Building HeaterMeter PID - DIY

[tnlyne]

Here's the results of the inaugural run. PID controls worked good for adhoc choice of PID values. I'm currently using HM PID values of B=0, P=10, I =0.007, D=20. I opened the box around 1pm because I forgot to add the water/cider container. Opened again around 5:10pm to check. Finally took off 5:50pm. PID did a great job holding at 235 degrees. I may do some more number playing in the future but these values look pretty darn good.

Libo-
I can do steps manually or scripted. I might do that when I do a brisket. Here's a page with some example "alarm" scripts:
https://github.com/CapnBry/HeaterMeter/wiki/Alarm-Script-Recipes


And yes you can check temps when you are fishing. This is EXACTLY what I did today. I threw the ribs in the BBQ and went ice fishing with my father in law. For ribs I didn't need to watch while fishing but it was fun to do anyway. The other REALLY cool feature I like about this is that I can set low and high alarms. These alarms will trigger a piezo buzzer in the HM making lots of noise if I tell it to. Additionally, I have any alarms directly routed to my phone using a service called push bullet. It's basically the same as instant messaging me if anything I have programmed leaves a threshold. With that I can manually log into the HM for manual control updates or I can run home and handle the "situation" should that ever happen.


Divot-
The current setpoint is in the upper right corner and also is the red line on the graph. With the graph you can see set point changes over time. For example, if I used a ramping feature you would have seen that in the red line and PID control reactions.


I have a brisket in the fridge I intend to do in a few days (gotta start the brining and injecting process soon). If I remember I'll try to plan a ramping profile on that to show setpoint changes through some alarm scripts I can program into it. I'll also try a ramp down profile for when the brisket reaches near final temp.

 

[DivotMaker]

Tony,

I looked at the programming scripts link...yikes!   Serious flashbacks to the old days of DOS, Fortran and Cobol!  I'm pretty techy, and computer-savvy, but that is way beyond anything I would want to deal with to smoke a butt.  Are you figuring-out a way to simplify that process, like the Auber?  If the "steps" are not easy to set, with a few button presses, you will not be able to market this to anyone but serious nerds, imo.  Looks like a very promising unit; you just need to figure a way to easily program it, for the non-tech person.

 

[tnlyne]

Tony (DM)-

Scripts are more difficult but that's why we have support forums.  There are easier methods of controls for the HM as well. For example, here's the alarms page where I can set an alarm and/or change the setpoint when a threshold is hit. For example, I could enable the Probe1 threshold to 190 degrees (i.e. internal temp of food it's probed into) and then have it change the setpoint to 140 degrees for holding. This HeaterMeter is awesome for both power users and novices. If you don't want to play with webpage settings you can also use the black four way switch on the actual box to change settings as well (such as setpoint). I did this to "start" my smoke today since I was at the smoker I used the box to set the setpoint then I went to the webpage and started watching. 

 

[Libohunden]

Tman,

I'm liking this thing more and more.  Is it waterproof too????

I'll be watching your Brisket smoke later this week!

 

[tnlyne]

Libohunden-


I think I have about $235-$250 invested in this. That don't include my time though. I have a rough parts and price breakdown at the base of this thread. I think it's pretty close to Auber prices but gives more features and capability. I enjoyed the project though. Wasn't sure how to make it happen but everything came together smoothly for me. I have a background in computers and engineering though. Something like this may not be for anyone. I don't think it was very difficult though since there are lots of step by step instructions available and many support resources available.

 

[tnlyne]

Tman,

I'm liking this thing more and more.  Is it waterproof too????

I'll be watching your Brisket smoke later this week!

No... That's on my soon to address list. I think I'm going to just make a tupperware container with some cuts in the side for cables to use when there is any chance of rain or bad weather. I may think about a cleaner/better way of waterproofing too. I might bring this topic up on the heatermeter forums as a good discussion point. I don't think it would take much to make it waterproof. The biggest concern areas would be the LCD and the switch opening.

