Homebrew pit controller

[Steve]

Here's the blower adapter...



Here's a view of the inside, you can see the draft gate in the blower tube



Here it is attached to te WSM base



Still need to tidy the metal work up a bit. It's not my strong point to be fair. But it's functional. I plan to connect the draft fan up tomorrow to test te flow before I put the electronics into their housing.

[Steve]

I wired up the blower adapter to test today.





There's a noticeable draft blows through so I will probably need to slow the fan down but I expected that.

The housing is all cut out and has been painted so there's just the wiring to do now before I can test it.

[esselle]

Looking good!

[Steve]

Powered up for the first time...



Seems to work but may require tuning of the PID. I hope to test it at the weekend.

[keith157]

Hi Steve will this be on show at Grillstock/Mayhem???

[Steve]

Assuming it works well and I get along with it I'll be using it at all four IBQN comps so you'll be able to have a look at Mayhem if you're coming.

I plan to put a full parts list up on here after I've tested it properly and made sure I don't need anything else. To be honest cost wise it's probably not far off what the guys in the group buy have paid for the IQ. However it was fun to knock together and could be done cheaper if you were able to scrounge a few of the parts and didn't use illuminated switches and stuff like I did.

I might yet need to change the alarm buzzer too, it is, how shall we say, a tad loud

[keith157]

I suppose you could use the buzzer to call in your friends & diners from the surrounding villages

[Steve]

Ran the first test of the controller today. Bearing in mind I'm using the first stab at PID settings it went really well. I think it averaged running about 5 degrees up on the target temp with swings typically within 10 degrees of target.

It was quite a windy day and there were a couple of upward swings of slightly greater magnitude but always within 15 degrees which happened at windy times. The controller behaved perfectly at these times so I think these spikes were caused by draft getting into the closed vents.

I find the WSM does like to spike if you're not careful so wasn't to surprised, tweaking the exhaust vent a tny bit kept the temps locked in very tightly.

I'll play some more soon but for now here are a couple of pics.

[esselle]

Genius !

[Steve]

A quick update...

I've used it three times now and it works a treat. Got my swings under 10 degrees and I have now managed to run the WSM for just short of 25 hours at 250 in good weather conditions on a single load of lumpwood. Hell yeah