Bunnings 4 outlet programmable power board

[Bad Inferno]

I was in bunnings today and looked at a 4 way 240VAC power board that has an in built electronic timer. Each of the 4 power outlets has 4 programmable on/off times. This is great for lights, moon light and I was thinking of putting my air pump on, only at night. It must be built just for Aquariums :lol:

Now for Baldy and DIYJ if your reading :shock: we should look at maybe hacking this unit to provide a 1wire 240VAC switching unit. The unit itself would already have the 240 switches (Triac ?) and the electronic timer somehow triggers them on/off. So I was thinking all we may need to add is 4 x opto isolator and turn the opto on/off from a 1wire output...All very safe and effective...who's going to buy the first one and open it up...? they are only $25.00

[ILLUSN]

I'll bite, going to bunnings tomorrow to get a few powerbords and timers anyway, you want me to pull it apart and get some good photos with the SLR?

[Bad Inferno]

just lets know if you can actually see the switching devices...relay or Triac if you don't kill yourself doing it how we might take out the clock bits and install some interfaces

[ILLUSN]

will do mate.

[Tommo]

Bad Inferno Do You Have A Brand Name And Part Number For The Power Board ?

Cheers

[Bad Inferno]

FISHO NO there was just a stack of them in Bunnings, I was in geelong for the day. It was NOT a known brand like Arlec, HPM etc..however did have an LCD display and a couple of buttons...I think it also stated it can handle two wide power adapters....I should of just picked one up whilst I was there :(

[Tommo]

I'd Be A Little Skeptical On The No Name Stuff ! Untill You Get A Really Good Look As To Whats Inside ! If There .5 Or 1 Amp Relay Contacts They Will $h!T Themselves In No Time .

[Bad Inferno]

Illusn...In my enthusiasm, I didn't actually acknowledge who the first post was from...I thought you where Bald_noggin (don't know if thats good or bad !) who built the 240VAC switching unit.

Please do not take the unit apart on my behalf unless you know what you are doing....ie electrician, 240VAC can kill you....

cheers

[Bad Inferno]

Doh...its in the bunnings catalogue which was delivered today."the big book of fathers day gifts"

.brand is Heller on page 45

[Tommo]

Yes 240v Hurts!" I Know, So Does 415Volts" I Think If I Ever Went To Get My Heart Tested,On One Of Thoes Special Machines. " Dont Know The Name Of Them"They Would Tell Me I Have Had Atlest 8 Heart Attacks !

But You Can Never Get Hurt If The Power Is Off! Unless A Capacitor Or Choke Or Ballast Is Discharging.
Dont Work On Live Equipment !!!!!!! 8-)


[/quote]

[Bald_noggin]

I'll bite too!! I'll drop into bunnings tomorrow and see if they have them in stock. If so, I'll grab one and beging and autopsy. :twisted: Yes, I am qualified, I have certificates in electronics and I use to work for a Funeral Parlour! :shock:

[Tommo]

Nice :lol: You Have To Show Me Some Pic's Bad Inferno, And Just For The Record I Was Not Trying To Tell Anyone To Suck Eggs Either :D

[Bad Inferno]

Fisho...Bald_N built a switching unit, see the tank monitor thread in this forum DIY...

I see your a sparky....I am not day to day involved anymore with 240 however am an instrument tech by trade..thus have built lots of 240VAC panels...Hopefully some of this is useful in my new tank building...its in the amazon garden forum under Vision Journal. I have 1wire relays at the moment switching 24VDC devices

cheers

rob

[DIY]

Sounds promising!

If they are anything like the single electronic timers it will be based on relays. Look forward to pics & details :blob

Close up pics of the relays (or triacs), circuit board etc will be handy :thumb

[Bald_noggin]

I have aquired one of those powerboards. The autopsy will begin later tonight if not tomorrow.

Nurse, screwdriver please........ :D

[Tommo]

SORRY You Are A Instro Tech ???? There Is Not To Many Of Us Left In The World !!! I Am Dual Trade "Dont Get Me Wrong In am Not Smart " :P

Cheers Tommo !

[Tommo]

And The Prognosis Being ?
Gee Bad Inferno And I Tought You Were An Insto Tech Geezzzzzzz!
Cheers Tommo !

[Bad Inferno]

Tommo,
Really busy this week so will have to let Illusn, Baldy and DIYJ to have the first look ...Its in good hands, we got a Scientist, Telecommunications guy and DIYJ well I don't know what he does however do know he can make cct boards !

I will be ordering some more 1wire Digital outputs from dallas this week. Although I may just try and use the 4 channel A/D which is one chip and also has a DO function when you don't use the AI functions.

[DIY]

DIYJ well I don't know what he does however do know he can make cct boards !

I do as little as possible :lol: :lol: :lol:. Electronics, just like aquariums is a hobby for me and it's great when I can combine them :wink:

I work in IT, there's so many cowboys & idiots in IT I'm almost embarrased to admit it these days :(

[Tommo]

Ok Cool ........Lets Hope This All Works Out ,Who Ever Is Giving It A Crack Good Luck :salute

[Bald_noggin]

OK. I have the results of the post mortem. I'll be back with the result in a bout 30 minutes. I have resize the pics and watch a little of the footy!

