Battery-powered irrigation controller

[scalz]

@user2684
that's a cool project :+1:
I have built a device like this, batt operated custom board, but not finished sw and enclosure for the moment (too much projects). I'll use it in my garden soon as seedling has started too here.
I also have solar charging option on my board.

[gohan]

@user2684 can't you use like 4 relays to supply voltage with different polarity? 2 give pulse for opening and 2 give pulse to close. Maybe not as neat and tidy as the H Bridge but it may do the job without voltage drop.

[user2684]

@gohan you're right, a set of relays could definitely do the job, good alternative thanks for the advice!

[Samuel235]

@gohan - I'm struggling to determine why you would prefer to use 4 relays rather than a H-Bridge. If the device is a simple pulse activated device then i don't see any reason to use a relay over a H-Bridge. Is there a specific reason why you would and i'm not aware of that characteristic?

Or am I not following your project plans properly?

[gohan]

@Samuel235 it is in the first post where he is saying the H bridge didn't work
@user2684 said in Battery-powered irrigation controller:

After some googling I've discovered I needed a H-bridge (http://www.instructables.com/id/H-Bridge-on-a-Breadboard/?ALLSTEPS) to control programmatically the valve. I've tried building mine on a breadboard with different transistors/resistor but the valve didn't switch due to a massive voltage drop. Once gain due to the current draw.

[scalz]

In my circuit, I'm not using h-bridge nor relays and i can also control higher voltage solenoid valves like rainbird.. (i'll post my project later),
but imho, I think the H-bridge should work, that depends on resistors values or the circuit was not optimized. 4 relays is a bit gorgeous maybe, but if it works, then it's the most important :)

[gohan]

@scalz sometimes you've got to use what is available and 4 relays usually are laying around somewhere :D

[Samuel235]

Well I brushed over that because i don't see how a H-Bridge wouldn't work due to high voltage drops. They use these ICs for motors and are fine with that and hence why I kind of brushed over that first point.

I was thinking more in terms of a new product being made for people, relays wouldn't be the best option for a few reasons, one being cost. However, if its just a few products for yourself then its fine obviously :)

[user2684]

Just to share how the finished project looks like in the picture below. I'm powering it with 3 AA batteries (4.5v) since the solenoid valve would not trigger when below 3v. In the picture you can see on the right side the pro mini and the RFM69 radio, on the left the H-bridge module in red and a mini board with a voltage regulator to provide 3.3v to the arduino and the radio and a 1M/300K voltage divider to feed an arduino's analog pin. I have two valves connected to the H-bridge so I'm using 4 pins to control them (pulse on/pulse off for valve 1, pulse on/pulse off for valve 2). On the code side, with NodeManager (https://www.mysensors.org/download/node-manager) I have the following configuration:

  nodeManager.setBatteryMin(3.2);
  nodeManager.setBatteryMax(4.6);
  nodeManager.setBatteryInternalVcc(false);
  nodeManager.setBatteryPin(A1);
  nodeManager.setBatteryVoltsPerBit(0.00459433);
  
  nodeManager.setSleep(SLEEP,1,MINUTES);

  // open valve 1
  nodeManager.registerSensor(SENSOR_LATCHING_RELAY,6);
  // close valve 1
  nodeManager.registerSensor(SENSOR_LATCHING_RELAY,7);
  // open valve 2
  nodeManager.registerSensor(SENSOR_LATCHING_RELAY,8);
  // close valve 2
  nodeManager.registerSensor(SENSOR_LATCHING_RELAY,9);  

The board sleeps for one minute, then reports back (with smart sleep of course) and the controller sends a SET message with payload 1 to the relevant child id to control the valves when instructed. On this side with myHouse (https://www.mysensors.org/controller/myhouse) I can activate it manually or schedule the duration of the irrigation for each zone.

Here's the pictures (as you can clearly see I'm really bad with hardware so I tend to wire everything up without soldering so I can reuse all the components if needed or, more likely, if the project fails :P):

[gohan]

Don't worry about the wire mess, it is normal when building a prototype (breadboards and jumper wires exist for a reason :) )
So the node every minute checks if any commands have been sent to switch on or off the valves, right? How much battery life are you getting? I guess it will depends on how much time the valves are on. In theory you could swap the AA batteries with a 18650 to save some space, right?

[user2684]

@gohan that's correct, I'm using exactly the same principle in my boiler controller with the sensor checking in periodically for new commands since battery powered. I do expect a decent battery life since the valves I'm using are pulse-based so it doesn't matter for how long they stay on (as in my boiler controller I'm using a latching relay and since January moved from 3v to 2.75 now.). And yes, 18650 would be ideal for this project. Only concern with that battery is that when the solenoid triggers, it draws a lot of current and I'm not 100% sure a rechargeable battery is as good as a standard one to handle it.

