OK. Building has started. And is going well for the most part. Below are some of the good and the bad - MOST of the bad are of my own doing. The Robo-Tank stuff is great. Good, clear instructions (if you follow them 
)
Started off building the controller board. Good thing I bought 2 controllers (second one is for someone else). I failed on the second step by soldering the 40pin header to the wrong side of the board. Then I discovered that my old and very cheap solder-sucker must have got married since I last used it - not sucking anymore, so I couldn't de-solder it until I got a replacement. So I built the second controller in the meantime. I'm happy to report that has gone very well and I have that built and installed in the case with it's new Pi4 4Gb (with reference to a previous post, I was going to go with the 2GB model, but nobody had stock, so I got the 4GB model). I also had to buy a new 40pin header so that arrived at the same time.
Having done quite a bit of design and 3D printing of parts like cases and other parts that interface with ready-made items, I know the challenges associated with clearances and making them fit together properly. I must say, using the Robo-Tank cases with the Robo-Tank boards and the Pi everything has fitted together very well. Just minor clean-up of the 3D printed parts required. Heat gun and fingernail.
Power Bars - Here's where my next problem came in. My print for the case failed at like 90% complete due to a power failure. Part of Nationwide rolling blackouts or "Load Shedding" as they call it here. I should have made sure the printer was running on the UPS, but I didn't. I really didn't want to throw away 12+ hours of 3D printing, so I redesigned the lid to accomodate the shorter case while retaining the original overall dimensions of the case. I may reprint a new one later for the sake of conformity. I had a question for Rob about the Power Bar assembly which he responded to pretty much immediately and had a revised version of the assembly manual available within about a day. However in the meantime, my haste had me make a silly mistake - I didn't insert the "plate" in the case before soldering the board to the outlets. I think this is the main reason I will change my redesigned case to Robs original design and address both issues at the same time.
So now I have built 2 x Controllers and 2 x Power Bars. The process is pretty painless as instructions are really clear.
So now I'm spending some quality time with Excel generating a spreadsheet listing all the ports and how I plan to allocate stuff.
For the most part, it's pretty basic with the setup being similar, if not the same to what I currently have. Main differences being stuff I had to create from scratch is now plug and play - like the backup floats on the ATO and AWC pumps.
I want to have a dual optical sensor and high level float backup on my ATO like Rob uses on the Robo-Tank stand alone ATO - elegant and safe solution.
Next thing to get my head around is setting up my 3-head dosing pump. I'm currently running it on it's own PCA9685 fed by pins on the HAT and set up as Jacks and Dosing Control in Reef-Pi. Still getting my head around the best way to handle that - but there will be a way.
)Started off building the controller board. Good thing I bought 2 controllers (second one is for someone else). I failed on the second step by soldering the 40pin header to the wrong side of the board. Then I discovered that my old and very cheap solder-sucker must have got married since I last used it - not sucking anymore, so I couldn't de-solder it until I got a replacement. So I built the second controller in the meantime. I'm happy to report that has gone very well and I have that built and installed in the case with it's new Pi4 4Gb (with reference to a previous post, I was going to go with the 2GB model, but nobody had stock, so I got the 4GB model). I also had to buy a new 40pin header so that arrived at the same time.
Having done quite a bit of design and 3D printing of parts like cases and other parts that interface with ready-made items, I know the challenges associated with clearances and making them fit together properly. I must say, using the Robo-Tank cases with the Robo-Tank boards and the Pi everything has fitted together very well. Just minor clean-up of the 3D printed parts required. Heat gun and fingernail.
Power Bars - Here's where my next problem came in. My print for the case failed at like 90% complete due to a power failure. Part of Nationwide rolling blackouts or "Load Shedding" as they call it here. I should have made sure the printer was running on the UPS, but I didn't. I really didn't want to throw away 12+ hours of 3D printing, so I redesigned the lid to accomodate the shorter case while retaining the original overall dimensions of the case. I may reprint a new one later for the sake of conformity. I had a question for Rob about the Power Bar assembly which he responded to pretty much immediately and had a revised version of the assembly manual available within about a day. However in the meantime, my haste had me make a silly mistake - I didn't insert the "plate" in the case before soldering the board to the outlets. I think this is the main reason I will change my redesigned case to Robs original design and address both issues at the same time.
So now I have built 2 x Controllers and 2 x Power Bars. The process is pretty painless as instructions are really clear.
So now I'm spending some quality time with Excel generating a spreadsheet listing all the ports and how I plan to allocate stuff.
For the most part, it's pretty basic with the setup being similar, if not the same to what I currently have. Main differences being stuff I had to create from scratch is now plug and play - like the backup floats on the ATO and AWC pumps.
I want to have a dual optical sensor and high level float backup on my ATO like Rob uses on the Robo-Tank stand alone ATO - elegant and safe solution.
Next thing to get my head around is setting up my 3-head dosing pump. I'm currently running it on it's own PCA9685 fed by pins on the HAT and set up as Jacks and Dosing Control in Reef-Pi. Still getting my head around the best way to handle that - but there will be a way.
Des
Durban - South Africa
Durban - South Africa