Col.

[Bad Inferno]

Well I suppose I've waited this long so another 30 minutes wont hurt..especially if your a West coast supporter, I know you'll rather be on the discus forums than watch them get thrashed by the saints !


For me go Collingwood

[Bald_noggin]

O.K. Here we go. This will be spread over several post due the amount of photo's I have.

[Bald_noggin]

P.S. I'll have a brief run down in the last post. I'll then pull my briefs back up and describe what I've found.

[Bald_noggin]

:shock:

[Bad Inferno]

Looks great (well not the crappy soldering). I bet all we have to do is fit our own board where the LCD is placed, add a couple of opto isolators and we are set. I hope the ribbon cable running to the LCD just needs four of the conductors taken down to ground for the relays to turn on.

So, If we power the LED side of the Opto's from the 1wire bus and hopfully just connect the outputs into the ribbon cable. I suppose we need to know if the LCD relay control lines are either taken high or low. Open collector type of opto ?


Keep em comming

[Bald_noggin]

When I re-assembled the power board, I manage to get the LCD to work the way it should!

VERY IMPORTANT!!!!! The relays I presume are switched by 24VDC however, I did not measure this as there is no isolations from the mains! No transformers, no optocouplers. The entire circuit is LIVE!!!

This circuit can be very easily modified. Each individual relay is controlled by its own individual output line from the timer IC. No Multiplexing. This signal is feed in the C945 (NPN) transistor base pin. The Emitter is to what I presume to be a 0V rail. The collector connected to the +V rail by way of the relay. The relay has a supression diode for reverse EMF protection when the relay is de-energised. Also of the collector pin, is a 6.2Kohm resistor which in turn is then hooked up to the LED above the respective outlet to indicate its power status.

One strange thing that I noticed is that the 0V and +V rails for relays 1 and 2 were common but relays 3 and 4 had there own seperate 0V and +V rails which were only common to them!

Probably explains why there are 2 bridge rectifiers IC's on the AC input side of things.

I have some ideas on how mod this for one wire operation. It does involve sourcing a seperate 24VDC supply. Preferably one that is isolated from the mains. Other than that, rip the guts out except for the surge protector, mains cap, circuit breaker, relays, diode, resistors for the LEDs and the LED board. Apply your required signal to the Base of the transistors to switch the relays on.

Any questions??? PM me!!! :D

I hope you enjoyed. P.S. Did any one get the breifs gag???

[Bad Inferno]

great write up !

I assume fi we can just replace the lcd board we the same size cct board, the 1wire connections can be positioned to pop out of the LCD window ?

I would rather use the 5VDC on the 1wire bus to switch some optos and somehow wire the outputs into the existing cct. Hopefully no mods at all to the base board just solder the ribbon to a new cct board.

I gotta get one of these however on the other hand, need the time....How do you think they generate the low voltage to run the board ? Do they have one of those switch mode IC's ?

[Bald_noggin]

This is the power supply.

No switchmode. A couple of rectifiers and then some high volatge resisitors and zener diodes (CR1, 2 and 3).

As I said in my post, there is NO isolation from the mains. If a fault occured here, it could travel back into the 1-wire network and introduce a live mains voltage into your other equipment.

[Tommo]

GAF Yes What A P.OS ! ,Just A Quick Question "I Bought A Dual Module Timmer/Outlet But It Could Not Switch Both Relays AT The Same Time When It Stated That It Could . So My Question Is Can All Of The Relays Be Switch Individually At Any Time ? Or Do They Work In Tandem ?Bald_noggin Can You Program The Timer Unit For All Types Of Oppertions Eg 1 On 2,3,4 Off. 1,2 On 3,4 Off Etc Etc .

Cheers Tommo

P.S If you Ever Need To Call These @#@$wits Bont Bother Cos They Dont Even Know What They Sell !! "Past Experience"

[Bad Inferno]

Bald_N

Opto device probably good for 240VAC isolation if not higher between transistor side and LED...It comes down to track spacing.

Thus 1wire bus 5VDC can switch on the LED and just connect the transistor into the existing cct. i.e. the wires going up to the LCD..

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v319/rjconway/opto.jpg

[Bald_noggin]

The packaging claims to be able to program all 4 outputs individually. I have not really played around with setting it up. I give it a go in the next couple of days and let you know.

Key Features:
Surge Protection
7 Day digital timer
Reduced standby power consumption
4 individual programmable outlets
4 on/off programs per outlet
2 extra wide transformer spaces
Easy one button program check function
rendom function - sets a random program period of between 10-31 minutes during 0600-1800
Daylight savings function - switch to summertime without resetting the programs and current time
Built-in rechargable battery backup
Current time and date display
LCD screen

Then it cr&ps on about it's uses :lol:

[DIY]

I'm thinking this,

cut a small opening to suit an RJ45, using the 1-wire standard the connections will simply be

+5v (to power the 1-wire cct board only), gnd, 1-wire data.

