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Q-talk *ON TOPIC ONLY* QUALITY ON TOPIC discussion of Backyard BBQ, grilling, equipment and outdoor cookin' . ** Other cooking techniques are welcomed for when your cookin' in the kitchen. Post your hints, tips, tricks & techniques, success, failures, but stay on topic and watch for that hijacking. |
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01-31-2010, 02:08 PM | #31 | |
is One Chatty Farker
Join Date: 01-11-08
Location: Nashville
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The Stoker also has some "extras" too like the abillity to control a draft fan, the OneWire bus for multiple probes, and audible alarms for doneness or out fires. You can get a Stoker with a single probe and a wifi bridge for about $250, and with a little configuration, everything will work out of the box. Extra probes are $35, or if you wanna solder, you can do your own with Grainger (who sells Omega) and the OneWire address chips. Your kit is cool, and I'm not trying to take anything away from it, but I'm wondering why people are so interested in it, as it's not new functionality in the BBQ world. Does the $100 price difference really make it that much better? Do people hate The Stoker that much? By the time you add in functionality for multiple probes and the time/labour of putting it all together, I question what the price difference really is. Years ago I went through something similar when I was heavy into TiVo hacking and Tridge invented a PCI adapter board that we could connect to the debug PCB to connect to it over ethernet, dubbed TiVoNet. I bought the kit, soldered it all together, did what I wanted, and thought it was great. A few years later I needed a different kit for a different form factor, and that time I had the option to get a "TurboNet" board: The ethernet was built in and it came all soldered. It was a few extra dollars, but for my time and money, it was just easy to have it work out of the box, hacker or not. dmp |
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01-31-2010, 05:57 PM | #32 | |
On the road to being a farker
Join Date: 05-29-07
Location: Cedar Rapids, IA
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I think for me, part of it is the "tinkering" factor. It's the same reason we have people who build a UDS themselves when they could just buy a Stumps or a Traeger or whatever. It's not necessarily about the money. It's pride not only of ownership, but of "doing it yourself" and learning something along the way and having fun in the process. And don't forget the idea that if you did it yourself, then maybe if you have a better idea for it later, you can just go ahead and do that too.
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Country Smoker CS680 Weber 22.5" OTG 2005 Weber Genesis Silver B and only the fastest Hawkeye Yellow Thermapen |
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01-31-2010, 06:03 PM | #33 | |
On the road to being a farker
Join Date: 05-29-07
Location: Cedar Rapids, IA
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Maybe a way to interface the Arduino to a headphone jack that a cheap one-wire probe could plug into? Maybe a cheap thermistor like a DS18B20? I'm not a hardware guy so I have no clue what I'm talking about here, but just throwing out ideas off the top of my head.
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Country Smoker CS680 Weber 22.5" OTG 2005 Weber Genesis Silver B and only the fastest Hawkeye Yellow Thermapen |
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01-31-2010, 06:36 PM | #34 | ||
is One Chatty Farker
Join Date: 01-11-08
Location: Nashville
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dmp |
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01-31-2010, 08:20 PM | #35 |
is one Smokin' Farker
Join Date: 11-27-08
Location: Tacloban, Leyte, Philippines
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Costs are definitley not even close to being the same. For a dual probe system, I'm looking at about $215. For a dual probe Stoker (with WiFi), I'm looking at $400+. WiFi is a requirement.
As it stands now, using the Arduino Duimilanove, I can support 6 probes. Each box is about $85. Each probe $65 (including the interface chip and board). I like that the probes I'm using are high-quality. The goal is to get the best value that I can. Not the cheapest. If I want to support up to 14 probes, I can move to an Arduino Mega (about $65, fully assembled). This makes my basic box $120. Each probe about $65. Another requirement I have is maintainability. I live in the rural Philippines. I can't just call Rock and have something shipped out to get here tomorrow without suffering great pain to my bank account. What I've built I can fix or at least afford to have spare parts lying about. All that said, it's really not about the money. It's about tinkering and building it myself. It's about making it do exactly what I want. It's about having the system entirely open to me and allowing me to adjust it to fit my needs as they arise. Why is there interest here? Because people like to tinker and fiddle. Because sometimes just being handed a black box just takes the fun out of it. Honestly, I spent 5 minutes soldering what needed to be done on this kit. The rest comes assembled. I spent a few hours playing with software. But, that's 'cause I'm a software guy and enjoy it. The software contains a complete table (0 to 200 degress Celcius, in 1 degree increments) for translating K-type thermocouple voltages to something meaningful to us. And, it takes multiple samples per second, averages those, and interpolates between the voltages to give fractional degrees. Why? Because it was fun (and relatively easy, too). I derive a great deal of pride in looking at something and thinking "I made that". It's what drove me to write software, it's what drives me to cook/BBQ.
