24h timer with web interface
ArticleCategory: [Choose a category, do not translate
this]
Hardware
AuthorImage:[Here we need a little image from you]
TranslationInfo:[Author + translation history. mailto: or
http://homepage]
original in en Guido Socher
AboutTheAuthor:[A small biography about the author]
Guido likes Linux because it is a really good system to
develop your own hardware.
Abstract:[Here you write a little summary]
Timers are present everywhere. Many industrial control systems
needs timers. Your heating system might have
one where you can define when to change between day and night
profile. Sometimes you might just want a simple timers to
switch on/off the lights of the Christmas decoration.
What ever it is, a generic timer is useful for many things.
This timer has a web interface. You can program it with
a few mouse clicks. Because it is web based you can
change the timer remotely whenever you have an internet connection.
Even from your smartphone.
ArticleIllustration:[This is the title picture for your
article]
ArticleBody:[The article body]
What it looks like
The 24h Timer has a "calendar like" user interface. It is a table
and you can click onto the table fields. When the field is green
then the timer switches it's output on at that time. A field that is
not green means output off. To select or unselect multiple fields you can
click and drag with the mouse.
The smallest time interval on this 24h timer is 15min.
Here is a simulation of the user interface. Just try it!
Simulation of the 24h timer
To apply the changes you would enter a password and press on "save". Only
that would activate any changes made to the table.
Screenshot of the 24h Timer web interface.
Using it from the phone
Traditional mobile phones, even if they have a built in web browser,
do often not have a mouse cursor. You can therefore not select or activate
fields in the table. All recent smart phones (iphone or any android phone)
can be used. You just touch the table fields with your finger.
The 24 hour timer on a smart phone (samsung with android)
Manually changing the output
The 24h Timer has the possibility to attach a push button to the
tuxgraphics ethernet board. By pressing that button you can
manually switch the relay on or off.
Via the web interface you have as well the possibility to manually
overwrite the timer.
The manual overwrite does not switch the timer totally off. It just
changes the state of the relay for the moment.
Example: You have
selected in the table that the output should be on from 14:00-16:00
and from 17:00-18:00. If you switch the output manually off at
14:30 then the output will be off until 17:00.
Web interface to manually change the output of the timer (change the
state of relay temporarily).
The hardware
The software will run on a tuxgraphics ethernet board with an atmega328p or an
atmega644/atmega644p. Older boards with atmega88 or atmega168 are too small for such a big and complicated table.
Circuit diagram with external connections: relay and optional push button. A LED
can be attached to pin PB1 and it will blink with a frequency of 0.5Hz. If you
want to see the state of the relay then connect a LED with resistor in parallel
to the relay coil. The power supply connections for the ethernet board are not shown here. 5-6V DC and at least 0.2A is a good choice for the power supply. Look for an old mobile phone charger. Many of them provide voltages in that range and more than enough current. Those mobile phone chargers are usually compact and easy to get.
Click on the image for a PDF version.
Continuous power
In many places around the world the power grid is quite reliable
and will almost never fail. In the rare event that the power
fails you have to go around the house and set all clocks again.
This is valid for devices like stoves, microwaves, VCRs,... and
this 24h Timer.
The 24h Timer can however be powered temporarily from a battery.
This way you can bridge power outages that last just for a few
hours. If the ethernet board is equipped with a traditional voltage
regulator then it will consume the same amount of current no matter
the supply voltage. It will need about 170mA. If you equip it with a switched
voltage regulator such as the Recom R-783.3-0.5 then it will need less
current the higher the voltage is and the regulator will not get warm.
At 9V DC the board will consume less than 70mA. A 9V block battery will
be able to handle that for about 5-6 hours.
They wiring of such a setup with a battery buffer would look like this:
The 24h Timer battery buffered. The ethernet board must
be equipped with a Recom R-783.3-0.5 switched voltage regulator.
Click on the image for a PDF version.
The battery buffering is optional. It is not required if you are
happy with the reliability of your power grid.
Assembly
Here a few photos of the 24h timer
Front view
Back view, case open
I used an old mobile phone charger as power supply for the ethernet board. It's
the little black box on the right besides the ethernet board. The relay is the small black
item in the middle. The north american power socket on the left is the output.
References/Download