Differential thermostat for your solar project. I use one of these to trip the fan in my solar lumber drying kiln, but they have many uses. Building a solar hot water system? This will work perfectly to turn your pumps on.
Features:
- SPDT relay output. This means you have "normally open" and "normally closed" outputs on the board. Useful if you want to turn things OFF at a certain differential temperatures and not just turn things on.
- LED indicators to show you what the board is doing.
- Freeze protection, will not trip relay if either of the sensors are disconnected, or either read below freezing. You can disable this.
- Will run from just about any "wall wart" type power supply
- Differential adjustable from 1C to about 24C
The output section of this circuit boad is good for 24V, AC or DC, and can handle 5 amps. Note that this is a thermostat and not a motor controller, to turn on or off motors that run on AC line voltages you should use a proper relay or contactor, and control that with this thermostat.
You will need to purchase two temperature sensors for this to work. I sell them cased and potted, with short pieces of wire attached so you can extend them for your project. See below. I will also include instructions for making your own when you purchase this board, if you wish to do that.
12V Solar Tracking Controller
This solar tracking controller will drive a motor to position anything you want to follow the sun on a single axis. It can be used to position solar cells, a reflector to heat water, or anything else. The controller is mounted on the object to be steered with the sensors positioned along the rotational axis. Using most any D.C. motor up to a maximum of 12 VDC @ 5 amps, it can easily cause a solar collector, reflector or array to follow the sun through a single axis. Motors suitable for this system can move quite large loads as long as proper gearing or lead screws are used. The controller uses a differential sensing approach and can drive the motor in either direction. There is no "reposition for the morning" electronics, but I intentionally used sensors with a wide field of view. In the morning the "east" sensor will trip and the controller will position to point at the morning sun.
This controller will work with 12V motors, solar panels, and batteries. Actually, they will work with any voltage from about 8V to around 18V. You should not exceed 20V with these. You will need to mount this under glass or plastic to protect it from the weather. A glass or plastic jar upside down works pretty good. Wiring instructions are included. You should use limit switches in your design unless what you are controlling is free to move in a full circle, or they are built into your actuators. Here is a good link on how to wire limit switches: http://www.beam-wiki.org/wiki/Using_Limit_Switches
The controller has enough hysteresis built-in to the design so that it does not oscillate and positions the device smoothly. This controller can also be used to steer any device along a single axis to follow a light source. Note that this controller is tuned for sunlight, I use a 3 watt LED light to test it with. If you are planning on using this for something other than tracking the sun, please let me know and I can adjust the sensitivity of your board.
Solid state, no relays to wear out. Controller has indicator LED's to let your know when the sensors have tripped.
Please note that I also have these that run on 24V.
This solar tracking controller will drive a motor to position anything you want to follow the sun on a single axis. It can be used to position solar cells, a reflector to heat water, or anything else. The controller is mounted on the object to be steered with the sensors positioned along the rotational axis. Using most any D.C. motor up to a maximum of 24 VDC @ 3 amps, it can easily cause a solar collector, reflector or array to follow the sun through a single axis. Motors suitable for this system can move quite large loads as long as proper gearing or lead screws are used. This can be wired to control relays to move arbitrarily large motors. The controller uses a differential sensing approach and can drive the motor in either direction. There is no "reposition for the morning" electronics, but I intentionally used sensors with a wide field of view. In the morning the "east" sensor will trip and the controller will position to point at the morning sun.
This controller will work with 12V motors, solar panels, and batteries. Actually, they will work with any voltage from about 10V to around 30V. You should not exceed 30V with these. You will need to mount this under glass or plastic to protect it from the weather. A glass or plastic jar upside down works pretty good. Wiring instructions are included. You should use limit switches in your design unless what you are controlling is free to move in a full circle, or they are built into your actuators. Here is a good link on how to wire limit switches: http://www.beam-wiki.org/wiki/Using_Limit_Switches
The controller has enough hysteresis built-in to the design so that it does not oscillate and positions the device smoothly. Hyteresis is tunable in this model. This controller can also be used to steer any device along a single axis to follow a light source. Note that this controller is tuned for sunlight, I use a 3 watt LED light to test it with. If you are planning on using this for something other than tracking the sun, please let me know and I can adjust the sensitivity of your board.
Solid state, no relays to wear out. Controller has indicator LED's to let your know when the sensors have tripped.
This solar tracking controller will drive a motor to position anything you want to follow the sun on a single axis. It can be used to position solar cells, a reflector to heat water, or anything else. The controller is mounted on the object to be steered with the sensors positioned along the rotational axis. Using most any D.C. motor up to a maximum of 36 VDC @ 3 amps, it can easily cause a solar collector, reflector or array to follow the sun through a single axis. Motors suitable for this system can move quite large loads as long as proper gearing or lead screws are used. This can be wired to control relays to move arbitrarily large motors. The controller uses a differential sensing approach and can drive the motor in either direction. There is no "reposition for the morning" electronics, but I intentionally used sensors with a wide field of view. In the morning the "east" sensor will trip and the controller will position to point at the morning sun.
