Glad you asked, @serialBuilder . I can see now that my last post was a little hasty. It was getting late when I wrote it.
We are now going for the dyi moisture sensor that are mentioned in Nicks post - see the link. The commercial ones are faulty as heck (order 100 and get 82 that have issues or does not work - see Capacitive Soil Moisture Sensors don't work correctly + Fix for v2.0 v1.2 Arduino ESP32 Raspberry Pi - YouTube) so were better of that way. It’s also cheaper and the homemade ones can be made to fit almost any size. They are quite easy to make. My design gives room for one that will measure the water-level from top to bottom rather than just give a warning when it’s nearly empty.
They can be used as both water level sensor and moisture sensor making everything a little easier.
The moisture sensor is curved to give it a little spring-effect, pressing it against the soil. The holder for it doesn’t actually have to be curved. I just want to prevent the sensor from flipping backwards.
The round hole near the top is the opening of a pipe that goes down to the bottom and is meant for the wires and the hose. This reduces the number of holes in the bottom with water pressure on them and thus eliminates the issues we have had obtaining perfect seals.
The flat hole is for sliding in the moisture sensor for the ressovoir. It could also function as an overflow allowing water back into the reservoir, if the pump switch malfunctioned, but actually, I was thinking I’d plug it with silicone.
The price of this design is that wires and the end of the moisture sensor will be visible on the top of the pot. Get wires in green, brown and black and it shouldn’t make too much of a mess of the design, I think. Also the reservoir will be a little smaller.
Good question. I had the same thought while I worked on it, but just assumed they had been there all along, and not giving them much thought while focusing on other parts. But they haven’t. I’ll get rid of them and re-upload.
I just had some lying around. I am not sure what they are. As I understand capacitors, the thinner isolator (it’s called the dielectric, right?) the better. I haven’t tested mine yet.
Are any arguments given for the increased thickness wherever you saw the requirement?
Anyone here have any updates?
Its been two weeks since the last post, I am just wondering how everyone is getting on?
Anything that you guys can report back on and let us know of?
Anything I can do to help? (I don’t know how to code, (other than python) sorry.)
Thx!
//Elliot
I am still working on it. Next step for me has been to test the new version of the physical parts.
I’ve been having issues with my 3d printer, hence the silence, but now I’m rolling again. I’m getting rid of the last bugs in the design, by printing small portions of it. Hopefully I can start the first full print in a few days.
The next things that needs doing are almost exclusively coding, I think.
Btw. if you can code Python you can surely code Home Assistant Yaml too.
No, that was one of my findings as well. I’ve made the big pipe 2mm bigger to fit the tube and the wires. It’s on it’s way out the printer.
Awesome news about the sensor. Did you test it with moist soil as well as water? If not, could you also test how well it measures soild moisture, and if it will do it when mounted as it is in my design?
