, primarily because mine was so custom with wireless diagnostics and had a different size screen. Ardbir came in afterwards and I believe it was based on mathos code, but added a lot of other features for different size screens, multi languages, etc. A few of us also designed hardware and software revisions to help others out and before we knew it every one was in the game! Lael is a big help for everyone as he has the motivation to keep things ticking along, which is nice to see.

I really like your system though, love the capacitive touch interface, the black PCB and simple looking design. Will have to have another look to see if I can find the SSR.

Edit: do you still have fleas?

 

[Tytonegro]

<snip>
I really like your system though, love the capacitive touch interface, the black PCB and simple looking design. Will have to have another look to see if I can find the SSR.

Edit: do you still have fleas?

The SSR in my system? No such thing, at least not a bought one, I made one with a triac, opto-coupler and the PIC detects zero-crossing.

PS No all fleas are gone. Fantastic trap, that's for sure ;-)

 

[pbezza]

Found compatible arduino capacitive touch here http://www.pjrc.com/teensy/td_libs_CapacitiveSensor.html

 

[Tytonegro]

Found compatible arduino capacitive touch here http://www.pjrc.com/teensy/td_libs_CapacitiveSensor.html

Capacitive touch switches are nothing special nowadays. A lot of PIC, AVR and other processors have standard interfaces for it on-board.
The datasheets will tells you all about it.
When selecting a device on the manufacturers site you can usually indicate how many of these channels you want to have, ranging from 0 to twenty something or more...
And if a processor doesn't have it as a standard option, you can make it easily when the processor has a comparator and features like capture & compare and timers to count pulses.

 

[pbezza]

Okay, I wonder why I haven't seen anyone incorporate it into their Mathos or similar mash arduino controllers at this stage if it is so easy to implement. They would be super cheap to implement compared to spending $10 or more on momentary buttons. I've read about people using plain/coloured drawing pins as capacitive touch buttons and they are really cheap.

 

[Tytonegro]

Okay, I wonder why I haven't seen anyone incorporate it into their Mathos or similar mash arduino controllers at this stage if it is so easy to implement. They would be super cheap to implement compared to spending $10 or more on momentary buttons. I've read about people using plain/coloured drawing pins as capacitive touch buttons and they are really cheap.

I don't know the AVR processors that well. But you are absolutely right. Why spend good money on pushbuttons, when you can have the added advantage of having a 'kitchen'proof solution cheap.And also save on making an expensive front panel. 1 + 1 = 3 for me here!