FlyTrapCare Forums

Hi I am an IT and robotics student from Ireland, and basically had an idea for a system to keep my VFTs at a perfect watering and moisture year round for summer then dormancy period. I am possibly going to use a liquid fill level sensor so I can fill the tray with an inch of water and have it stop there, But to initiate the pump to fill the tray of water I could have moisture sensors in the VFTs medium which will tell the system to start filling with water and the liquid level sensors will tell it when its reached an inch of water in the tray and stop the fill up, while i am coding it I was thinking I could have it water more frequent in summer and when dormancy starts have the system change frequency to less water and keep the medium with less moisture before refilling, I was also planning on having the system email me updates, when it waters, if it has any errors, and to log all the details to a database that could provide useful insights. my idea to power it I'm not going to go much into specifics about it but I'm going to try see if I can get the CFL full spectrum lighting to produce power via a small-ish solar panel that will sit were I have spare space under my lighting, were it will store power in batteries for powering the system over night as I don't want to add to my electricity bill,but the will be an option to power it from the mains. but if there is anyone that has any other ideas how to make the system better? or just generally wants some input go for it, I am open to further options or criticism. so far I'm working on the design of the system and will post the design as soon as its complete, but another good note is I'm an advocate of open source, so I'm going to also tell what parts I used to build the system and give out the full source code once its fully working and operational just in case anyone else would like to give it a go.