Controlling SANLight Grow room LED lights with HomeAssistant

[DanRamone81]

Hi there!
I’m pretty new to Home Assistant and this is my first post here, so i already apologize for my noob questions.
I’m planning to upgrade my growroom with LED lights called SANLight EVO 5, here is the data sheet https://www.sanlight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/datasheet-evo-series-neu-final.pdf
These lights can be dimmered with a magnetic dimmer or a bluetooth dimmer connected by a dimmer plug (in the datasheet you can see the spec). These dimmers are sold by the same company, the bluetooth dimmer can be connected to their phone app.
They sell also a RJ12 and a RJ45 cable adapter to connect their dimmer 3rd party controllers like GrowControl or TrolMaster.
I sent them already an email asking more information about the connectivity of the lights, and they replied me that probably the easiest way for me would be to control them with the RJ12 or RJ45 cables. They also sent me this picture of the dimming curve

Since i’m a noob, i wanted to ask you guys how difficult it is to dim those LED lamps with HomeAssistant, if it’s a doable project for a noob and eventually if there is a way to use their BT dimmer and eventually what information i need from the manufacturer to have access to the BT.
Thanks you all in advance for the replies
Cheers

[csharpfaze]

Hey, I read your post and would like to share my experience.
My use case is a bit different since I only had the magnet dimmer, as well as a Q-Gen2, but the dimming works exactly the same.

That meant that I was not searching for bluetooth connectivity.

I use ESPHome for custom sensors/controllers since it easily works together with home assistant via wifi.
I already had a esp8266 and found a board for controlling 0-10V:
https://wiki.dfrobot.com/SKU_DFR0971_2_Channel_I2C_0_10V_DAC_Module

It uses the 8266 onboard 3.3V and does not need any amplifier/external power, so it was perfect for me (I don’t have any experience in hardware/electricity etc).
I got mine from a polish shop (Schwerkraft - 2-Kanal-DAC 0-10 V I2C-Modul - DFRobot DFR0971 Botland - Robotikgeschäft).

Then I bought a electric cable and the wieland plug from amazon (rst20i3s, I compared the picture with my sanlight magnet dimmer). Again, this was for my Q-Gen2 series, so I am not 100% sure which plug type the evo series uses - it should be rst20i3f.

The wiring layout is the same, I asked the sanlight support just to be sure.

(picture is from evo series)

The tricky part is not getting confused with the wiring and setting up the esp device correctly.
Remember the picture shows the lamp, so if you look at the plug dim- is on the left.
You will have to:

• connect esp with the board (cables included), I2C bus
• connect Vout with sanlight dim+
• connect GND with sanlight dim-
• configure esp

Here’s my config:

esphome:
  name: dimmer
  friendly_name: dimmer

esp32:
  board: nodemcu-32s

###
# (default settings omitted)
###

i2c:
  sda: GPIO21
  scl: GPIO22
  scan: true
  id: bus_a

gp8403:
  id: my_gp8403
  voltage: 10V
  address: 0x5f #I had to set this for my device, since the default address was different

output:
  - platform: gp8403
    id: my_gp8403_output_1
    gp8403_id: my_gp8403
    channel: 0
# this is for 2nd channel, but I only use the board for the sanlight
#  - platform: gp8403
#    id: my_gp8403_output_2
#    gp8403_id: my_gp8403
#    channel: 1

# I use light entity, so I can control % in home assistant    
light:
  - platform: monochromatic
    output: my_gp8403_output_1
    name: "Sanlight"
    gamma_correct: 1

It was a lot of work, but also interesting.
Money wise, it is a lot cheaper than the official options. (and I dont even mean the 600€ Growcontrol)

• 5€ power cable (5m)
• 6€ Wieland plug
• 12€ 0-10V DAC
• 4€ esp 8266

So around 27€, lets say 35-40€ if you have to pay for shipping.
The growcontrol cable alone would cost 36€ (1m or 42€ 3m) which is basically just power cable + plug + rj45 and can not control anything by itself. They should not charge more than 15€ for their cable.

