KurtE
Senior Member+
I live out in the country on some acreage. and this morning, I spent some time, having some maintenance done on our well systems. Each time I work on the system, it makes me feel like I should do something to monitor the system, before it bites me in the ...
Rough system information:
The pump house is somewhere between 50 and 100 yards from the house and the trees are growing like mad between the buildings. The Pump House/Wells are on a different Meter/Transformer than the House and unfortunately I did not run any wires between the pump house and the House.
The Pump house has a reasonably large tank (2800 gallons) and a pressure pump/tank. The tank has a low float switch to not allow the pressure pump to run if the tank is out of water.
The Tank also has another pressure switch toward the top, that turns on the wells to refill the tank. The water goes through some filters before actually making it to the tank. Currently the system will run both wells when the tank asks for water, and they will only shut off when the tank is full, which shuts off the power to the wells, or if the wells run dry, the well saver will shut the pump off...
Some things, I think that would be good to monitor and potentially Alarm:
1) Water Tank level: Not sure the easiest way to measure. The tank is probably 7" tall, so maybe some form of distance measure, like mentioned in: http://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=376722 Would be good to measure, and if it gets too low, some form of alarm.
2) How often and how long is the pressure pump running. The pump runs on 220, so don't want to hook it up directly to teensy. What is a good way to measure when voltage is there? (Same issue on some other things as well)
3) When are the two pumps running? (Side note: Would like to see if there is a good way to run these pumps separately. That is ideally one pump runs and then maybe next time the other pump...)
4) Why did the pumps start/stop - Tank float goes down far enough to start the pumps. Do they turn off because the float went back or did the well go dry and the pump saver came on...
5) ... (maybe door switch, maybe water on floor...)
Now assuming I can use a teensy to collect the data. Next question is what to do with it? Could record to SD card or the like.
But if I only go to the pump house every few weeks, and there is a problem that is probably not the best solution. Wireless connection to house? XBee? Or maybe some other wireless? I don't want wifi that far out in the property? Have second unit as receiver, that maybe connects to my home network. Maybe have simple web page showing info/history? Maybe send me email when something does not look right?
Does this make sense? Suggestions? I should continue to do some more searches to see if there is a ready made system that does most of this.
Thanks
Kurt
Rough system information:
The pump house is somewhere between 50 and 100 yards from the house and the trees are growing like mad between the buildings. The Pump House/Wells are on a different Meter/Transformer than the House and unfortunately I did not run any wires between the pump house and the House.
The Pump house has a reasonably large tank (2800 gallons) and a pressure pump/tank. The tank has a low float switch to not allow the pressure pump to run if the tank is out of water.
The Tank also has another pressure switch toward the top, that turns on the wells to refill the tank. The water goes through some filters before actually making it to the tank. Currently the system will run both wells when the tank asks for water, and they will only shut off when the tank is full, which shuts off the power to the wells, or if the wells run dry, the well saver will shut the pump off...
Some things, I think that would be good to monitor and potentially Alarm:
1) Water Tank level: Not sure the easiest way to measure. The tank is probably 7" tall, so maybe some form of distance measure, like mentioned in: http://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=376722 Would be good to measure, and if it gets too low, some form of alarm.
2) How often and how long is the pressure pump running. The pump runs on 220, so don't want to hook it up directly to teensy. What is a good way to measure when voltage is there? (Same issue on some other things as well)
3) When are the two pumps running? (Side note: Would like to see if there is a good way to run these pumps separately. That is ideally one pump runs and then maybe next time the other pump...)
4) Why did the pumps start/stop - Tank float goes down far enough to start the pumps. Do they turn off because the float went back or did the well go dry and the pump saver came on...
5) ... (maybe door switch, maybe water on floor...)
Now assuming I can use a teensy to collect the data. Next question is what to do with it? Could record to SD card or the like.
But if I only go to the pump house every few weeks, and there is a problem that is probably not the best solution. Wireless connection to house? XBee? Or maybe some other wireless? I don't want wifi that far out in the property? Have second unit as receiver, that maybe connects to my home network. Maybe have simple web page showing info/history? Maybe send me email when something does not look right?
Does this make sense? Suggestions? I should continue to do some more searches to see if there is a ready made system that does most of this.
Thanks
Kurt