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James Kuya's Kitchen - my culinary adventures in the rural Philippines IMBAS Certified MOINK Baller Equipment: Weber Kettle, Stainless GOSM, Green Super-Fast Thermapen Equipment Wish List: Smokehouse, Backyard Brick Pit with Lechon Spit |
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01-31-2010, 08:27 PM | #36 |
is one Smokin' Farker
Join Date: 11-27-08
Location: Tacloban, Leyte, Philippines
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Cool :)
I'm like you. Software guy. Started writing code in 1972. I'm intentionally keeping the web interface to the board simple. I don't want to have to write a lot of software for the Arduino. It's very, very weak compared to what I'm used to. So, I'm thinking this will be what the box serves up as its web page (0.0 meaning the probe may not be attached): Code:
Probe 0: 60.5C Probe 1: 102.3C Probe 2: 0.0C Probe 3: 0.0C Probe 4: 0.0C Probe 5: 0.0C I agree. My intent is to share this here with the Brethren. If others like it, build it, and use it, cool. If not, I have what I need, at least.
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James Kuya's Kitchen - my culinary adventures in the rural Philippines IMBAS Certified MOINK Baller Equipment: Weber Kettle, Stainless GOSM, Green Super-Fast Thermapen Equipment Wish List: Smokehouse, Backyard Brick Pit with Lechon Spit |
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01-31-2010, 08:33 PM | #37 | |||
is one Smokin' Farker
Join Date: 11-27-08
Location: Tacloban, Leyte, Philippines
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I tend to agree with you. There's art to BBQ, but there's also science. I want to get the science down as much as possible so that I can focus on the art. I'm only returning the favor already done by so many people here.
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James Kuya's Kitchen - my culinary adventures in the rural Philippines IMBAS Certified MOINK Baller Equipment: Weber Kettle, Stainless GOSM, Green Super-Fast Thermapen Equipment Wish List: Smokehouse, Backyard Brick Pit with Lechon Spit |
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01-31-2010, 10:51 PM | #38 | |
is One Chatty Farker
Join Date: 01-11-08
Location: Nashville
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One thing to say though, I'm not sure where you are getting your numbers. A two probe Stoker shouldn't cost any where near $400! The Stoker itself is $175. Each probe is $35. You may even be able to get a progressive $5 discount if you buy a few at a time. A wifi bridge is about $40. That's about $285 without any discounts. Still more than what you'll have spent, but by my math, the break even point is at about 4 probes, and that's fine if the average person only wants 2-3. Take into account what else is there, and it's a harder decision to me. Again, I'm not saying anything bad about what you've done, and I totally get it. I'm sorry if I came across that way, but so many of the things people are asking you to add already exist. I'd be saying the same thing if some one said he found a way to build a device to pick dirt up off the carpet that only cost him $20, but took half a day to put together. And for the record, I built my own pellet pooper in stead of buying one because I wanted to do it myself, but it was also cheaper! One last thing, and then I hope to bow out unless I can help: Some one asked for trending software I think. There is a free piece of software out there called StokerLog which does just that, monitoring your various probes and such. It keeps a log on disk, and maps the results in a nifty graph, which you are able to save. There's also a port based protocol where you can query and set just about everything about the Stoker, and I've written some of a C# library to access it. Cool work. dmp |
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01-31-2010, 11:15 PM | #39 |
is one Smokin' Farker
Join Date: 11-27-08
Location: Tacloban, Leyte, Philippines
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I was thinking that one would use an WiFi access point (about $150). Not a bridge. So, yeah, your numbers are a lot closer.
