An “orchidarium” experiment

[jkarlbarlow]

Sorry, that title should have read - An "orchidarium" experiment. I'm not sure why it put all those characters in there...

I recently picked up my first mounted orchid, Aerangis fastuosa, and a small Angraecum didieri in a basket. These two small orchids rapidly dry out in my house and I lost a couple leaves on the fastuosa very quickly as a result. This led me to consider growing in a terrarium.
I have a tank roughly 14 gallons in size that I setup to grow in. I have a working ability to do some process programming and had much of the material on hand. The tank has a temperature and humidity sensor that is hooked up to an arduino. Low humidity is handled by a fog maker and temperature by a heat mat. A large fan in the cover is turned on if the temperature starts to climb too high. It also vents if the humidity is excessive. A real time clock handles the sunrise/sunset times which controls a 4-bulb T5 fixture. There is a fan in the aquarium that runs constantly to keep the air moving.
So far the plants seems to like it. The fastuosa is growing a good looking new leaf and the the didieri has active root growth. I am lookin. For feedback on the settings and the setup. Has anyone tried this before here, an automated environmental control? I have the temperature set to 22C (71.6F) minimum, 27C (80.6F) maximum with a 5C drop in temperature overnight. The humidity is kept between 65-75%RH. Is there anything else I should be concerned about?
Mounted orchids in terrarium by jkarlbarlow, on Flickr
A picture of the setup. The sensor is on the back wall. A few tilandsia and CPs are in the the orchids.

Mounted orchids in terrarium by jkarlbarlow, on Flickr

Mounted orchids in terrarium by jkarlbarlow, on Flickr

 

[cnycharles]

interesting!

tapatalk has a problem with ' and " characters
at least my iphone version


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[Ozpaph]

sounds good.
Id be interested in hearing about the 'arduino' device and your control systems.

 

[jkarlbarlow]

The setup is shown below. It is still a bit in prototype phase so don't mind the breadboard and jumper wires. The arduino is connected to an Si7021 temp/humidity sensor and DS3231 real time clock. In case you are interested, they are both I2C devices so they share the same pins on the arduino. The only other wires connect to an 8 relay breakout board. These control 4 separate outlets that power the grow-light, heat mat, fog maker, and exhaust fan. The arduino reads all sensors every 3 seconds and updates the outputs as needed. I am willing to share the code with anyone who would be interested, just let me know.

[/url]Orchidarium control by jkarlbarlow, on Flickr[/IMG]

Also, in case you are interested, I am writing the temperature and humidity data to a hosting site and it can be viewed at:
Orchidarium
The data is updated every couple minutes.

 

[NYEric]

From experience. Don't have the top completely closed. Even with a fan you can steam cook mounted orchids!

 

[Ozpaph]

that's impressive.
Can you control it remotely? ie say if the temp rose unexpectedly could you turn on a fan remotely?

 

[jkarlbarlow]

that's impressive.
Can you control it remotely? ie say if the temp rose unexpectedly could you turn on a fan remotely?

I do not have that capability, though I did think about having manual overrides. The exhaust fan will automatically come on anytime the temperature inside rises above 81F so my hope is that I shouldn’t have those unexpected temperature rises.

 

[Ozpaph]

I have installed an Elitech temp and humidity sensor which has real-time data sent to an iphone app. Its interesting but would like the ability to 'influence' the equipment.

 

[jkarlbarlow]

I have installed an Elitech temp and humidity sensor which has real-time data sent to an iphone app. Its interesting but would like the ability to 'influence' the equipment.

Ozpaph,
I suppose one of the easiest ways to set this up would be with an internet connected switch similar to the these. This would allow you to use an app to turn fans or lights or whatever on/off remotely. I have enough parts laying around to mock up something similar but arduino based but it was more complicated that i bargained for. Maybe some day I will put in the hours. The wifi switch would probably be up and running in less than 10 minutes.
By the way, does your name mean you live down under?

 

[Ozpaph]

thats an interesting idea, though not integrated.
yes, Australia

 

[jkarlbarlow]

I did muck around a bit more and did get a working integrated solution that involves using an app called Blynk to interface the phone with the arduino to control the outputs remotely. There is a lot of "black magic" going on behind the scenes and this means you can only use supported hardware. I have a wifi module that i have used on other projects but could not get it to work here because you cannot manually configure it. I did have another board in my box that I was able to get working, a NodeMCU, and they are cheap. Maybe this is more along the lines of what you were looking for?
I was wondering if you were from Australia because I spend a semester studying at Adelaide Uni. Really nice city.

Sorry if this thread is straying too far from orchid care..

 

[cnycharles]

its your thread, and you are sharing interesting info, so feel free to stray all over the place! Things are more interesting that way


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