DIY Automatic hydro Grow

**rolln1up** · 03-19-2008, 02:43 PM

The Project: Build a grow room that can be operated by a computer which allows for monitoring visually through a webcam, and through sensors to include air/water temp., RH, PH, & EC. It will also be capable of adjusting all grow conditions and maintain an ideal environment at all times. I will be building and designing much of this myself with the goal of it being as cheap as possible and still be very functional. Any comments, questions, or suggestions are welcomed here. I plan on making this journal very comprehensive as to everything I do to get it working with enough detail for someone to follow and duplicate my process so if I leave something out let me know.

The Grow Room:The grow room I am using as the experiment is a 4' x 3' x 7' cabinet that bought form home Depot for $108, fitted with a 400 watt HID light $230. MH for veg and a HPS for flower. It contains two 18 Gal Tupperware containers fitted with 3 plants each in a DWC. Exhaust is a 50 CFM fan from home depot $12.

Computer and supplies: I got this computer given to me sometime ago and its an old HP with an 800 MHZ processor and 126 MB ram. The connection for the keyboard on the mother board has gone bad and the cable must be pulled down for it to make connection and work, As it will be operated remotely it will not be a problem. Webcam is an aiptek with built in camera capture button. Old as shit but also free. I have installed PClinxOS on the computer as the OS but this may change to slackware or another distro depending on problems I run into The basic design for the serial port controller is here

I will be heavily modify it to run the controllers but it the basic start. I will be programing it using freeBASIC and the freebasiccompiler; both applications free on Linux. My experience with basic programing is limited so if anyone has experience and would like to help let me know as I am sure I will need it. I have a design for the tempiture sensor and EC sensor as well but I will upload those later as I need to upload the circuits. Well that should give you a basic idea of the project I will post as I work on it PEACE

**email468** · 03-19-2008, 02:48 PM

subscribed - there are quite a few computer folks on here - i am a sys-admin (UNIX) and loudblunts is a network admin and there are some coders on here too.

unfortunately, i know nothing about basic but if you need some shell scripting done or Perl - let me know.

in the meanwhile - good luck -- i'll be watching this one!

**toolage** · 03-19-2008, 02:58 PM

+rep for this one, i dont know anything about that kind of stuff but I will purchase the software from you when you finish it lol

**cbraaszsy** · 03-19-2008, 03:10 PM

SOUNDS good i'll be watching.

**LoudBlunts** · 03-19-2008, 03:47 PM

wow...i want in. although im completely confused on how you'd do it. i've been interested for a long time about this....but i hate programming. fuckin A!!!

im completely at your services! network help signing in!!!

**rolln1up** · 03-19-2008, 05:02 PM

I've decide to switch OS to Ubuntu because I have experience with similar setups using it am having problems with ssh and vnc on PClinuxOs. I want to thank everyone for the support. I'll get pics of the computer grow room and cam pics online soon

email468 is there a way to allow access to a web page hosting live images of grow room and current conditions whale keeping my location secure. I have used proxys before but I don't think I could use one and still host a webpage. It not a big issue but I thought alive feed showing what I'm monitoring and controlling could really add to the journal but I don't want to broadcast where I am.

**email468** · 03-19-2008, 05:07 PM

Originally Posted by rolln1up

I've decide to switch OS to Ubuntu because I have experience with similar setups using it am having problems with ssh and vnc on PClinuxOs. I want to thank everyone for the support. I'll get pics of the computer grow room and cam pics online soon

email468 is there a way to allow access to a web page hosting live images of grow room and current conditions whale keeping my location secure. I have used proxys before but I don't think I could use one and still host a webpage. It not a big issue but I thought alive feed showing what I'm monitoring and controlling could really add to the journal but I don't want to broadcast where I am.

record on a webcam and post the movie of it rather than a live feed would be my knee-jerk reaction.

i've never had to do anything like that but i would think as much control you have over your network would be important. Multiple IPs and control over DNS would be, I think a requirement for any kind of real security - anyone else have any thoughts about this?

You would also have to rotate your IPs all the time and redirect from something like tiny DNS and then redirect to a fake IP that actually responds to http requests. Hmmmm. anonymous browsing is one thing - but anonymous serving is tricky i think!

**panhead** · 03-19-2008, 05:32 PM

Boy do i feel stupid after reading this thread

.

**email468** · 03-19-2008, 05:49 PM

Originally Posted by panhead

Boy do i feel stupid after reading this thread

.

it is the lingo man - trust me this computer stuff is far easier than doing a top end on a panhead and i'm betting by your handle you know how easy that is

**LoudBlunts** · 03-19-2008, 09:35 PM

Originally Posted by email468

record on a webcam and post the movie of it rather than a live feed would be my knee-jerk reaction.

i've never had to do anything like that but i would think as much control you have over your network would be important. Multiple IPs and control over DNS would be, I think a requirement for any kind of real security - anyone else have any thoughts about this?

You would also have to rotate your IPs all the time and redirect from something like tiny DNS and then redirect to a fake IP that actually responds to http requests. Hmmmm. anonymous browsing is one thing - but anonymous serving is tricky i think!

correct.

i would also create a macro so it would actually post the video at decided times or whenever you wanted it to update it self.