 

[tnlyne]

FYI-

I also have a second one of these built up and almost ready to go. I'm likely selling it. If you don't like messing around with soldering, ordering parts, and building the thing you can private message me about negotiating a deal for a complete unit. On my second unit I haven't bought the thermocouple, probes, or electric smoker modification components because there are choices and options which not everyone would want to keep the same.

 

[tnlyne]

Another cool feature the HM has (sorry if I'm sounding like a broken record - I just love playing with this thing) is database stashing/archiving. So, I can save each of my smokes in the HM device itself and then I can name and date them. So if you found a perfect smoke or perfect profile you can recall it later and review it for repeat-ability in the future. See examples below:

 

[BedouinBob]

Man Tony, that is one cool box.

 

[Barrel99]

Tony, I have to say you are producing an amazing box. The true inventive spirit and I really enjoy watching the development.

 

[DivotMaker]

It's definitely coming along, Tony!  Curious - how many "steps" can you program into it, and how are they triggered? 

 

[tnlyne]

Thanks guys. I'm loving the toy and I'll be continuing to use and learn about it in the months/years to come.


Tony-


The HM don't necessarily have the concept of "steps" as you are accustom with the Auber. HM uses "alarms" and shell scripts to manage a wide range of programming options. These scripts are usually 5-15 lines of commands (called recipes) that do whatever you want them to do. For example, I could set an alarm that triggers when internal meat probe1 reaches 190 degrees. I could have that alarm to send me a text message or email letting me know the event happened and then have it reduce the smoker setpoint to 140 degrees for a holding temperature if I wanted. Some more complicated alarms could be set by using "cron" job timers that manage time based events and settings.


Basically, if a user wants to dream up a crazy smoking profile and they don't know how to make it happen they could post a question to this forum or the heatermeter forum and we could try to give them the "recipe" to achieve what they are looking for. For the simpler minded folks they could use basic alarms to make a single change to setpoint on triggering event (such as moving to smoker holding temp when internal meat reaches cooked temp range). Once you get a complex recipe it should be saved so you can just tweak the values (time/temp/etc...) and activate the recipe later.


Basic recipe examples are halfway down the webpage here (under the recipes section). I know you found this page intimidating at first but once you tried a few recipes I think you'd find it not that hard to use and tweak for repeat cooking later.


Alternatively, because this setup is web page enabled you can literally control everything by clicking on webpage links. For example, if you are remotely monitoring the cooking session (i.e. from work) and find that the meat is getting very close to done and you want to change the setpoint temperature right then and there you can do so. It's like being at the smoker and moving the analog dials but you can do it remotely from anywhere! You can set the setpoint to zero which should effectively shut off the smoker!


If I get my second unit up and running this weekend I'll try to create a weblink for you guys to log into and play around with the settings to see how the web interface and configuration works (just don't mess with the network settings or you'll lose connectivity with it) . I have my current HM locked down with a password so folks don't screw up my configuration. The "Alarms", "Archive", and "Configuration" links can be seen at the bottom of the webpage when you visit my HM webpage.


Dream me up a brisket "recipe" and I'll try to figure it out before I smoke later this week. If you get really complex I'll probably need to consult experts on the other forum and I don't know if that'll keep up with my timeline for this particular smoking session. I'm making my brine tonight, inject tomorrow, and probably throw in smoker early wednesday morning. That's tentative plans anyway.

 

[DivotMaker]

Wow, Tony!  Makes it look like I'm flying a Piper Cub, and you're piloting the Space Shuttle! 

 

[tnlyne]

Well, flying the shuttle is easy since they don't leave the ground anymore. 

 

[DivotMaker]

Hehe...great point!

 

[BedouinBob]

Dude! Heavy programming here! Not sure us mere mortals have a chance. 

 

[tnlyne]

I haven't done a single line of code for programming this project so far. Everything you guys have witnessed is "out of the box" capabilities.

I did copy 5 lines of code from another forum to enable my cell phone notifications but that was it! I wish we could all get together and have a party for live demonstrations. I'd have you all converted in no time flat! 

