Published November 13, 2018 © MIT

Tank Refillerator

Ever get tired of refilling your aquarium, well now we have a solution. With this you wiill never need to refill your aquarium manually.

IntermediateWork in progress2 hours663

Things used in this project

Hardware components

OLED Click

Maxim Integrated DS18B20 Programmable Resolution 1-Wire Digital Thermometer

Submergible Water Pump

Darlington High Power Transistor

Floating Limit Switch

In the project I used a regular push button, but the real application will have a floating limit switch

Pocket Beagle

1N4007 – High Voltage, High Current Rated Diode

Resistor 1k ohm

Resistor 100 ohm

Male/Male Jumper Wires

Ultrasonic Sensor - HC-SR04 (Generic)

In the initial stages of the project, a Grove ultrasonic sensor was used, but was not successfully incorporated into the project. This adafruit ultrasonic sensor should work better because it has supported libraries.

Hand tools and fabrication machines

Epilog Fusion M2 Laser Cutter

Story

Motivation:

If you have ever had an aquarium, you know how troublesome it is when the water just keeps evaporating. Especially in small tanks, without a lid that water level drops daily. The project, Tank Refillerator, would serve to end this problem. The Refillerator would be able to detect when the water level is below a certain point in the tank and would then begin refilling the tank to the desired water level. After the water level is reached, the flow will automatically stop. The Refillerator would also have the capability to read the current temperature of the water so that you know that it will be safe for the fish. There is an OLED screen that displays the water temperature and the water level of the reservoir.

Overview:

When the device is turned on, the program initializes the screen and then detects whether the button (limit switch) is being pressed. If the button is pressed, that means that the water level is fine, but if the button is not pressed, that means that the motor then has to turn on to refill the aquarium. On the screen the temperature will be display of the water in the reservoir, or the aquarium depending on where you place the temperature sensor. As the water is used up from the reservoir, the ultrasonic sensor will be detecting the water level and display the level on the OLED screen. Once the water level falls too low, then the screen will notify low water level and will disable the motor from future use until the water is replenished. This is so that the motor does not keep trying to fill the aquarium even though it is out of water.

Finished Project

Electronics:

In the project, the temperature sensor was used to detect the temperature. The motor for the project is submersible and so would be used to direct the water into the aquarium. The ultrasonic sensor is used to detect the water level in the reservoir. Both the temperature and the water level will be displayed on the OLED screen. Additionally the button (limit switch) is used to determine whether the pump needs to be activated and refill the aquarium.

Fritzing Diagram:

Pin Connections:

Button GPIO IN: P1_29

Transistor GPIO OUT: P1_36

Temperature Sensor: P2_33

Device:

The setup seen in the picture of the finished project consists of the demo aquarium that I made as well as the enclosure for the Pocket Beagle. The demo aquarium was made using a laser cutter and the attached file. The materiel thickness for the acrylic was .125". As for the pocket beagle enclosure, it was cut out of .192" plywood also with the use of a laser cutter. A laser cutter is not needed to make either as they were just made for demonstration purposes.

Pocket Beagle Enclosure

How to Make It Work:

There are a few installs needed to allow the project to work. First these various libraries need to be installed

pip install Adafruit_BBIO
sudo apt-get install fbi

After installing the libraries, then there are a few steps needed to make the temperature sensor usable. The temperature sensor used works with a one wire communication so there are steps needed to make this work with the Pocket Beagle.

1. First clone bb.org overlays

2. Put dtbo file included in src arm directory

3. make

make

4. Then copy dtbo to /lib/firmware

Sudo nano /boot/uEnv.txt

6. Add .dtbo file to the boot

This will allow the .dtbo file to be accessed on boot and allow for the one wire communication with the temperature sensor.

Additionally, the OLED Click screen must also be initalized upon startup in a similar way. For these steps visit the hackster project HERE and follow the steps to set up the OLED Click board. After this is done, you will now be able to use the OLED screen.

With that, all aspects to be able to run are complete. In order to run the files/software visit my GitHub page under the README to obtain the directions to be able to run from the command line.

