I'm working on a project that uses a 12V LED strip along with a 12V water pump. I will be running the LED strip for about 12 hours a day (it will act as sunlight for plants). the Water pump will run twice a day for about 10 seconds or so. I would like to power the Arduino, the LED strip, and the pump with the same pack of 8 rechargeable batteries in series, but I don't really know how to do so.
What are the flaws with this approach? I understand that using the same battery pack would drain the battery much faster and I'm OK with that for now. My long term solution is to have multiple battery packs and switch between them when one is getting too low, but that will be tackled down the road.
I'm working on a project that uses a 12V LED strip along with a 12V water pump. I will be running the LED strip for about 12 hours a day (it will act as sunlight for plants). the Water pump will run twice a day for about 10 seconds or so. I would like to power the Arduino, the LED strip, and the pump with the same pack of 8 rechargeable batteries in series, but I don't really know how to do so.
That sounds a lot like something that is illegal (at least where I live). Are you allowed to tell us what kind of plants you're growing there?
Nevertheless, having the batteries in series adds the voltages, so if you have 12V batteries you get about 100V which already may kill you. Why don't you use a wall adapter? Did you make the calculation about how long the batteries will last? What power do the LEDs and the pump pull?
I'm working on a project that uses a 12V LED strip along with a 12V water pump. I will be running the LED strip for about 12 hours a day (it will act as sunlight for plants). the Water pump will run twice a day for about 10 seconds or so. I would like to power the Arduino, the LED strip, and the pump with the same pack of 8 rechargeable batteries in series, but I don't really know how to do so.
What are the flaws with this approach? I understand that using the same battery pack would drain the battery much faster and I'm OK with that for now. My long term solution is to have multiple battery packs and switch between them when one is getting too low, but that will be tackled down the road.
The big flaw is LEDs will never have the same wavelengths of light as the sun. For plants to utilize LED light, you need to have leds that emit the wavelengths that plants require.
I had a good laugh at your reply. I'm not trying to join the 420 industry. I'm trying to grow my own vegetable plants as well as decorative plants in a small 5' tall X 2.5' wide X 2' deep greenhouse that has 4 separate racks. This is the situation I'm trying to work for now, but my idea is to accommodate larger setups as well. To be more accurate I have 8 1.5V rechargeable batteries in series so it is 12V. My idea is to allow users to be able to choose a power source of their liking as long as it can plug into a female DC jack. I have not made any calculations on battery life. The water pump says Power: 4.8W and the LED strip says it is 5W. I'm new so if that is not what you're looking for please let me know.
Paul_KD7HB,
I agree with what you're saying. That will be a task for another day. I'm trying to take this one step at a time.
What I'm trying to figure out is how to connect the 12V power source to the Arduino, water pump, and LED strip. I'm using one MOSFET to control the water pump and another to control the LED strip. I'll post a diagram of my current setup either later tonight or tomorrow.
Thank's again. I'm a newbie and I cannot do this on my own. You're suggestions and advice are a great help to me. I appreciate your replies.
CanogaEngineerGuyDude:
What I'm trying to figure out is how to connect the 12V power source to the Arduino, water pump, and LED strip.
That's easy. Use wires. Just connect them all together.
The main issue I see here is that you want to run LEDs (I assume you'll have grow light type) for 12 hours on batteries. That's going to be a hello of a lot of batteries to run those LEDs - with that puny 5W LED strip, if that's grow light, you may grow a single lettuce. If you're lucky.
For good growing you need some 10-20W/ft2 worth of LEDs. For your warehouse, 4 racks of 2.5x2' requires 200-400W of LEDs.
Well, it's your project, of course. But I think you are getting the cart hooked to the wrong end of the horse. First determine the array of various LEDs needed to supply the wavelengths and intensity of light for your plants, then determine the power and control needed for the LEDs, and then the program to control the time needed for each wavelength to be on.
o be more accurate I have 8 1.5V rechargeable batteries in series so it is 12V.
Are we talking about standard AA batteries (rechargeable)?
Good types have about 2500mAh, so with 8 of them you get about 30Wh. That drives your LED strip 6 hours at most, given the pump is not active and the Arduino is sleeping during that time. I don't think that such batteries will work here.
I'm using one MOSFET to control the water pump and another to control the LED strip.
That should work although it depends a bit on the type of pump and LED strip you use.
I agree with Paul_KD7HB that standard LED strips will not work as the plants do not get enough light they can use.
Do you need the LEDs to continue growing during the night or are the thought to be the only light the plants will see? 5W for more than a square meter is not enough light even if you get LEDs with the perfect spectrum for plants.
Pumps, motors, solenoids, etc. inject electrical noise into the power wiring, which can destroy an Arduino.
It would be better to add a 7 to 8V buck regulator between the 12V supply and the Arduino Raw input, or use a 5V buck regulator and apply that to the Vcc Arduino power input.
My attempt of growing some plants in an area of about 1.5 ft2 with about 15W worth of "full spectrum" growing LED plus some daylight (including direct sunlight for maybe an hour a day) failed terribly... Don't know what I did wrong. Lights didn't look that bright to me, anyway, may have to double that.
That's why the 400W I said OP will need for that garden, so 400 Ah of 12V batteries for 12 hours of light (well, make that 500 Ah as you can't usually fully drain the batteries). That's several lead/acid batteries.