Not sure if the invested time is worth it, but I am pretty happy with the result.
Hope this helps someone.

[Butch]

Hi,
Can i ask you how you Power the esp and can you share some Pictures of your Selfmade Dimmer?

[Brushpower]

Can you post screenshot about your grow dashboard? Looking for some ideas for mine.

I have mars hydro fc evo smart lights but mars hydro app sucks.

Been trying to get it to HA by trying to connect it to some other apps but no luck so far.

Dimmer box has Esp32 wroom 32E in it.

Any advice how to start integrating it?

For my older lamps I bought same DAC module as OP but what esp board should I get?

[csharpfaze]

Hey, sorry to disappoint you but I don’t have anything fancy.

On the sanlight, it is a wieland plug (looks just like the power supply one).
Outside of the tent, the electronics are unprotected and lying around

For power supply, I use a multi-socket which also has 3 usb ports ( https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0761VTNP3 ), so I only needed a mircro-usb cable.

[csharpfaze]

Sure, here is my dashboard:

(It’s more about functionality than aesthetics ^^ )

If you want to use the DAC, any Esp is fine if this is the only use case its serving.
E.g. nodemcu Esp8266 (cheap)
If you want to have more sensors connected via I2C, Esp32 has 2x I2C Bus, so you can also use devices with the same I2C address directly.

As for your hydro fc / dimmer box, I cant really say anything because I don’t own these devices or know anything about them.

[carlosr (Carlos)]

Hey csharpfaze,

I plan to connect my lights in the same way, is there a reason not to use the 12V pin from the light to power the ESP (with a step down-board)?

Cheers!

[csharpfaze]

I use my dimmer to slowly start the day (turn on with a 30 minute transition), so I find it more comfortable for configuration to have the exact same time schedule and always have access to dimmer (also for upates and config changes etc).

Other than having to buy a converter board and to figure out when your dimmer is “online” after turning the light on, I see no downside to your solution.

[asn.1ce]

How did u configure the dashboard for the light so that it shows the percentage right there. Also i followed your build with an EVO 4-80 1.5 265W. Works good. Only thing in the guide that is missing is which type rst20i3f plug is needed. its the “RST20I3F S2 ZR1SV BL0”. I ordered the wrong one, but made it work with dremeling away some of the plastic.

[csharpfaze]

Good to know, I only had my Q-Series and there it did fit perfectly.

You can show the percentage by configuring an entity card with enabled secondary info (brightness):

In code it looks like:

type: entities
entities:
  - entity: light.dimmer_sanlight
    secondary_info: brightness
    name: ' '
state_color: true

[asn.1ce]

Thank you so much, works instant if you know how to do it Im just too new to the HA game. I guess i will get used to it over time.
Also saw that you are a german brother, cause of the berrybase/sertronics ESP32.
Cheers

[Christau (Chris)]

Found this thread by accident. Should have found it earlier because i had the same challenge recently with the EQ Series. I also built it with a wemos d1 mini a buck converter and a 0-10v output board from aliexpress.
I designed a case and am quite happy with the results.
I used a pwm to 0-10v board for that because I didn’t know about gp8403 until yet. So thanks for the inspiration.

GitHub - christau/sanlight_wifi_dimmer: Sanlight grow light dimmer with...

Previously with tasmota, but now using esphome - a fantastic enhancement for hassi.
Cheers

[Weedalf]

Do you also have an idea hove to replace a fan controller for the mars hydro / spider farmer inline fan with an esp32 ?

[csharpfaze]

As far as I read, these fans have the possibility to wire them up “directly” to a esp32 by using the molex plug.

Maybe check this out:
https://www.rollitup.org/t/idiots-guide-to-getting-an-esp32-to-control-ac-infinity-cloudline-ec-fans-esphome-ha.1053910/

On Reddit someone also said that he did it like this with his mars hydro fan.
Here is also a thread: Ac Infinity (S-series Fan)

(I dont have any of these fans, so no guarantees there)