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A little paranoid or not....

Fisher2007

Member
Joined
19 Feb 2018
Messages
430
Location
Warrington
I've been thinking about my CO2 set up (as background I'm still relatively new to injected CO2 for plants, with my current system running only 3 months and this being the first time I've used it)

Right now I have a segment timer controlling the solenoid, it comes on two hours before lights on and goes off one hour before lights off. In the main segment timers are pretty decent and I've used numerous over the years on various aquariums I've had. I do recall occasionally though them failing and more often than not when this happens they don't turn off and they just skip past the turn off point until they go round again. For example I think a year or so ago I came downstairs one day to see my low tech tanks lights still on and so the timer hadn't turned them off, they'd clearly been on all night. No big problem in that circumstance but if that happened on my CO2 I think I'd be right in saying I'd wipe my fish out (and probably shrimps and snails) and that worries me? Is it a case of one of those things, am I being paranoid or is there some redundancy I can build in somewhere, and if so what have people done?

Just to add, my tank is approx 220 litres and the bps is high (too quick to count)

Cheers
 
Yes I had timer failures, the "stuck to on" was especially fatal to both plants and liquid carbon. So I built this.
https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/how-to-use-a-plc-to-control-your-fish-tank.42993/

upload_2020-1-20_15-18-54.png


And 27,585 hours (3.2 years) later has worked 100%, no issues, no dead fish, no dead plants....:)

When are you starting to build it then ?
 

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Haha! Errrmmmmm......

Now that may be a bit out of my league and I was probably hoping for more of an off the shelf solution. Unless you're manufacturing to order? :lol::thumbup:
 
Sorry not making PLC's. Other people have managed to use PLC's, see Zeus's tank and the 2000litre featured journals. They knew nothing about PLC's but both cracked the programming, no problems and have wonderful tanks.:grumpy: (compared to mine).

You could always start with Logo module, with 4 relays as a basic start, replacing 4 off unreliable mains timers.

Any PLC help, just ask.
 
They knew nothing about PLC's but both cracked the programming, no problems and have wonderful tanks.:grumpy: (compared to mine).

Agree with the first part about PLCs and as for the wonderful tanks compared to Ians well without Ians help they wouldn't be so wonderful IMO
 
One can use a simple WiFi programmable socket timer to do this now days.


https://www.tp-link.com/uk/home-networking/smart-plug/hs100/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-Link-Wireless-Tapo-Required-P100/dp/B07Z942YWS

This is used along with a smart phone app.

Spent 40
Years as a PLC tech in industry. This tech works great. I have a full PLC setup for my aquariums. An also use these on tanks not near my PLC systems.

How reliable are these Ed? Not had any experience, however I do control my general room lighting via WiFi with Philips Hue, and if there are WiFi issues the lights can remain on
 
I have recently bought the TPLink Tapo ones that Ed has linked to, after the first batch of more traditional, but electronic, timers I bought off Amazon kept randomly resetting themselves after a timer cycle!

So far the Tapo units have been excellent, though I will caveat that by saying they have only been in a couple of weeks. It's a real asset being able to turn them on and off, and change settings, from the phone, without having to dig around in the cabinet trying to find the correct on/off switch.

It also updates the status when you are away from the local network, so for example I can access right now from work, and confirm that my automated water change is currently in progress!

upload_2020-1-21_10-38-47.png
 
Spent 40
Years as a PLC tech in industry. This tech works great. I have a full PLC setup for my aquariums. An also use these on tanks not near my PLC systems.
Any pictures/designs we could see please ?
 
The Tp-link products have been great I have been using them for a couple of years now. I also use their power line Ethernet products to connect all my media TV devices like Apple TV and TiVo’s. TP link is a very large network computer vendor so this stuff is their main business.
Here is my control center shelf‘s
Kind of messy right now. I am starting to build a invert grow out system for berghia nudibranchs. Will be also using the system for my new planted tank. Will be doing a build thread on it.
Had a hard time with a stand build custom builder messed it up two times and the third version is shipping to me today.

62072badc1327c95e9d623085553a138.jpg
 
The Tp-link products have been great I have been using them for a couple of years now. I also use their power line Ethernet products to connect all my media TV devices like Apple TV and TiVo’s. TP link is a very large network computer vendor so this stuff is their main business.
Here is my control center shelf‘s
Kind of messy right now. I am starting to build a invert grow out system for berghia nudibranchs. Will be also using the system for my new planted tank. Will be doing a build thread on it.
Had a hard time with a stand build custom builder messed it up two times and the third version is shipping to me today.
And I thought my setup was a mess of wires and pipes :eek:. Nice. This would never get past my wife the WAF (wife acceptance factor) is far far too low.:D
 
This is out in my garage which the wife doesn’t care about. It’s a two car attached garage. An since I am now retired I am selling my work car for more aquarium work. Having a friend help me add electric circuits in that side of the garage for all the equipment.
When I lived in a home with a basement
Me an a friend raised marine clown fish in 3000 gallons. So I did a lot of automation to help with the simple task’s
 
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