Posted Tue Nov 11, 2008, 10:02pm Subject: Help!!! PID problems...
Hello everyone, I have recently installed an auber PID into my Gaggia Coffee Deluxe. I am not super electronically inclined but I had a friend who is follow a wiring diagram and install the pid, and also installed the steam function via the alarm circuit on the pid, with a 12 volt adaptor. I have installed it and have been attempting to autotune the pid. I have attempted it a couple times and as it goes up and down i have seen boiler temperatures that reached as high as 314! This seemed awfully high to me, so i shut off the machine and didnt do the autotune anymore. I am just trying to get it to hold a steady temperature. I think everything should be hooked up right. The only thing i was not sure about was for the steam feature is the power for the 12 volt supposed to be wired into the main power, or the power going to the steam switch. On the diagram i had, it was going to the main power, so that is how it is set up. If anyone can give me any advice what i should do, or how I should proceed now please help! Are there some manual variables i could enter in, or does someone have some variable from their autotune, that could help me. Please explain, Im lost and need my coffee !
Thanks for the redirect! I have read all the posts on this, and done the search function many times on this site. That was not quite what i was looking for, although it did have some valuable advice on the steam function. Basically what i am looking at is settings for the gaggia coffee, that I could program in manually as a start, because the autotune isnt functioning...
It's not clear from your description, but I think you may have it wired up incorrectly. I'm assuming you are following Jskene's design? If so, you want the 12v source to be "on" only when you flip the steam switch. But from your description it sounds like your 12v source is always on. That will cause the SSR to always be on, regardless of what the PID unit is trying to do, autotune or otherwise. So it's no surprise that the autotune doesn't work!
Another issue is what to do with the steam thermostat. You may have chosen to remove it, or bypass it, since the SSR is going to play the role of both the steam and the brew thermostats ... if yes, you might consider leaving the steam thermostat in place as a safety backup. That way the power to the heating element will be cut at a sufficiently high temperature, regardless of what the PID and SSR are doing.
Thanks John! It ends up that the alarm circuit was hooked up incorrectly. When it is hooked up for some reason the ssr is always on. I cant seem to figure out where to hook it up so that it just works off the steam switch. I hooked it up to the brown wire that comes off the steam switch, but it seems to stay on. I am a little baffled. I will have to take a picture of the connections inside the machine, and maybe someone can draw me an arrow. The good news is, I was able to succesfully auto-tune now that i removed the ac connections..
Okay, so I am not to familiar with how ac works. It seems no matter which way i hook it up, the ssr seems to be on all the time once i hook up the ac adaptor. Where do i need to hook the other wire. I hooked the black wire, as show in the picture (the little one) to the brownish,grey wire on the left. It is hooked up to the steam switch. Where do i put the red. Wherever i hook it up, it seems to make the ssr on all the time. If i hook it up to the other side of the steam switch it has the ssr on when it is in the off position, and when i turn the switch on, it turns it off... Any help?
Posted Sun Nov 16, 2008, 10:07am Subject: Re: Help!!! PID problems...
I will be surprised if anyone will be able to help using the picture, what we really need is a wiring diagram.
That being said, you might check the setting for the alarm. Presumably the PID controller has a relay for the alarm output, and you are running the 12V DC signal through this relay before combining with the SSR drive output of the controller and heading to the SSR. If so, you should find that flipping the steam switch turns on the SSR, and that the SSR stays on UNTIL the temperature reaches the alarm setting value for the PID controller. At that point the alarm relay should go from its "normally closed" state to an open state, preventing the 12V DC signal from getting to the SSR. If the alarm setting is too high you will never see it turn off. You might set it on the low side, say 250F, during debugging.
I must agree with the post above, a photo is of practically zero help to anyone trying to assist you. Make a wiring diagram of exactly how you have everything hooked up right now, record your set points for your PID, give us the model/mfg of your PID, then possibly we can assist you.
Also, you are somewhat playing with fire here, because it seems you have very little experience or understanding of the basics of electricity. If you mess things up, your boiler heats up to hot, pressure builds to high, you are basically creating a bomb... think the mythbusters-hot water heater bomb episode for the power of high temperature/pressure water. I would caution you to tread very carefully as you progress, and maybe spend a fair amount of time understanding the difference between control voltages and supply voltages, how a PID works, how to make a wiring diagram, etc.
I don't mean this to scare you away at all or to be harsh; but to enable you to be a more qualified coffee geek, working safely on your machine, with the best possible chances of getting everything working as you wish.
Thanks for the tips. I agree with you, I am not qualified to wire this up. I have a friend who installed it for me. Its just the steam function that im trying to figure out now. Everything is hooked up for the steam to work except the last two wires. Currently for the last couple weeks i have been using the PID with good success for brewing, and had a good autotune. Currently I am just using the stock steam thermostat for steaming until I figure out how to get this hooked up right. I will see if I can get a wiring diagram made up. I am basically following the wiring diagram of the one posted for the silvia on the forum. I am using and Auber Instruments PID. With I believe a 25Amp solid state relay.
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