[gohan]

as rule of thumb 18650 can deliver continuous 2C, so they could take a higher load for a brief moment (depends how long those valves take to open or close)

[user2684]

@gohan thanks good to know, I will give it a try, a 3 AA pack is actually using too much space!

[gohan]

Remember that lithium batteries suffer heat, so put the box in shade :)

[user2684]

Oh didn't know that, I'll stay with the 3 AA batteries then for now since the box is in full sunshine and can become pretty hot during summer time at this latitude ;-) Thanks

[Tmaster]

That's an interesting project!
how are these valve working after almost a month of work?some bi-state valves have reputation of get stuck opened or closed. They are cheap enough to i like them if the don't get stuck :)

And what about time to control the valvs. Are you requesting from gateway?
For power you can use a 4v or 5 v solar panel to charge 1 li-io cell with this charge regulators((https://cdn.instructables.com/FSH/L5F0/IO0G95Y5/FSHL5F0IO0G95Y5.MEDIUM.jpg?width=614)) if regular batteries have poor life, and of course you can hide battery box under a flat rock or a tile because sun heat.

There are common 9v valves that are bi-state as well ,like the ones used on rain bird 9v programmers

my irrigation controller (24v Ac controlled by 5v Dc) its about to be presented here as well soon :) i'm finishing tests on attached sensors and stability tests and upload on emoncms.com

[Tmaster]

And about selenoids ,this is how i control them:

on arduino pwm pins you can define how much voltage you send to solenoid with "analogwrite" .
You can use any mosfet or transistor that can handle the 3.5v 1a(buy double or triple value of curente for safe)

[user2684]

@Tmaster actually I came real here just a few days ago so difficult to say right now. I did notice though a couple of situations in which the command was not executed (which is really annoying since having irrigation going for hours would create a lake :P) but I'm not sure if it is because of the valve or some missing messages from the radio (since quite away from the gw). I was also evaluating a bunch of "close" commands sent periodically by the controller to be sure the valve does not stay open forever but it is not very clean.

Yes, the open/close logic is in the controller which is sending out a turn on/off message during the scheduled timeframes (https://sourceforge.net/p/my-house/forum/general/thread/2d98b751/).

Thanks for the advise regarding the batteries. I'm noticing when the valve toggle a huuuge impact on the battery. After a few tests changed from 4.5v to 3.8v. If confirmed, I will be obliged to move to a rechargeable solution.

Do you have a link of those 9v valves you are using? Just to have a good backup solution in case my approach would somehow fail ;-)
Regarding the solenoid, I'm using the following to control it from the arduino: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/2-DC-motor-drive-module-reversing-PWM-speed-dual-H-bridge-stepper-motor-Mini-victory-L298N/32648692160.html and seems to work just fine.
Thanks

[Tmaster]

i think that AA batteries hardly approach the 1A discharge if its your selenoid rate.
Another thing you can change is NEVER trust on a incoming signal to shutdown you valve. if power fails or signal is missing ,you selenoid will be open all life because gw never send the signal in time .

what i did is: call time from GW , store it on irrigation node ,and then after time out(2 hours) it shuts off alone .in fact i don't have any code to control valves from gw . Gw only receive status for domotics. all time for valves On and Off its on the node.
See the timeaware sensor example to know how get time from gw and how handle it
you can just use for ex:
if(hour()==09) { //if its 9 hour AM TURN ON
digitalwrite (valve, HIGH)
}
if(hour()==10) { //if its 10 hour AM TURN OFF
digitalwrite (valve,LOW)
}

Or on shutdown implement a "time out"timer (if millis have been passed turn off) like on "blink without delay" example

https://github.com/mysensors/MySensorsArduinoExamples/blob/master/examples/TimeAwareSensor/TimeAwareSensor.ino

[user2684]

@Tmaster that's a very good advice, especially if keeping it open for too long could create any damage. But I'd rather keep the logic on the controller otherwise I'd need to flash a new sketch on a weekly basis. The timeout approach would probably be more close to my requirements, even if millis() doesn't work for sleeping nodes, I can still work with the time as you suggested.
Another issue I'm experimenting with this valve is the loss of pressure, which is of course expected but it is so strong I cannot cover my garden correctly :-/ So an alternative I was evaluating is to hack my legacy irrigation controller which is very basic but I need to find a way to handle the rotary encoder. But on the same time I don't want to move away so soon from those valves ;-)