Blog2016 ≫ Aquarium heater is in

Mistakes made so far: I bought a heater that is rated a bit too high really. These details weren't on the ebay listing but I bought the 100W model and that's recommended for a tank (brewing bucket in my case) or approximately twice the size, so I could have got away with a 50W version, bit cheaper too. Also I had to drill new holes in the lid, one for the power lead for the heater, and so I thought I'd drill one for a new temperature probe inside at the same time. I fitted a grommet, but when I went to seal it with some plumbers gold that I had, my sealant gun bent, so no sealant available... For now I've put glue around the seal and am keeping my fingers crossed, will have to get a new sealant gun.

Heater is on now, as of about 11:45 today, let's see what it does to the temperature graph:

At some point my home brew beer graph would have appeared here. I haven't done home brew for ages, it doesn't quite seem worthwhile, but maybe in times of austerity it will return.

The tumble dryer is also on right now so expecting quite a spike, but it should settle down.

I had to cut off the moulded three pin plug in order to thread the cable through the hole I drilled, so a) I had to find a new plug, luckily had one, and b) now I've cut through the mains cable anyway I might as well fit the inline relay on the raspberry pi board. I hope it doesn't use the same pins as the temperature probes.

Oh also now I've cut the cord I guess I can't send this back if it doesn't work! Didn't test it first, but it was only six quid.

raspberry pi: Credit card sized super cheap computer, awesome.

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Paul Clarke's weblog - I live in Hythe in Kent. Married + father to two, I am a full-stack web engineer, + I do js / Node, some ruby, other languages ect ect. I like pubs, parkrun, eating, home automation and other diy jiggery-pokery, history, family tree stuff, TV, squirrels, pirates, lego, and TIME TRAVEL.