This controller will work with 12V motors, solar panels, and batteries. Actually, they will work with any voltage from about 10V to around 38V. You should not exceed 40V with these. You will need to mount this under glass or plastic to protect it from the weather. A glass or plastic jar upside down works pretty good. Wiring instructions are included. You should use limit switches in your design unless what you are controlling is free to move in a full circle, or they are built into your actuators. Here is a good link on how to wire limit switches: http://www.beam-wiki.org/wiki/Using_Limit_Switches
The controller has enough hysteresis built-in to the design so that it does not oscillate and positions the device smoothly. Hyteresis is tunable in this model. This controller can also be used to steer any device along a single axis to follow a light source. Note that this controller is tuned for sunlight, I use a 3 watt LED light to test it with. If you are planning on using this for something other than tracking the sun, please let me know and I can adjust the sensitivity of your board.
Solid state, no relays to wear out. Controller has indicator LED's to let your know when the sensors have tripped.
This is the circuit board that goes with my article on building the Smart Chargers for Versapak batteries, which you can find in the September 2010 issue of Servo magazine and here. This is designed to use the stock Versapak charger case, and the battery connection terminals from same, to rebuild one into a smart charger. You would also need a nominal 12V power supply to run this, see my article in the magazine for details. This is just the circuit board, no parts or components are included. Schematic and parts list will be included. If there is enough interest I will compile a "kit" that includes all the parts, as well as instructions, and of course the boards.
This is the circuit that goes with my article on building the Smart Chargers for Versapak batteries, which you can find in the September 2010 issue of Servo magazine and here This is designed to use the stock Versapak charger case, and the battery connection terminals from same, to rebuild one into a smart charger. You would also need a nominal 12V power supply to run this, see my article in the magazine for details. This is the circuit board and the parts and components. Schematic and parts list will be included.
This is the circuit board that goes with my article on building the Smart Chargers for Versapak batteries, which you can find in the September 2010 issue of Servo magazine and here This is designed to use the stock Versapak charger case, and the battery connection terminals from same, to rebuild one into a smart charger. You would also need a nominal 12V power supply to run this, see my article in the magazine for details. This is the circuit board and the parts and components, assembled and tested. You will need to solder on the battery connectors from your board, and the two power wires from your power supply. Schematic and parts list will be included.
There spring weather where I live is often below freezing at night, then into the 70s the next day.
A friend of mine gave me a cold frame to keep my seedlings in, but I got tired of opening and closing it every day to keep the plants from cooking during the day and freezing during the night.
This is something I designed to do this for me. It is meant to control a linear actuator or small DC motor to open and close windows in cold frames or greenhouses or whatever. It has two adjustable set points, a "close it's to cold" set point and an "open it's to hot" set point. I will send these out preset to 5C (41F) and 35C (95F), but they are adjustable, on the cold side you can go from approximately -30C/-28F to 38C/101F and on the hot side you can go from approximately 0C/32F to 68C/154F.
Yes, there are mechanical versions with wax that do this for greenhouse windows.
However:
The good ones that do this are expensive, more expensive than this board.
The cheap ones don't last very long.
The mechanical openers are quite large. To big for some cold boxes.
The mechanical openers are not adjustable, or not very adjustable.
As long as you don't exceed the amp rating of this board, you can open multiple windows with one control board.
You can also use the output of the board to trip relays to open arbitrarily large windows.
Board is designed to run at a nominal 12V and will handle 5 amp motors. You should use limit switches in your design unless they are built into your actuator. Here is a good link on how to wire limit switches: http://www.beam-wiki.org/wiki/Using_Limit_Switches
I include a temp sensor, as in the pictures. If you want a remote probe, so you can open and close your windows or whatever based on temperatures that are not located at the control board, see the remote probe below. (I will combine shipping if you order them at the same time.)
This is a remote temperature probe cased and potted, puts out 10mV per decree C. Works with the differential thermostat and the thermostatic opener in my store below. I will combine shipping if you purchase this with one of those. You will need to extend this with piece of wire to whatever length you need.
Some people who buy my tracker boards want to run BIG motors with them. I always say: "This can be wired to control relays to move arbitrarily large motors", and I provide this link for directions on how to do this: http://www.spellingbusiness.com/isolation_relay_circuit.jpg
However, some don't want to wire the relays themselves. For these I have provided this relay module. This should be used when you are wanting to run BIG motors with my trackers.
Specs:
12V - 30 amps
24V - 15 amps
36V - 8 amps
If you are not sure whether to get the relay module, send me an email and I'll help you choose. Most people who use actuators don't need this module. Builders who are using their own motors may or may not. Builders using drill motors should use the relay module.
You should use limit switches in your design unless what you are controlling is free to move in a full circle, or they are built into your actuators. Here is a good link on how to wire limit switches: http://www.beam-wiki.org/wiki/Using_Limit_Switches
Please note that I sell 12V, 24V, and 36V versions of these. You will need to specify which version when you check out.
You can visit my ebay store for more solar and electronics items. http://www.spellingbusiness.com
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