Greetings and General Guidance Request

B

BlakeD

New member
Hello from Oklahoma!

I got out of fishkeeping around 15yrs ago.  My wife and I recently decided to dip our toes back into this, and being an IT guy, I naturally wanted to blend my interests and make some aspects of my life easier.  Hence, I found this community / product.  However, I'm wanting to simplify this too... So, I wanted to ask for guidance on what I need to look at buying from Robotank to suit my application.

I'll be keeping a FW planted tank, 17g, with the following equipment:
Canister filter
In-line Heater
Pressurized Co2 System w/ Solenoid
Chihiros WRGB II Pro 60cm light

I'd like to also add a TDS sensor/probe and maybe (not immediately I don't think) dosing pumps to automate fertilizing.

Someone want to make an overworked IT guy happy and just tell me what kit/parts I need to pick up?
 
Hi Blake, thanks for dropping in and welcome back. :)

It looks like you could get away with the basic controller and an AC power bar, I assume you don't have any 12v DC equipment? If you do add dosing pumps you would need the equipment extension as that has 6 DC ports for small DC devices such as those.

The light wouldn't be compatible, you could only turn it on/off via an AC outlet. Not many lights are external controller friendly.

TDS is possible but it's expensive and would need to mess with some code. The Atlas conductivity circuit puts out a TDS value so I think it should work.

https://atlas-scientific.com/kits/conductivity-k-1-0-kit/

With this you're getting close to $500 when all said and done unless you already have a Raspberry Pi, microSD card, power supply and some other cables.
 
Thank you very much, Rob.  Basic controller + AC Bar is what I though I'd need, but since I'm still learning, the confirmation is greatly appreciated.

As for the light, what are compatible solutions?  I assume full DIY is, but anything commercial?

Coding and cost don't worry me.  Especially if I'm just monitoring it.  I already have a grafana stack running in a esxi vm environment in the house.
 
Oh Blake I'm so sorry for taking so long to reply again!

DIY light is definitely an option and commercial can be a challenge. The older Kessil A160WE has a 0-10v input, unfortunately they've removed that from their new lights.

https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/kess...D=4102&indexName=brs_prod_m2_default_products

There's also this generic one on Amazon, the 50w or greater version has an input.

https://www.amazon.com/NICREW-Aquar...7b0b350e76575&language=en_US&ref_=as_li_ss_tl

With these you would need the equipment extension for the controller as it has the 0-10v circuit, these would be plug and play using a 3.5mm TRS cable.

With your experience sounds like you might like reef-pi, it can do a lot but some of it's for advanced users.
 
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