AC3 Best practices

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Here is the worst thing that has happened to me with my AC3. I have all the over protective statements as mentioned....but a human in the loop can always screw things up...

The heater was on and someone went into my basement to get a bottle of Rum and accidentally pulled out a DC4 plug...unfortunately this was the first DC in a line of many and with no power when the AC3 tried to the heater, plugged into a separate DC8 to shut off it could not...well the tank went up to 88 before I realized the lights had not come back on in the morning and went down to the basement to figure out what was going on..i was very confused as everything was still running until i noticed the heater was in off mode on the AC3 but was still emitting heat and my Refugium powerhead and salt storage pump were off and traced it back to the DC4 being unplugged, well I plugged in an bam, everything started working, lights turned on, which I turned off to keep the heat down as my sump fans worked there asses off to cool the temp down 9 degrees....anyway moral of the story is that a human in the loop can always break good equipment, by the way the alarm did not sound because it was plugged into the same DC8 as the heater and the AC3 could not talk to the DC8. I have the AC3 set up to email my pager now....everything survived and looks good (actually all my soft corals open a lot more know strangely enough) I took temp readings by three different means and determined my AC3 was off by about 5.5 degrees so the tank was running around 75ish when i though it was running around 80. With that fixed the tank is actually in better looking condition than ever.
 
Any other best practices? These are great. Also, is there a website where people post their Aquacontroller programs?
 
How about this?


Max Change 015 M Then LT1 OFF


I've got restrike problems with my MH HQI ballast. They will NOT turn back on anytime within 12-15 minutes after having been turned off. And if you try to turn them on, that 12-15 minute clock just seems to start all over.

Having the above statement just keeps me from frustrating myself. If I foolishly try to turn them on too soon, I won't reset the clock. And if I turn them off manually for a few minutes, but have got a timer that will turn them back on soon, this prevents that problem too. They'll stay off as long as needed for the restrike to reset, but no longer.
 
I'm not sure if this qualifies as a "best practices" pointer, but if you need to extend the distance between your PX-1000 and the main unit beyond the 15' max OR if you need to extend your DC4 or DC8 beyond the 10' max distance, I have detailed instructions on how to do it on my build thread on page 8. Just click on the little red house on top of my post and go to page 8 of the thread. I extended my DC8 to 100 feet with no problem and my PX-1000 to 45 feet. I'm not sure how much further I could go, since I didn't try, but at least to these lengths the solution works. Cheers and great thread.
 
for what it is worth here is my program
If Time > 11:00 Then HD1 ON
If Time > 11:30 Then HD2 ON
If Time > 18:00 Then HD1 OFF
If Time > 18:30 Then HD2 OFF
If Sun 040/000 Then PC1 ON
If Sun 000/040 Then PC2 ON
If Temp < 79.7 Then HEA ON
If Temp > 80.0 Then HEA OFF
If Temp < 75.0 Then HEA OFF
If Temp > 85.0 Then HD1 OFF
If Temp > 85.0 Then HD2 OFF
If Temp > 80.5 Then SFA ON
If Temp < 80.0 Then SFA OFF
If Time > 00:00 Then VT1 ON
If Time > 00:00 Then VT2 ON
If Sun 000/000 Then HFA ON
If Time > 23:30 Then RHD ON
If Time > 06:30 Then RHD OFF
If Time > 23:00 Then RPC ON
If Time > 06:30 Then RPC OFF
If Time > 01:00 Then SHD ON
If Time > 05:00 Then SHD OFF
If Time > 00:00 Then PHC ON
If Time > 00:00 Then CAR ON
If Time > 00:00 Then AqL ON
If Time > 00:00 Then FLU ON
If Time > 00:00 Then RTN ON
If Time > 00:00 Then VT1 ON
If Time > 00:00 Then VT2 ON
If Time > 00:00 Then ATO ON
If Time > 00:00 Then SKM ON
If Time > 00:00 Then SLT ON
If Time > 00:00 Then RFP ON
If Time > 00:00 Then KLK ON
If Time > 00:00 Then UVS ON
If Time > 00:00 Then SVH ON
If Time > 00:00 Then CO2 ON
If Time > 00:00 Then CaP ON
If Time > 20:00 Then PHC ON
If Time > 04:00 Then PHC OFF
If Temp < 50.0 Then HEA OFF
If Temp < 50.0 Then SFA OFF
If FeedA 000 Then VT1 OFF
If FeedA 000 Then VT2 OFF
If FeedA 000 Then RTN OFF
 
I have seen cases where opposing OSC commands end up being in sync which is why I prefer to replace code like this :

OSC 015/015 ON/OFF Then PML ON
OSC 015/015 ON/OFF Then PMU OFF

with this:

OSC 015/015 ON/OFF Then PML ON
If Timer PML = On Then PMU OFF
If Timer PML = Off Then PMU On
 
Ken,
Why do people use statements like this?


If Time > 01:00 Then ALM OFF

What does this do by having it at the front of your program?
 
another question

another question

i want to set up my lights to turn on/off on my days off from work to enjoy the tank. how do i this?
 
you would need to know ur Internet IP and then you could access the Controller through the internet and then you can change or control anything you want
 
you would need to know ur Internet IP and then you could access the Controller through the internet and then you can change or control anything you want

I have the lights and all equips on timer but i want is to automatically turn on my lights on sunday and monday at diifernt hours.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15088524#post15088524 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by WWodyz

I have the lights and all equips on timer but i want is to automatically turn on my lights on sunday and monday at diifernt hours.
That's not currently possible w/ the ACjr, 3, or 3pro. The APEX does handle programing based on day of week.
 
Power Out with OSC question

Power Out with OSC question

I want to use an AC extension plugged into a UPS (along with the AC3) - the extension will be plugged into outlet PH1 running a low watt powerhead. I want to have it running all the time under normal conditions but if the power goes out I want to run the following OSC - this is in case the power goes out for a long time - this may extend the time the UPS will last. Do these statements get read in order/ would this work?

OSC 005/015 ON/OFF Then PH1 ON
If Power 005 Then PH1 ON

thanks rich
 
This should work; if power will take priority; did you test it; you should be able to quicky verify the functionality bu simulating a power fail?
 
just tried it and it is in the off mode while power is on so it looks like the OSC prevails. i dont think it would work anyway as i dont want to have my dc8 on UPS so how will the relay for PH1 get triggered with no power?
 
based on the above is there any information about precedence? ie what commands are just read in order vs TIMER trumps time or OSC trumps POWER when programming. Seems neptune would publish this somewhere which would make programming a little easier.
 
I need a program to turn on my auto top off 4 times a day for 30 min at a time.

Can some one post a program that I can just cut and paste into the Apex advanced set up box?

Thanks!
 
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