Project in Action

Future Plans:

Unfortunately the Grove ultrasonic sensor that was initially used for the project did not work. Realizing that it may be because it may have been non-compatible, I decided to try to use the Adafruit ultrasonic sensor seen in the component list above. This sensor would be usable with the Adafruit_BBIO library and may produce better results. Additionally, the screen is currently only set to display a constant image using fbi. My intention is to get the screen working will PILLOW to be able to display the current temperature as well as the water level in real time.

Useful Links:

Using the Adafruit BBIO Library: https://learn.adafruit.com/setting-up-io-python-library-on-beaglebone-black/using-the-bbio-library

Pocket Beagle reference manual: https://github.com/beagleboard/pocketbeagle/wiki/System-Reference-Manual

Schematics

Code

#Adulfo Amador
#Rice University 
#ENGI 301 - Fall 2018

#Copyright 2018 Adulfo Amador

#Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of #this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in #the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to #use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies #of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do #so, subject to the following conditions:

#The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all #copies or substantial portions of the Software.

#THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR #IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, #FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE #AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER #LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, #OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE #SOFTWARE.



#imports

import os
import glob
import time
import Adafruit_BBIO.GPIO as GPIO
import time
import random
import os



# ------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Global variables
# ------------------------------------------------------------------------

BUTTON0                      = "P1_29"
MOTOR0                       = "P1_36"

# ------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Main Tasks
# ------------------------------------------------------------------------

 # Initialize Button
 
GPIO.setup(BUTTON0, GPIO.IN)
GPIO.setup(MOTOR0, GPIO.OUT)
    
 
os.system('modprobe w1-gpio')
os.system('modprobe w1-therm')

# ------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Temperature Code
# ------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
base_dir = '/sys/bus/w1/devices/'
device_folder = glob.glob(base_dir + '28*')[0]
device_file = device_folder + '/w1_slave'
 
def read_temp_raw():
    f = open(device_file, 'r')
    lines = f.readlines()
    f.close()
    return lines
 
def read_temp():
    lines = read_temp_raw()
    while lines[0].strip()[-3:] != 'YES':
        time.sleep(0.2)
        lines = read_temp_raw()
    equals_pos = lines[1].find('t=')
    if equals_pos != -1:
        temp_string = lines[1][equals_pos+2:]
        temp_c = float(temp_string) / 1000.0
        temp_f = temp_c * 9.0 / 5.0 + 32.0
        return temp_f
        

# ------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Display Image using display.sh script
# ------------------------------------------------------------------------

def temp():
    image_choices = ['Screen_Display.jpg']
    command = 'sudo /var/lib/cloud9/ENGI301/Aquarium_Pump/display.sh ' + image_choices[0]
    print(command)
    os.system(command)
    time.sleep(5)

temp()

# ------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Motor Triggering Code with Button Input
# ------------------------------------------------------------------------


        
input = GPIO.input(BUTTON0)

while True:
    while (GPIO.input(BUTTON0) == 1):
        GPIO.output(MOTOR0, 1)
        print("Motor running")
        time.sleep(1)
        
        if (GPIO.input(BUTTON0) == 0):
            GPIO.output(MOTOR0, 0)
            print("Stopped")
            break
        
    print(read_temp())	
    time.sleep(300)

Credits

Adulfo Amador

1 project • 0 followers

Tank Refillerator

Things used in this project

Hardware components

Hand tools and fabrication machines

Story

Motivation:

Overview:

Electronics:

Device:

How to Make It Work:

Future Plans:

Useful Links:

Custom parts and enclosures

Test Aquarium Display

Pocket Beagle Enclosure

Schematics

Aquarium_Pump

Code

DT_Thermistor.dtbo

Temp_Motor

display

Run_Aquarium_Pump

Credits

Adulfo Amador

Comments

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Tank Refillerator

Tank Refillerator

Things used in this project

Hardware components

Hand tools and fabrication machines

Story

Motivation:

Overview:

Electronics:

Device:

How to Make It Work:

Future Plans:

Useful Links:

Custom parts and enclosures

Test Aquarium Display

Pocket Beagle Enclosure

Schematics

Aquarium_Pump

Code

DT_Thermistor.dtbo

Temp_Motor

display

Run_Aquarium_Pump

Credits

Adulfo Amador

Comments

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