My project has to do with the solar heated shower boiler that most Mediterranean and sun bathed countries use. The concept is simple, there's a solar panel with a water tank on top and when the sun is out and about, the water heats up all the time. Now, what happens when it's a rainy or cloudy day, the only choice you have is to turn the heat on the boiler manually. The picture below clearly depicts an electrical water boiler typically found in North American and European homes.
The electrical part of the water heater is simple. For example, 230v 15amp power comes in, connects to the thermostat and in turn the thermostat is wired up to an element. Now the thermostat turns on via the circuit breaker it's connected to, which is found in the main panel. Below is a diagram of a thermostat.
So the idea is that we automate all of this process by using an Arduino/Genuino 101 instead of a thermostat. Below is a picture and a video of my project.
As you can see the component connections are the following:
- Relay: Pins 12 & 13, 5v, GND
- Temperature Sensor: A3
- LED: D8
- LCD: I2C
Keep in mind that were also using the Arduino/Genuino Bluetooth capability for this project.
So the general idea is that if the temperature drops below a certain level as implied in the code, the LED turns on telling the user that the heater is on and, of course, the relay turns on where the "Hot" wire on the element passes through the Normally Open and Common wire inputs. To use the Bluetooth capability apart from the code, we connect another part of the "Hot" wire of the element to the relay on the Normally Open and Common wire inputs.
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