I'm back

Sorry everyone for the my long absence, after a bit of posting in October and little to no response from the online community I started to think that there wasn't a big enough audience to keep this blog alive, but after checking back I realized that all the blog needed was a little time to get noticed.

I'll be continuing my project but i will do so a little bit differently than i had planned. From this point on the Arduino will be the middle man for the project and the software to control it will run on a PC.

So far I have temperature and humidity control ported and once I get the lighting control implemented I'll make a release. I'll be keeping everyone posted.

If you have and software development experience and are willing to help let me know.

Update - Version 1.11 - Fixed Bugs and a Look into Moisture Sensors

After checking on my system yesterday I noticed it stopped updating the LCD display and operating the controllers within a couple hours after powering on the device. The issue was very simple to solve, all it involved was changing an "if" statement to a "while" statement. Also the updated version notifies the user when it cannot initialize the SD card during start up via the LCD display.

Here's the updated version:
Download v1.11

I've been googling moisture sensors for the past week or so. The most ideal product I found was the Vegitronix Soil Moisture Sensor but they run roughly $30 a piece which isn't a very ideal price. I then stumbled upon a tutorial for home made moisture sensors that uses galvanized nails to take measurements by passing a alternating current between the probes while taking readings on the one that isn't currently emitting a current. The probes are set in gypsum plaster to avoid corrosion from salts and to make sure they don't touch. During the next week i will be working on making a set of my own, once they are complete i will run some tests to get a better understanding on how to make them work accurately in the next update.

I'll be keeping you guys posted, thanks for listening in.

Now Available - Version 1.1 - Arduino Uno Compatible w/ Humidity Control

Hey peoples, I just finished debugging Version 1.1. I've included a pin map I made using Fritzing:

**Here's the Download Link

Like I mentioned earlier, this is most likely the last version that will be available on Arduino Uno and Duemilanove. If you intend on using a larger scale grow room controller with more features I recommend getting a Arduino Mega.

Leave me a comment and let me know what you think!
Enjoy!

Debugging Version 1.1 - Arduino Uno Compatable + Humidity Control

Hey everyone, I've been working on version 1.1 the past few days. I've reduced the code down by 100 lines and have shrunk the code enough to add a humidity controller and it will fit on an Arduino Uno or Duemilanove. Right now I'm working out the last few bugs so it should be available within the next few days.

*After version 1.1 the project will be based on Arduino Mega because I'm running out of pins and flash memory.

I have also had time to get some feedback on various forums and have gotten a good idea of a release plan:

• V1.1 - Arduino Uno compatable, humidity control
• V1.2 - Arduino Mega based , soil moisture logging
• V1.3 - Soil Moisture Control (automated watering)
• V1.4 - Ph Logging
• V1.5 - Ph Control
• V1.6 - Larger LCD Display
• V1.7 - Nutrient Control
• V1.8 - Co2 Control
• V1.9 - Fire, Leak and Leak Alarms and a Silent Intruder Alarm with SMS
• V2.0 - Ethernet and PC server with full online control, monitoring, and surveillance (I better start learning javascript now lol)

These are subject to change and reordering but that generally the track the project'll follow.

**Download Version 1 - GrowRoomController_v1.zip

Here is my Arduino-based Grow Room Controller.

This nifty project of mine effectively controls a small scale grow room setup. My setup currently controls only a few appliances, but the code could easily be modified to work with other environmental variables. My setup contains:

• The Grow Light
• The Exhaust Fan that pulls air out of the room, through the grow light fixture
• A Heater

The controller has the ability to log the temperature and humidity readings with a time stamp to an SD card. It also logs events such as the powering on and off of appliances in a separate file in the same directory. The file directory structure is as follows: "YEAR\MM\DD\" and there is an event and data log for each day.

It is composed of the following components:

• Arduino Mega 1280 (I'm sure with some code adjustments it could work with an Arduino Uno, but currently the sketch is almost 32Kb it would require down-scaling)
• SHT15 Digital Temperature and Humidity Sensor
• DS1307 Real-time Clock w/ Rechargeable coin-cell battery
• Serial 2x16 Alphanumeric LCD Display
• SD card mounted on Ethernet Shield (I don't use the Ethernet for this project, just the SD interface)
• 3 NPN Transistors that activate relays that control the grow light, heater and exhaust fan (I use 2 PowerSwitch Tails and a Relay from Sparkfun)

The pin map can easily be deciphered from the beginning of the code and by looking up the communication protocols used by different components

You can dig into the code for more info (be warned it's almost 900 lines of code including comments). DOWNLOAD: GrowRoomController_v1.zip

**The download includes necessary libraries that normally do not come with the Arduino IDE, it also includes a modified version of the SLCD library that uses the NewSoftSerial library to communicate with the LCD display.