Arduarium - The Arduino Aquarium Controller

Forum 2005-2010 (read only) Hardware Development
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Pretty much the only thing I thought of once I started with the arduino was automating my aquarium. There's a thread here with somebody did one up too, but it wasn't enough for me.

May I present the Arduarium... the open aquarium controller.

Features:

4 BNC inputs for PH,ORP,Calcium, Nitrates (MCP3208, MCP3304 in the future)
4 12bit inputs pinned out (salinity mostly, but I haven't gotten a method for it yet)
3 PWM pins for lighting control
2 digital pins (fans for LEDs, but are multi-purpose)
Support for Ethernet Shield (just plug it in on top)
Support for ladyada's Xbee shield (plugs right in. The 10 pin one which is pretty cheap)
DS1307 RTC
32Kb EEPROM
8 digital outs for SSR control
6 DS18B20 temp sensor inputs
8 I2C ports (1 used by lcd/keypad)
4 Arduino analogue ins (probably for float sensors)
Alarm (can be added easily)

I've just finished breadboarding everything together and except for 1 mistake in my schematic (not reading the datasheet) everything plays nicely.

All of the I2C devices that have jumpers for addresses have them pinned out just in case.

One of the cool things with the xbee module is I added in the circuit from ladyada so that it's possible to wirelessly program the arduino.

I have a couple more tests to run and than it's getting sent to fab.

I'm working on the code right now and it's going to be pretty cool. It will have config options to enable disable stuff, find which ports things are on etc. etc. Basically a very expensive controller that you can modify any way you want.

Right now it's looking like parts are about $45 and boards are ~$40.

If you guys think I missed anything or would like to see something added please let me know because I want to get this out to fab so I can have a new toy to play with.

For now the project page is going to live here:

http://www.diy-labs.com/projects/arduarium-controller

Questions and comments are welcome. I'll be releasing eagle files shortly (after I do some more tests).

Another note: All of the smoothing is going to be done in software. There's room enough for the code. I've seen the phduino which uses an additional stage for filtering, but adding that in on 4 inputs blows the board up huge making it a lot more expensive. All that happens for inputs is a 10X gain which gets sent to the ADC. We don't worry about what it should output, but rather take 100 measurements each of 2 solutions and store those values. Take the current measurement 10 times, average it, and than use our stored values to calculate the current value. It saves quite a bit of money for board parts and it will be pretty accurate.

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This is a very interesting project. I went to your link and looked at the video.

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Yeah, it changed again after the post was made. It's 4 shields so you can pick and choose what functionality you want.

Schematics and pcb board layouts are going up as soon as I get the boards back. Want to make sure they work first lol.

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Just figured I'd give an update. I've had the boards in and hooked up for a couple weeks and it works great.

Currently 4 shields make up the controller. They're all made by me although I borrowed some of the circuit from the phduino to make the phorpduino shield.

PH/ORPDuino - http://www.diy-labs.com/projects/arduino-phorpduino-shield

I2C Port Expander - http://www.diy-labs.com/projects/arduino-port-expander-shield

I2C/SPI/Onewire - http://www.diy-labs.com/projects/arduino-i2c-spi-onewire-shield

RTC/EEPROM -http://www.diy-labs.com/rtc/arduino-rtc-eeprom-shield

Project page: http://www.diy-labs.com/projects/arduarium-controller

This page includes links to the boards and the current code. Thanks to the guys who have been helping test it.

I've put up schematics (eagle) with the pcb layouts. If anybody has suggestions please feel free to let me know (they're on the board pages at the bottom).

I've also got ~5 extra sets of boards since a couple people that were interested pulled out. Anyone interested please pm me.

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Hi, are you thinking of adding Ethernet to this?

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As soon as I get an ethernet shield I'm going to add support for this.

I don't know if you've seen the tankedcam (http://twitter.com/tankedcam), but the idea would be to integrate it with a variety of services.

When I get a chance to figure out android programming there's going to be an app that lets me control it from online.

Now if I could just find the time...

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Very Nice work in deed

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@danm - thanks... glad you like it.

@squartochi - I've thought about it and I'm going to be using a wifi shield. Even though I could run a cable to the tank, many people won't be able to and I like the idea of having it wireless.

Got some extra money so I'm going to be ordering the shield and adding it in to the code.

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Nice project. I've been thinking about creating something like this to automate my pool water management; I think this will translate quite nicely.

Do you have a good source for PH, and ORP Sensors? The ones I've found via Google seem to be sold as part of a complete package and quite expensive.

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It took me awhile to find some cheap ones as well. These are the ones I'm using at the moment.

http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/store/products/monitors-controllers/brs-ph-and-orp-probes

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Thanks for the info, and awesome find on the probes. You might want to link to them off of your website, as it makes the project more "entice able" (initially I was scared of sine I thought the probes were going to cost over $100 each).

Do you have any extras kits around? I'm very interested for my pool controller project. (When I click to 'kit link' on the website it gives a not registered error.)

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Hi Mate,

Awesome project, i recently had a Profilux P3, which had a lot of the above functions.

Are you going to add dimmable ballast and lighting management??

Great project

Scott