Graphing and trending software is fairly trivial given modern tools (C# comes to mind immediately). As is data storage. I understand your points about using equipment that's already built and debugged. But, I have the free time to spend on this. And, I enjoy it. Another thing to remember: there isn't a whole lot to do here in terms of entertainment. Hobbies are all one really has. :)
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James Kuya's Kitchen - my culinary adventures in the rural Philippines IMBAS Certified MOINK Baller Equipment: Weber Kettle, Stainless GOSM, Green Super-Fast Thermapen Equipment Wish List: Smokehouse, Backyard Brick Pit with Lechon Spit |
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02-01-2010, 07:50 PM | #40 | |
On the road to being a farker
Join Date: 05-29-07
Location: Cedar Rapids, IA
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Code:
<tempsensor> <sensor type="probe" id="1"> <value type="temp" unit="C">102.3</value> </sensor> <sensor type="probe" id="2"> <value type="temp" unit="C">0.0</value> </sensor> <sensor type="probe" id="3"> <value type="temp" unit="C">0.0</value> </sensor> <sensor type="probe" id="4"> <value type="temp" unit="C">0.0</value> </sensor> <sensor type="probe" id="5"> <value type="temp" unit="C">0.0</value> </sensor> </tempsensor>
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Country Smoker CS680 Weber 22.5" OTG 2005 Weber Genesis Silver B and only the fastest Hawkeye Yellow Thermapen |
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02-02-2010, 12:41 AM | #41 |
somebody shut me the fark up.
Join Date: 05-10-06
Location: Overland Fark, KS
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Whoa! Pretty high tech!
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Asshattatron Farkanaut, CGCFO Chief Galactic Crockpot Foil Officer Certified MOINK Baller & IMBAS Certified MOINK Ball Judge #0003 - Are you MOINK Certified? Sole recipient of the Silverfinger and fingerlickin Awards! Don't forget about the Throwdown Thingies! The Secret Squirrel Society doesn't exist - Zero Club Duh. |
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02-02-2010, 03:42 AM | #42 |
is one Smokin' Farker
Join Date: 11-27-08
Location: Tacloban, Leyte, Philippines
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I understand the desire for XML ... since it's a web page, one could also say that
GET "/" returns the human-readable GET "/xml" returns the XML page That way we return both.
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James Kuya's Kitchen - my culinary adventures in the rural Philippines IMBAS Certified MOINK Baller Equipment: Weber Kettle, Stainless GOSM, Green Super-Fast Thermapen Equipment Wish List: Smokehouse, Backyard Brick Pit with Lechon Spit |
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02-02-2010, 03:55 AM | #43 |
Got rid of the matchlight.
Join Date: 01-31-10
Location: Enoree, SC
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PID controller made with Arduino board
Hi all,
After reading these posts, I thought I would share a link to a post by Bob Hruska on "The Virtual Weber Bullet" forum. Bob has created his on PID controller using the Arduino board and the probes from the Maverick ET-73 which are thermistors instead of thermocouples. He also has a link to his web page that he kindly put up with all the details on doing it yourself. He got his board from Sparkfun, his part list has a link. He also has this wifi setup for webpage monitoring. He is on his second version of this and it looks very interesting. There is also some feedback on the forum post and some improvements to the code. The Sparkfun link also has a ton of information about compilers for the Arduino board and syntax examples. Here is the link to the forum post: http://tvwbb.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a.../909108292/p/1 Here is the link to Bob's Homebrew BBQ temperature controller http://www.hruska.us/tempmon/ Enjoy! Brewdog |
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02-02-2010, 06:47 AM | #44 | |
somebody shut me the fark up.
Join Date: 08-31-09
Location: Homeworth, OH
Name/Nickname : John
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He is not reinventing the wheel, he is merely making the wheel himself to his own specifications. Yea there are all kinds of gadgets out there on the market. Stoker guru, etc, but what fun is it to let someone else have all the creative fun? I for one encourage open source tech, and applaud James for sharing. Using your point of view...it wouldn't make sense to spend hundreds/thousands of dollars to make BBQ, when you could simply go to your local BBQ joint and buy it.
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John |
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02-02-2010, 09:06 AM | #45 |
is one Smokin' Farker
Join Date: 11-27-08
Location: Tacloban, Leyte, Philippines
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Brewdog,
Thanks for posting the link. I'd seen his work briefly but lost the location. One reason I stuck with thermocouples is that I can get probes in different styles. And, I don't mind paying a little extra for that convenience. Thermistors would certainly be easier. Although, I found a table that translates K-type thermocouple voltages to degrees C. It's just a simple look-up in the code now. Thermocouples seem easy enough to deal with. He adds blowers, which is cool. Personally, I don't need blowers. I run a gasser. :) This is why I want to do this as an open source project. We can get inspiration and help from all kinds of places. Thanks!
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James Kuya's Kitchen - my culinary adventures in the rural Philippines IMBAS Certified MOINK Baller Equipment: Weber Kettle, Stainless GOSM, Green Super-Fast Thermapen Equipment Wish List: Smokehouse, Backyard Brick Pit with Lechon Spit |
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