09-09-2020, 11:24 PM
Hey Randy, yeah I'm robsworld78 and Ranjib is the developer of reef-pi and that is one long thread.
You can get away with no soldering, there are no components or circuits to build as the controller has what reef-pi supports. Lights can be the most difficult to connect as a lot don't have an input for external controllers and the ones that do get expensive. If you go through the 3 pages on this BulkReef search you can some that will work without too much difficulty as they have a jack you can plug into.
https://aquarium.bulkreefsupply.com/reefing/0--10v
There isn't any coding as such but you do need to have an understanding of the connectors feature in reef-pi or it can get confusing. Basically connectors allow you to define if a port is a specific type of input or output, it gives the software a lot of flexibility but can make things confusing until understood. Many have had to reformat card and start fresh as things get too messed up so there is that learning curve. When you install reef-pi using the script I made it will copy a database that I already setup as I see fit for most users so to begin you don't need to setup the connectors as this will be done but at some point you may want a port to do something different and connector would need changed. Here's a link to the section in the manual that goes over them.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uFP4...=h.44sinio
Here's the manual to setup the Raspberry Pi.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1t9ma...o3woZ/edit
After connectors are defined you then just define what ports on controller you want to use and give them a custom name. I did say there was no programming but timers are unix based and call cron jobs so they are defined a little different. Here's how they work.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uFP4...=h.2p2csry
The last manual is the main manual for reef-pi and as you can see its quite long so it's definitely not the easiest to use.
For hardware I've tried to make things as plug and play as possible but there will usually be a time when you need to mess with wires or do a little soldering. The kit includes a sensor extension that comes set default for optical sensors, this eliminates the need to cut any wires and you can extend up to 50' using standard USB cables but if you wanted to plug in a non-contact sensor (they use same connector but wired different) you need to either cut a few solder pads on the extension board and solder some jumpers or cut the connector off the sensor and manually extend and use a port on controller that doesn't require soldering jumpers. So it's always one or the other. If you know ahead of time what sensors you need I can set the controller to match.
It won't be as easy to use as an Apex as they have all kinds of modules and cables to match factory equipment.
Sadly summer is over here too, this week has been good but won't be long till I dread starting the car, days are getting short quick.
You can get away with no soldering, there are no components or circuits to build as the controller has what reef-pi supports. Lights can be the most difficult to connect as a lot don't have an input for external controllers and the ones that do get expensive. If you go through the 3 pages on this BulkReef search you can some that will work without too much difficulty as they have a jack you can plug into.
https://aquarium.bulkreefsupply.com/reefing/0--10v
There isn't any coding as such but you do need to have an understanding of the connectors feature in reef-pi or it can get confusing. Basically connectors allow you to define if a port is a specific type of input or output, it gives the software a lot of flexibility but can make things confusing until understood. Many have had to reformat card and start fresh as things get too messed up so there is that learning curve. When you install reef-pi using the script I made it will copy a database that I already setup as I see fit for most users so to begin you don't need to setup the connectors as this will be done but at some point you may want a port to do something different and connector would need changed. Here's a link to the section in the manual that goes over them.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uFP4...=h.44sinio
Here's the manual to setup the Raspberry Pi.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1t9ma...o3woZ/edit
After connectors are defined you then just define what ports on controller you want to use and give them a custom name. I did say there was no programming but timers are unix based and call cron jobs so they are defined a little different. Here's how they work.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uFP4...=h.2p2csry
The last manual is the main manual for reef-pi and as you can see its quite long so it's definitely not the easiest to use.
For hardware I've tried to make things as plug and play as possible but there will usually be a time when you need to mess with wires or do a little soldering. The kit includes a sensor extension that comes set default for optical sensors, this eliminates the need to cut any wires and you can extend up to 50' using standard USB cables but if you wanted to plug in a non-contact sensor (they use same connector but wired different) you need to either cut a few solder pads on the extension board and solder some jumpers or cut the connector off the sensor and manually extend and use a port on controller that doesn't require soldering jumpers. So it's always one or the other. If you know ahead of time what sensors you need I can set the controller to match.
It won't be as easy to use as an Apex as they have all kinds of modules and cables to match factory equipment.
Sadly summer is over here too, this week has been good but won't be long till I dread starting the car, days are getting short quick.
