I currently run two Watec 902 analogue CCTV cameras and associated CCTV cabinet heater and fans for capturing videos of meteors. Each camera and heater is turned on every evening and and off in the morning with plug-in mains timers, which are an absolute pig to adjust. As the computers that run the capture software are on 24/7, it would much more convenient for me to have a simple piece of Windows 7 compatible software that controlled relays to turn the cameras on and off at user-defined times each day. As the year progresses, I could very simply change the on and off times from the computer (Using light sensors to turn the cameras on and off is not practical in my situation).
In my ignorance, I thought that this sounds like a relatively simple piece of software and that there must be loads of cheap USB relay boards with associated Windows timer control software packages out there. I have spent hours and hours searching the web and I can't find anything that will do what I want for less than around £80.
Are there any Ardunio-based Windows projects that will allow me to simply wire an Ardunio to a cheap relay and turn the relay on an off at user-defined times (using the PC's clock) with the whole thing controlled through a relatively idiot-proof Windows 7 compatible application?
Important note : I have NO programming skills! I use aRobert Brown's superb Ardunio-based system and associated Windows software and ASCOM drivers for focusing the telescopes in my observatory.
However, the only programming skills needed for this project was learning how to upload the firmware to the Ardunio. This is about the limit of my programming capability
Do you actually need to adjust the times manually or would it be enough if the system could calculate dawn and dusk times daily and trigger off that?
If so, the system could be standalone but it would still need to be coded. It's a similar requirement to controlling a chicken coop though, which comes up here from time to time. Try searching the forums - IIRC a user called Southernatheart (?) was trying to build one a while back. You might be able to find something that could be hacked into what you need.
wildbill:
Do you actually need to adjust the times manually or would it be enough if the system could calculate dawn and dusk times daily and trigger off that?
I am part of a national network amateur meteor cameras which has associations with many international partner groups of amateurs.
Having an astronomical timer function would be great, but simple manually-adjusting the on/off times in a windows interface would be less complicated to use and set up.
Of course, the ideal set up would be an astronomical clock function within the Windows software so that the user could input their longitude and latitude and their desired delays before and after sunset/sunrise for operating the relays for the camera and cabinet heater. This is all rather complicated, which is why a simple Windows-based timer control would be so much easier.
michaelmorris:
I am part of a national network amateur meteor cameras which has associations with many international partner groups of amateurs.
What you're looking for isn't particularly hard to do. Most of the pain would likely be testing it against different windows machines and ensuring that you can find/configure the appropriate serial port that the Arduino is on. I'd suggest that you use your network to find some people (students or schoolchildren most likely) to take on the project for kudos/beer money/ extra credit. There must be a computer science teacher in the UK who would be interested in having a real world project for their students.
Another thought - if there's ethernet or wifi available you could do the astronomical version standalone with a raspberry pi and a relay with a fairly simple program. You could provide a config file to tell it where it is (or it could deduce it from it's router's IP address) and the on/off offset times needed. It would keep it's clock synced over the network.Then drive a relay board as required.
I have such a thing controlling a light for my Dad's hydroponics setup although it just turns on and off at hard coded times of day.
I assume though that adding another technology to the mix is probably not what you had in mind.
Thanks. I've tried these relays. They certainly fit the bill of being cheap, but the only pre-written software I can find is the simple on/off the test program you gave a link to.
You could use the windows scheduler to invoke it at your required on & off times. Come to that, you can almost certainly find a freeware program with a gui that will let you call other programs at particular times. Much easier to find than the turnkey solution you were looking for.