Inside the power board put a very simple cct board, but carefully insulated from the rest, board is just a ds2408 or ds2450 with opt-coupled outputs. the opto-coupled (or if you like opto-isolated) outputs go to the c945 transistor.

Leave everything else intact but ensure the timer isn't porgrammed to do anything, and it can all be reversed if need be, ignoring the small cut-out of course.

[DIY]

Just saw your post Bad Inferno re: opto-coupler - that's exactly what I was thinking of!

[Bad Inferno]

DIYJ by the time we mount 4 optos 4 resistors and a DS2408 its going to take up quite a bit of room...

How do we find out what opto style is required I assume they have two types of outputs NPN or PNP ?

[Bald_noggin]

Yeah, that'll work. I have at work some chips that are (from memory), 4 optocouplers in one DIP. I'll get the details Monday when I return to work.

They are from some equipment that has been decommsioned and will never been used again. I've been told I can butcher it if I want.

I can't remember the part number and it's going to bug the $hit out me tonight!

[DIY]

Yep a qaud optoisolator would make it simpler & smaller, I'll do some searching, futurlec has a page of optoisolators so I'm sure theres something suitable from them.

[Bald_noggin]

Try PC846 by Sharp. I'm sure these are the ones I have at work!

[Bad Inferno]

Bald_N...what are the chances of a good installation if we takeout the lcd and replaced with a cct board and connect the ribbon to it.

4 channel opto $7:00 and I think I have a DS2408. I would like to have 2 x 4 port optos and a DS2408 (which has 8 channels) we could wire the power boards LED indicators back into the DS2408 as four inputs (5-8) and actually get feedback that the output is actually turned on. Is there a low power opto..i.e. does not take 17ma to turn on the LED. would need to look at this if we want to jump onto the back of the existing 4 LED's.

I assume the board has two power supplies as the relays if all 4 where turned on would be too much for their crappy bridge/zener power supply.

[Bald_noggin]

I'll disassemble the powerboard again over the weekend or at work on Monday. There are 3 zeners there so I'm figuring one may be for 5 volt for the timer IC.

If this is the case, then we can use this on the collector side of the optocouplers transistor and the emiter to the relays transistor base pin via a resistor. That way you still won't need to modify the LED side of things and you can reduce the amount of additional components required.

Sorry if I can't explain it clear enough but I'm starting to get a bit tired. I probaly should draw a schematic scan it in and post it.

[Bad Inferno]

The ribbon cable going to the LCD will have all the signals that are required to switch the relays already.

The LCD/control panel will have 4 "transistors/switches" that will take the relay control lines to the +VE rail thus switching the C945 (NPN). I think for an NPN transistor the base is taken high (+VE) to switch on. We probably need a cct of whats around the C945 (NPN) in the way of resistors.

Anyhow Bald_N what a great Autospy you where able to achieve. I wasn't going to rely on my 1wire (SLUG) to control 240VAC devices however it looks like it will be simple and safe. My SLUGs reliability has been very good actually have been able to get months of uptime out of it.

Now what do I need to switch which is 240VAC besides lights ! Maybe heaters when I do a water change or the ambient temperature is greater than 29 degrees, or tank temp 30+

[DIY]

I agree great the photos and info Bald_noggin,

I wonder if the 1-wire signal could be isolated with an opto isolator? that way the ds2408 could be connected straight to the 5v supply for the timer and directly to the transistors. hazards like fire are not really increased as the timer etc is already running that way.

[scuba123cliff]

Say what .......is it any good or not

[ellwa]

So what is the low down on this bad boy, hot or not?

[fishyfishyfish]

Hi there fishy friends :)

had a read of the thread and was wondering if anyone thought of removing the 240VAC all together from the input (power supply)?

I am building for my friend exactly the same and started this project some months ago. First i removed all 240VAC wireing and replaced the power supply with a low voltage power pack (cheap and isolated low voltage). Tested out the unit again and found 2 resistors (current limiting) which gave me trouble. Removed those and try again....working :)
Next i had a look at those relays....no good stuff and bound to fail....they had to go too. Replaced the relays with SSR (solid state relay). Those SSr's can be switched with ease with 5VDC (same output that used to drive the relays). The LED's come one at the right time with the right output. Put everything back together and started testing. All works very well and the best of it is...there is no more 240VAC in the timer or on the relays...in other words it's safe to use and there is no danger of 240VAC blowing up the timer circuit. The only area where i have 240VAC is on the SSR's.

There is another project coming along....same base timer unit from Bunnings but this time instead of switching 240VAC i will convert to DC switching SSR's on the output stage to controll low voltage stuff in the tank (solenoids and stuff that could come in contact with water) and use the same power pack to power up the timer and supply power to the output DC SSR's.....

[Bad Inferno]

Great work..have you got a pciture of the finished solution including SSR's

[fishyfishyfish]

Sorry guy's not as yet, but will post some pic's soon ;)
Have another project going at the moment and that makes me $$ , so it comes first....lol