SpidersWeb

And on a side note, my point of doing this was for accuracy. But finding an accurate linear temp sensor that doesn't cost me my first born child is proving to be quite hard. LM335 is obvious choice and only a couple of bucks, but if you look at the stat sheets, it's not as accurate as they make out. Plus it'll look nasty all waterproofed on a budget. Hopefully I find something low cost that's not too hard to get. Because I'd like to put my finished plans up for others to try and build.

I am using a serial interface, just using my own. $2.25 worth of chips + my time vs $27 chip everytime I make one, not sure what the price is through brightsparks but still, this works I'm using a 4017 decade counter combined with a serial to parallel shift register. The microcontroller will pulse the 4017, and outputs 0-9 from the 4017 will clock the shift register which will be receiving data from the microcontroller, bit by bit. On the 9th count the controller wont send data, but the 4017 will poke the register to send the data, we ignore cycle 10, and start all over again. So far I've sorted the 4017 part of the circuit. I've got it setup (and it's working) so one LED flashes, and another flashes only on the 10th occurance. Easy as piss. Doesn't make my project more complete but it educates me on the 4017 and I got to see my idea working. A valuable lesson I picked up, was the output voltage of the 4017 when high (with 4.8V in) is only 3.8V out, so to keep the signal strong I should use transistors when relaying the signal. I have to investigate that more, but sounds easy enough, otherwise by the time the LCD display gets the signals the voltages will be poopy. So tomorrow's mission is to connect the shift register, write a program, and just have an LED on each of its outputs. The idea being I send 01010010 or something, and the appropriate LEDs should light up correctly all at once on count 9. I've got a meeting until like 7PM so this might not happen, maybe Thursday. Learning heaps, but still to scared to program in assembler, using the PIC Basic. Here is my goofy little loop for testing I've been using: mainloop: high 2 pause 700 low 2 pause 700 gosub mainloop Any questions about what I'm doing or have done just ask! Chip numbers are MC14017B for the decade counter/divider, and MC7411C595A for the shift register. Both available at any dick smiths for around $1 each.

haha I'm just learning how to do things here. If I get good success with this, I'll convert it in to plain english for the regular folk. Isn't really a simple version of the posts above. e.g. the terminology is there because that's what things are called, not because we're trying to be technical Wouldn't recommend it without an electronics background of some sort. Yell out if there is something specific you're not following though and I'll do my best to explain!

Well I've got bigger fish to fry before I deal with heaters aynwho. I wanted to avoid moving parts, such as relays, but if I need to then I will, not a big deal. I was wanting crazy accuracy, and not because I need it, but because I'm tired of seeing my tank temp vary, particularly on fry tanks, and wanted a fun practical project to do. Was wanting to put one sensor on the filter intake, and one sensor on the output past where the heating coils would be, so the unit, with logging, could learn how to control the temp. (e.g. if input is 26C and output needs to be 28C, the element should be on for x secs or get so much power (PWM/Amp), if it fails, records for next time. etc. But anywho, getting ahead of myself! What I've been looking at today is interfacing with the LCD. Maltronics is for schools btw, they're not a retailer. Surplustronics has the serial to LCD for $27, but that's not viable if I ever wanted to make more of these. So went looking for solutions, found a serial in parallel out shift register chip that you can buy for $1.25. This combined with 3 of the controller pins, will run the display nicely. Just had another brain wave, if I put an octal counter on my fake 'clock' line, I'd only need two pins. hmm I'll draw up what I have in mind... Want to be able to build these for under $50 when finished, so $27 LCD interface doesn't cut it, I'll do it manually

Any male that looks good.

Song is FloRida - Low

I've got an adult male for sale. Can't be too friendly on price though because i'd need the money to buy another female.

Cheers, I'll look in to that. Not a brightsparks member. I'll go hunt that down, did see that orcon website that talked about brightsparks. Yes I considered relays, and at this moment it's the only thing I have to work with. Trouble is I don't want the heater running FULL ON full off, I want the controller to maintain tank temperature without creating sudden ups and downs in temp, so being able to lower the voltage or PWM the signal would be ideal. This is still a way off yet, hopefully I learn a lot more before I get a heater connected. Tonight I want to get the thermostat running, and some form of display. Gonna go grab some supplies from gaycar/dse at lunch. Thanks again

Ok so the kit turned up yesterday. Screen (I got a 8x2 LCD display, cheap one, not the blue backlight style), was a lot smaller than I expected, but will still do the job just lovely. Unfortunately I made the mistake of assuming it just took serial data, but it doesn't have a controller, so I either need a big PICAXE chip to manually control the points, or (better option) use their LCD Firmware chip which is soooooooooooooo much easier to program with. But anyway, built the kit, and hooked it to the computer, worked first time yey! I wrote a small program to slowly pulse pin 2, got the multimeter and it worked perfectly. Completely problem free project, already loving it. I also need a pile of common resistors, diodes, and maybe a darlington array or three before I can do much interesting stuff. I didn't even have a spare LED at home to make a pretty flashy light. So yeah, stoked, but also annnoyed the LCD didn't have a serial interface built in. Surplustronics threw in a second temp sensor free and optional the power filtering capacitor. Not expensive items but just that little bit extra can make the difference.

Fish are not considered pets. However if you have a lot of aquariums, which may be causing damage to the property, you're still out on your ass.

Cheers Original Stock as in the fish that were sold through pet stores before the ban. Most likely those I know have destroyed them, or keep them in a locked dungeon 6ft underground guarded by dragons and some form of ninja character and would never let me get a peek.

What was the MAF ruling on these? I can't actually remember. I do know of some people who got original stock, I'll see what I can find.

There is an article on the main FNZAS website on how to breed cardinal tetras, its quite difficult, but doable. Can't wait to hear about the dwarf rainbows

No Think they were infertile anyway? Not sure.

Any still going around?

Also make sure you're not using T5HO bulbs in a T5 setup. The power they require is different, but they're the same size.

I'd only recommend breeding Kribensis if you've got a stunnyly gorgeous pair. They're easy to breed and usually enough to go around. How they go with Corys will depend on the personality of them. For some reason mine are complete poofters and don't hurt a fly, but a lot can get very vicious especially when breeding.

Let me know where you get the poly from.

Congrats

They don't cross breed. But they do store sperm, either she was fertile before you realised, or she's just overweight.

Legend

That came to mind too me as well, but where can I get it from?

Right, so at some stage next week, when it arrives and I get to building it, I've got my temp controller project going right. Now when its finished I want to put a heating coil in the water stream. So I need something south of the cannister filter output, e.g. Now I need to be able to get in to it, to install and check the coil. I'm not sure how big or what I'll use as the coil, but want a bit of room to do whatever in. What I'm not sure of is how to make this? What can I assemble and with what? Ideas welcome Would be nice if the tube was see through as well, so I can keep an eye on things in there.

What you talkin' about Willis?

na the links are funky, I tried fixing it myself, to no avail.