AAPEN Part. 96

Automation, Automation

There have always been a few components of the cooling solution that has annoyed me, one is the system currently in use for controlling the ventilation system. A fairly basic setup using simple thermostats to control when turbines kick in and out, this works pretty well, but in the age of the the `@Internet of all the Things`, it feels like its roughly about the time to make something a bit more “intelligent”.

Had this thing laying around for a while waiting for an excuse to mod it.. As its an old school automation system, the choice only seemed appropriate 🙂PAL_7146

Current contents, some nice old cableporn going on there. 1992 was a really good year for electronics.PAL_7147

A bit more modern automation electronics at hand, a cute little thing from Freetronics, an `EtherTen`, an Arduino compatible clone of sorts. Quite some time since last I had a good excuse to play around with Arduino.. far too long.PAL_7124

Never been one to let a solid excuse pass by, adding a small 2×20 character backlit LCD seemed like the reasonable thing to do. The screen is fairly old, so its using parallel communications as opposed to serial, wasting a bit more I/O pins than strictly needed, but as its been laying around for some time waiting for a good use, it was a perfect fit for the project.PAL_7155

Tearing apart an old 12V DC power adapter. While the “Arduino” can be powered off the USB, or even running off PoE if it were available; when running by itself a power source of some kind is still needed. And a 12V is still required by other components, such as the high-current relays.PAL_7167

Nearly a perfect fit, what more could you ask. It only seems appropriate to re-purposing as much of the original components as possible. PAL_7175

Test mounting, not exactly cable porn worthy, yet, but it’ll do for now 🙂PAL_7190

More sample mountings, always a hard time trying to figure out how to best mount the electronics. By the end there will be a fair bit of wires, so getting a good layout is key.PAL_7202

Adding another 5V adapter to power the TTL relay board, and the smaller electronics components. Luckily the 5V DC power supply makes a good fit as well. PAL_7214

To be continued..