Literally, 99% of what I've done is just reading and following instructions to make this beauty work. I should have better known what I was getting myself into here. Showing a group of folks who take pride in calling themselves "Lazy-Q'ers" and have vested interests in drinking beers, perfecting the art of smoking, and keeping things simple! I have those same aspirations, but apparently I'm breaking some of the rules.    I'm bringing Lazy-Q to the next level for visualizing the parameters of perfection and hopefully helping make them consistently repeatable!

It may seem daunting to watch right now but I think eventually some of you will come around and see the light.

 

[NDKoze]

Maybe a YouTube video of a setup and configuration for a smoke?

 

[tnlyne]

I'll think about that Gregg. My setup for this brisket was literally plug in the cables, click 4-way switch on the box to change the setpoint to 225º and that was pretty much all I really needed to do. I optionally went into the configuration and put an alarm on one of the food probes so that when the point reaches 190º, the setpoint will drop to a holding temperature of 140º. I did this just in case I wasn't around to pull and wrap the brisket at 190º.

I did take lots of photos of my setup in the kitchen last night. I'll size them and upload them tonight to the live smoke thread I started. I might also add a few of them to this thread for adding clarity.

 

[tnlyne]

Here are some pics to get a better idea of what the HeaterMeter PID controller looks like while connected to the smoker. The only two cables I permanently wired out of the smoker are the Cat5 Ethernet cable and the Thermocouple probe for the pit temperatures. These are seen in the first image below (not connected). The HeaterMeter (HM) is the blue case device on top of the smoker and it has a power cable plugged into it (AC wall socket power supply which converts to 12VDC for powering the HM). The HM supports 1 thermocouple and 3 additional thermistor probes for reading simultaneous temperatures (at least for the model I built here). It also supports a Wi-Fi adapter for viewing its advanced graphing and configuration features with a webpage browser.

On this next picture I show a cheap battery holder I bought from Amazon which holds 8 - AA batteries and can be used to power the HeaterMeter if you don't want to use the AC/DC power supply. I tested this battery pack with 8 NiMH batteries and it worked great for an 8 hour rib smoke. Not sure how useful this is but I wanted to show the device can run on a battery option.

HM powered up with nothing connected shows on the backlit LCD that the thermocouple is not connected "- No Pit Probe -" and the "Ambient" air (option I installed) thermistor shows "69º". The labels that show up on the LCD can be named whatever you want and I just chose "Ambient" for this identifier. The thermistor that gives ambient temperatures is installed on the port for probe #3 and can be configured to disabled if you want to use port #3 for an additional thermistor probe sensor. The ambient air thermistor isn't all that accurate because it's inside the HM box which allows for heat build-up and other variations in its readings.

The LCD on the HM is backlit and its brightness level can be controlled with the 4 way button switch on the front or through the webpage configuration interface. This picture is currently 50% brightness

Plugging in the thermocouple and Cat5 cable, the HM will start reading the pit probe and display it on the LCD (and webpage if you had a web browser navigating to your HM). You'll notice it also has 3 Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) on the front of the HM. These lights can be configured for various trigger events. I currently have mine configured for:

• Green = (Output > 0%) -> lit when HM is commanding power to the heating element
• Yellow = (Pit Temp Reached) -> lit when the current setpoint temperature has been achieved
• Red = (Lid Open) -> lit when someone has the door open and the pit has dropped 6% from its setpoint

The picture below is just a clearer picture showing the Power, Cat5 Ethernet, and Thermocouple connections made to the HM.

Below I show the two ThermoWorks TX-1001X-OP food probes for providing my meat internal temps.

When I plug the food probes into the HM the LCD begins to show the values they are providing. Again, note that the labels for the probes are configurable. At the time of this photo I labeled them "Meat Probe1" and "Meat Probe2". During my brisket smoke I changed these to "Point" and "Flat" for location I probed them into the meat.

Below I show the configurable options from the physical HM unit itself.

Here it is all hooked up and controlling the smoker. You can see the smoker light on also showing that the SI2 is heating up the electric element.

And finally here is a current picture of the webpage showing my live smoke 21 hours into when it started. This is taking MUCH longer than I anticipated so waiting for this thing to get done tonight looks like it's going to keep me up for a while.