Reef nutrition

Reef Demon

Have you looked at Roberto's awesome Reef Angel controller and thought "Man that's just not complicated enough" or "Gee I wish the firmware were written in C instead of arduino sketches?" You have? Really? I thought I was the only one crazy like that.

Roberto was kind enough to provide me some boards before the cases were ready and I've been implementing my own software for it. It's coming along nicely and I'm talking to most of the hardware except the PH probe and the external flash. The only reef controller functionality it has at the moment is some hard coded hysteresis based temperature control.

I'm posting all my source code at: http://github.com/konkers/reefdemon

If you're still reading, come along for the ride on this hair brained journey of mine.
 
Woops I would watch out using that name, Reef Devil is a trademark of ETSS.

Other then that it's cool to see other software written. I can't wait to try them both out (When mine arrives).
 
:) It's doubtful they'd even notice but just in case it was a good idea to change it :)
 
And what's a new project without a logo:

reefdemon.png
 
Simple and elegant, I like it :) Now make a 468x60 pixel banner :)
 
Quick update. The software is fleshing out into something resembling a reef controller. I have it controlling the temperature in my test "tank" (a bucket of water with a heater and a pump.) I can control the temperature to ~ 0.13 degrees C (~0.24 F.) With moving the control to a PID algorithm, I should be able to get that much tighter.

Here a snapshot of the screen. The blue background of the graph is solid in person but had interference on my phone's camera.
 
Very nice. What other features do you plan on "building" (coding) in?
 
GreshamH said:
Very nice. What other features do you plan on "building" (coding) in?

I'm still mulling what model I want to use for programmability. The big question in my mind is if I want to make it programmable w/o the usb cable.

I'll have support for the usual things like heater control, timers (for things like lights, dosers, etc), ato top off.

One of my pet peeves with the Apex is how hard it is to express complex behaviors. Getting something like an auto water change which does the following requires creative use of "virtual outlets"
  • disable ATO
  • turn drain pump on
  • wait until sump low float switch closes
    turn drain pump off, turn saltwater pump on
    wait until sump full float switch closes
    turn saltwater pump off, enable ATO

My plan is to set up a nano tank for my office so I can get a feeling for how this will all get used.

Well.. now I'm rambling. I guess the real answer is: I don't exactly know until it's running a real tank. I'm more than open to feature requests.
 
Cerissa said:
Wow...Nice! So when are we going to have the first unit for sale? :bigsmile:

You can go order one from Roberto right now at http://www.reefangel.com/order.html . I know he's waiting a few more components to arrive before being ready to ship them out.

I think it will be several weeks before I have anything that's alpha testable. Once I'm ready, I'd love to have people try it out. Though, dropping $180 just to alpha test something is not for the feint of heart.
 
http://reefbuilders.com/2010/04/15/reef-demon-open-source-addon-reef-angel-aquarium-controller/
 
I hope the clock at 3 something wasn't am!!
Good press.
I've wanted to start a post called "angels and demons" just for kicks!
See the both of you at BAYMAC and we can talk controllers I've been grinding in my garage late at night too and we can catch up and bounce some ideas off each other...
 
houser said:
I hope the clock at 3 something wasn't am!!

Well... one of the many features I haven't done is setting the clock ;)

houser said:
Good press.
I've wanted to start a post called "angels and demons" just for kicks!
See the both of you at BAYMAC and we can talk controllers I've been grinding in my garage late at night too and we can catch up and bounce some ideas off each other...

Does BAYMAC have BOFs? Maybe we should do a DIY controller BOF.
 
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