Jonathan Pennington on sat 22 dec 01
* W. McGown [011222 00:52]:
> I am trying to find a way to control a kiln with a computer control of
> some sort. Basically what I envision is a thermocouple that passes thru
> where the old kiln sitter lived and some sort of digitizer that
> digitizes the thermocouple data and then passes this temperature
> information to computer via the RS-232 port. The computer would then
> either energize or de-energize relays that control the electricity to
> the coils.
I was going to try this too, although controlling the relays is a bit
down the road. I just bought a thermoprobe through ebay with an RS232
port. Making software to read this and respond would be trivial
(Although I'm a Unix programmer, Windows drivers would be hard for
me). I was going to log with it to begin with, but making a controller
(I'd optoisolate it!) to be controlled either via another serial port
or a parallel port would be trivial, you essentially have to write a
single bit to each of 2/4/whatever number of address bits on the
parallel port, that could be enough to energize a transistor which
could power the relay.
If you were thinking about a homebrew solution to this, email me off
list and we can work up some schematics for it. If you were looking
for something to buy, ignore me and my madness completely. (there is
some company selling something like this, but I a hobby roboticist as
well as my other activities, so this is right up my alley :-).
-J
------
P.S.
I actually bought a computer for just this, if you're a computer
hobbiest as well, check out www.tuxscreen.net. It's a $99 embedded
system with a touch screen, infra-red keyboard, and telephone. It was
sold as some kind of "internet appliance" but a bunch of us are
porting Linux onto it and it is perfect for this kind of thing. It's
cheap as hell, and you'll be able to have glaze recipes, logs, kiln
control, order information, a telephone and internet access all from
it. Real cool! (Hrm, maybe there's a market for this type of thing. I
could hack together a bunch of them at, say $200/each with all the
parts and software included.)
--
Jonathan Pennington | jwpennin@bellsouth.net
"There are no pots, there is only clay." -original
"It's hard to take life too seriously
when you realize yours is a joke." -also original
W. McGown on sat 29 dec 01
I am trying to find a way to control a kiln with a computer control of
some sort. Basically what I envision is a thermocouple that passes thru
where the old kiln sitter lived and some sort of digitizer that
digitizes the thermocouple data and then passes this temperature
information to computer via the RS-232 port. The computer would then
either energize or de-energize relays that control the electricity to
the coils.
Many thanks in advance.
Bill, On a bayou on the Mississippi Gulf Coast
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