Recently ditched my stupid timer

And built this: *Already installed this for 2 of my customers who are quite happy with how it all works*

 

Raspberry Pi Controlled Geyser Timer.

Components used:

1. Raspberry Pi Zero

2. Relay to drive the contactor

3. Din Rail 220~240v to 5v DC Power Supply for the Pi

4. 1 x 6A CB for to supply power to the above

5. 20A CB for the Geyser

6. 20A Contactor for the geyser

Outstanding for my setup: 25amp changeover switch to bypass the Raspberry Pi controlled system incase something goes wrong with the pi. Integrated with google assistant so I can tell google via voice commands when to switch on and off, this will override the automatic timers. Emails alerts as well to notify me when the timer kicks in. Working on the LCD display with temperature and current sensor next......

 

 

 

Thing to watch out for: Cold water because the SD-card failed... 🙂

I am always very wary of unexpected cold water issues. The long-haired folks don't like that...

44 minutes ago, plonkster said:

Thing to watch out for: Cold water because the SD-card failed... 🙂

I am always very wary of unexpected cold water issues. The long-haired folks don't like that...

I am bald lol... The pi is monitored by both external and internal servers so will get emails upon failure. Just need to prepare myself to sleep on the couch the day I actually miss the alert 🤣

I want to make something similar to run on my CCGX (or the more popular Venus-GX), so I am impressed!

how does this differ from the geyserwise controller with relays?
i like this however.

also where did you procure that 20A Chint contactor? 

1 hour ago, Fazil said:

how does this differ from the geyserwise controller with relays?
i like this however.

also where did you procure that 20A Chint contactor? 

This is my own solution and offering, my company is called STP Networks. Just FYI I am not here to advertise just share.

I am still working on temperature readings and quite some time away from getting it correct and I am not entirely sure if it's needed as yet.

Got the contactor from ARB

2 hours ago, Treschen said:

This is my own solution and offering, my company is called STP Networks. Just FYI I am not here to advertise just share.

I am still working on temperature readings and quite some time away from getting it correct and I am not entirely sure if it's needed as yet.

Got the contactor from ARB

Appreciated and i too am a tech junky so when i see stuff like this its of interest to me.

Sometimes i am lazy and opt for off the shelf solutions, but prefer to fiddle with the rasberry pi to control various things.

Keep us posted as this may be a commercial solution that many of us would use beyond geyser control and monitoring.

 

7 hours ago, Fazil said:

Appreciated and i too am a tech junky so when i see stuff like this its of interest to me.

Sometimes i am lazy and opt for off the shelf solutions, but prefer to fiddle with the rasberry pi to control various things.

Keep us posted as this may be a commercial solution that many of us would use beyond geyser control and monitoring.

 

Correct, the one I built is for my upstairs geysers. Building another one to control my pool (when my battery is full charged and I feel Solar energy is going to waste), boundary wall lights and down stairs geyser. Built something similar two years ago but for my garage with email alerts for doors opening and closing using the raspberry pi and glad to report it still works like a charm. Although the garage pi is not as complex as the one I just built. 🙂

 

 

 

Hi. You can use a DS18B20 thermo sensor to replace the thermostat. You can then measure and control using Sonoff th or Wemos on Home Assistant. You could probably connect it directly to the Pi GPIO. 

Latest updated, ditched the pi zero and replaced it with a Sonoff Wifi R3 device. Had a few cold water days because PI became unresponsive. Yeah wife was ready divorce papers 🤣

Logs showed memory heap error before pi would say bye! Thinking a Pi 2B+ or higher would of done the job. 

Working fine for the last 3 months with the Sonoff. 

On 2020/07/23 at 8:32 PM, Treschen said:

Had a few cold water days because PI became unresponsive. Yeah wife was ready divorce papers 🤣

It can be difficult to explain you had cold water because geyser was off-line.😀

On 2019/06/10 at 12:44 PM, Treschen said:

Recently ditched my stupid timer

And built this: *Already installed this for 2 of my customers who are quite happy with how it all works*

Hi Treschen I am thinking of a similar application, and wonder if anyone has used the relay in the Axpert 5kVA inverter to switch on the geyser when the inverter senses that there is a given amount of power coming from the panels and switch off when the incoming power falls below a given amount?

Is this a possibility? I am not au fait with the raspberry pi at all, but it may be a good project for my 18yr old grandson, to help me with? At the moment I use a CB at the sub DB next to the Inverter to manually switch on and off the geyser depending on the power available. I have reduced the geyser element down to 1.5 kW and have up to 3 kW available from the panels during the 5 hrs (10-1400hrs) on a normal cloudless day. 

Your comments and advice would be most welcome

Thank you

On 2019/06/10 at 12:44 PM, Treschen said:

Recently ditched my stupid timer

And built this: *Already installed this for 2 of my customers who are quite happy with how it all works*

Erm, cool and all but this isn't a SANS complaint installation.  Any CoC you issue for this would be invalid because you can't just stick anything in a DB and call it a day.  They need appropriate SANS ratings.  If you install this for enough people and they start reporting you or take you to court, you can get in serious trouble.

Device certification is much more strict than the actual CoC.

Edited June 5, 20215 yr by Gnome

I have a Sunsynk Inverter linked to Home Assistant running on an Intel Nuc so I can get the Battery SOC and how much power I am getting from the sun etc into HA.

I am using Bloubul7's Node Red Flows to get all the data from the Inverter

I built a Node Red flow to cycle through all my geysers, once one has finished heating up it switches to the next one (have three geysers and a borehole pump so they can't all switch on at the same time)

Geysers are controlled by Ewelink/Sonoff compatible breakers switches which give power draw as well (so I can tell when the thermostat kicks out)

Checks the time, power production and battery SOC levels before starting the flow & heating the geysers and sends me a Whatsapp when it is finished. 

I still have the timers enabled on the Sonoffs in case the Node Red doesn't run for some reason (wifi issues etc)