Outdoor Temperature Sensor
6 September, 2010 - 18:18
Can anyone suggest the best way to house an outdoor temperature sensor? I may want to add a light sensor at a later date as well.
I have one from the DBZoo shop, temperature-sensor, and was thinking of putting it in a old film case and putting in under the eaves. Or perhaps just sealing it with hot glue inside the case to protect the legs from corrosion.
Any thought? I know a few of you have them.
Thanks
Karl
7 September, 2010 - 12:29
#2
I use the stock 1-wire
I use the stock 1-wire sensors from the dbzoo shop injected with ordinary kitchen silicon and located under the eves.
Must admit tho, Derek's options look much sexier!
10 September, 2010 - 09:37
#4
Hint on Hack?
Hi Derek, just wondering what that hack might look like?
10 September, 2010 - 15:07
#5
Dawn/Dusk hack
Well, my D/D unit is now sealed back up and I didn't take pics. However, it's simple enough to hack
The unit is mains powered and is sealed up with silicone and glue for outside use. It takes a little scraping away of the goo to get it to where the top can be removed. This exposes the circuitry.
There is a relay which switches on when dusk is detected. By default, the relay applies mains to a third wire from the unit - to drive a mains light fitting.
The hack is to take the mains away from the relay contacts. This requires cutting of PCB tracks. Once the relay contacts are completely isolated from the mains, solder on a length of twin core cable across the contacts of the relay. This can then be attached directly across a HAH input. N.B. you must be very sure that you have completely removed all tracking that routes mains to the relay contacts ... otherwise you risk blowing up the HAH microcontroller.
The unit can then be put back together and glued/silicon sealed to re-achieve the IP waterproofing rating.
Took me about half an hour to do.
Derek.
9 December, 2010 - 14:53
#6
Some pointers
Hi Derek,
Just bought one of these pre-potted sensors, after my 3rd home made outdoor sensor went up to the silicon valley in the sky.
Wondered if you could give me a heads up on the wiring. I don't want to mess things up.
Cheers
Gary
10 December, 2010 - 08:18
#8
Wiring
The one that I use came from Sure on eBay. http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Digital-Thermal-probe-sensor-DS18B20-/350420424706...
shows the wiring.
Works nicely down to the -10C that we've had recently.
Derek
10 December, 2010 - 12:02
#9
Thanks but...
Hi thanks for the help. I got my sensor wired and fitted but find to my dismay that I'm still seeing "?" on Input and 1-wire. I had thought it was the outdoor sensor I had connected. This had gone kaput before and replacing it fixed the problem. This time, it looks like something else has gone wrong.
Any suggestions on something to try?
10 December, 2010 - 18:30
#10
Not good
Hmm,
If you are seeing '?'s instead of the 'on'/'off' input values, then something is seriously wrong with the microcontroller on the HAH PCB or the MMJ to RJ11 connection cable to the HAH. If you reboot, is the LCD still showing the correct IP address?
I'm hoping that the new 1-wire sensor wasn't connected with the Gnd and 5V lines the wrong way round ... this could cause hardware failure.
Derek.
10 December, 2010 - 20:03
#11
Don't think so...
This issue has been like this for a while. It was working, then stopped.
I just thought it had tripped out during the rain or something(even though it was coated, had silicon in the end and was taped up)...
It's the only one on the run but the run is 10m. I'll test the new sensor direct to the Hah.
11 December, 2010 - 13:56
#12
Checked....
Hi Derek,
I tested my sensor directly connected and no diff. I do get IP address on display as normal.
Everything else seems to work. How annoying, 2 steps forward, 1 back.
19 December, 2010 - 01:11
#13
Release 278
Derek spotted a problem with his basement temperature sensor in that after a while it would report '?'. Restarting the xap-livebox process or rebooting the HAH got things working.
I investigated this and found a problem.
A constant 1wire temperature would erroneously be reported as '?' when timeout period, as set in the WEB GUI, expired.
Why was this? Well as the xap-livebox process only get's notified by the additional hardware when the temperature changes if there was no change within the 1-wire timeout check period the xap-livebox process has no way to know the 1-wire device was still ok. So it timed it out.
What I do now is 10 seconds before the timeout the xap-livebox process asks the external hardware to report the temperature of all 1wire devices. If they are all still alive then each will report in, when this happens the xap-livebox process notices this and reset the timeout for each of them preventing it from becoming a '?' 10 seconds later when the 1wire timeout check occurs.
SO - If on the previous release < 278 you had the timeout check set low and/or the temperature was not changing in the timeout period you would see a '?' - This might have been contributing to your problem.
OR you just have dud hardware and your timeout check was 0 (disabled) anyway.
Brett
20 December, 2010 - 20:55
#14
Set at 0
Hi Brett, I haven't changed the timeout check. I had gone from 3 sensors down to 1 and it was working fine.
Derek suggested I swap out the chip to see if the pin for 1-wire had fried, I have tried that and still no diff, so I expect I've boiled the livebox board somehow.
I use this part for my outdoor sensor.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=350391169645
Seems pretty solid.
As for a light sensor, this unit http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/IP65-PHOTOCELL-DAYLIGHT-DUSK-TILL-DAWN-SENSOR-/390... is easily hacked to have the internal relay (which by default switches mains voltage) to just act as a simple switch which can be hooked up to an input on the HAH.
Derek.