Hmm, my son's new desktop hydroponics system is pre-ensh*ttified. Can't set the grow mode without an app, and the company is going out of business on January 1st. 😡 (Aerogarden). Nothing I can't fix with an Arduino or ESP32 and some relays, but...
Looks like for between $10 and $20 you can get yourself a 4-channel (or even just a 2-channel) ESP32 board, already all wired up, and you just need to connect your light and pump up and build yourself a little Wi-Fi or Bluetooth enabled control interface for setting some timers... Lots of random pre-built circuit boards from many sources. Need to check the voltage on those controls though, if they are not 5V they are 12V. #ESP32 #controller
Simple ESP32 web server. #ESP32 https://esp32io.com/tutorials/esp32-web-server
Plenty of examples of turning timers on and off, of course. #ESP32 https://randomnerdtutorials.com/esp32-esp8266-web-server-timer-pulse/
@ai6yr
I messed with the ESP32 back in 2019. Fun but had no serious use for it.
These days in my spare time I got my PIC development system back up and running and created some PIC-centric precision temperature sensors. Now I'm working on getting a Raspi talking to an SX1276 LoRa. After that, I'll develop software for the PIC to control a LoRa module and get them talking. Then I'll probably do a PC layout for the PIC and LoRa to easily produce small sensor modules I can install in various places and network them all together with the Raspi. The Raspi will upload the data to my server and it becomes available to monitor. That's the current fun project.
@ai6yr Yeah. Pretty wicked when I get it all working properly.
I mainly want to monitor and record temperatures in various rooms, coolers, and freezers, and I want precise data (0.1 C accuracy). Then I might play with other sensors.
I don't want to depend on WiFi and the Internet. LoRa solves that. The primary stuff I want to monitor is about 950 feet from here but LoRa gives me range up to several miles.
@shuttersparks Oooh, sounds fun!