Wifi soil sensor's

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Joe Fresh

Joe Fresh

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Been a while since posting...

Currently got a new spot going with a partner... its our first run st this spot... 54 light flower room... 240 plant Canadian medical grow.


I've always hand watered... but wanted to setup a watering system on our second run as it's taking about 5 or 6 hrs to water 350 gallons of water ...... it's just too time consuming.


So looking into our second crop coming up I want to set up our watering system and along with that has wifi soil sensors for EC and moisture and ph if possible...

I'd like to not have to journey to my spot to see what needs done every day... would be much simpler to have sensors and know exactly what needs to be done.


Looking for suggestions... I'm not up to date on all the tech and Google is just sending me in circles
 
Jimster

Jimster

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There are a lot of remote growing systems that can provide real time data on your plants, but they are more designed for indoor grows, I think. I know they aren't cheap, but a homebrew version shouldn't be too difficult if you can find the remote units. They usually have a way to interconnect with the internet, so that might solve your problems. Searching for a Cannabis Grow Controller brought a zillion systems to inspect... they could get pretty confusing I guess until you get a little more familiar with the hardware.
 
Ignignokt

Ignignokt

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Most of the sensors are BTLE (bluetooth, low energy) that seem practical. I've been experimenting with the xiaomi plant sensor and raspberry pi. I got 6 of these

I have been looking at this as a homebrew project for some long time and I have worked with quite a few sensors and looked at anything that looked anywhere similar that is available commerically. You could do this with simple wifi and say an arduino like ESP32. The problem comes more with managing a bunch (more than 10) of something.

The biggest problem from my perspective is that to get a great system, you need a botanist, a chemist and systems programmer to work with a hardware guy that builds what the rest of them talk about. I'm a long time amatuer at some of the requirements and experienced in some of the others. Only top of the line commercial greenhouse equipment seems to get the big picture. This is sort of my short list for a system.

Moisture in the air and soil ( and derivatives like Vapor pressure defict )
Light - calculated as DLI (daily light integral) with some sense of spectral distribution.
Temperature ( room and canopy with non-contact sensors )
Soil chemistry ( could be simple EC, and/or more sophisticated PH )
Light control
Temperature control
Ventilation control
Humidity control
CO2 control
Notifications
Single pane of glass status

I've build part of this and have components to complete most of the rest. If I hadn't gone stupid and went back to work for a salary, just writing this would probably get me to finish the project. Instead, this weekend was putting my 2 seismometers back up and networked to the mother ship. Got some big shakes south of me.
 
Joe Fresh

Joe Fresh

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In all honesty I just want something simple to setup... plug n play turnkey would be ideal ...


Only want 1 or 2 sensors per table .... got 10 tables..

And I only want/need them to measure grow medium water content and ec/ph

It's simply so I can manage my watering system and schedule from a distance from my phone.
 
Joe Fresh

Joe Fresh

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Ignignokt said:
You should check out these then. The work with Android phones, I use a Samsung Tablet to read the ones I have.

www.ebay.com

English Xiaomi Plant Monitor Flower Tester Flora Smart Sensor Soil Moisture Hot for sale online | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for English Xiaomi Plant Monitor Flower Tester Flora Smart Sensor Soil Moisture Hot at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!
www.ebay.com
Click to expand...
Looks interest7ngm.. think I may give them a go...

Any pics of what the interface looks like in the app?
 
Ignignokt

Ignignokt

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I looked at smartbee some time ago. I liked the system, but not the prices mostly because I could do better myself with the hardware and code. I toyed with the idea of entering that market - but I have a terrible habit of wanting to give shit away that would have had partners planning my demise.

I'm a die-hard open-source type which is why I like this site. Share what you learned, teach others. We could live in paradise if we (humans) just didn't have that tendency to keep more than we actually need. So much is wasted. I'm not communist or any of that, but I am the enemy of stupid.
 
Ignignokt

Ignignokt

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I've found something that works pretty well with these Xiaomi sensors. Push notifications on moisture levels or temp or ... Install this on a Raspberry Pi. You don't have to use a cloud account unless you want notifications

Screen Shot 2019 09 26 at 115511 PM


Per container, this is pretty cheap on small scale and not exactly rocket science. YMMV.
 
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