A friend of mine started working on a pellet burner in his garage and I offered myself to make him a suitable controller for it.
A pellet burner works by first igniting a bunch of pellets and it then maintains a sustained flame by adding just the right amount of pellets at precise intervals and controlling the inflow of air.
A perfect job for a microcontroller.
Doing some research online, it seems that there are some companies out there that make commercial controllers but I wasn't able to find any open source controller so the decision was to start one. By making the entire controller open-source a lot of people can benefit from it and create their own custom versions for only a fraction of the price of the commercial ones.
The pellet burner controller is not production-ready yet, but I chose to release it so other people can join and help with its development. It already has a lot done and you can see more in the video below. If you want to join in or if you are interested in the code, it is hosted here.
Components and materials used in the pellet controller:
- ESP32 Microcontroller - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_AeeJrb
- DS1302 Real time clock - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_AFFBKD
- Rotary Encoder - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_AeKzkz
- 4CH Relay Board - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_9v1uXB
- 10K NTC Thermistor - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_AFbVR3
- 20x4 LCD Display - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_9xaXG9
- Mini breadboards - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_ArbxHX
- Jumper Wires - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_AYYJ9R
- Dupont wires - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_AdZktL
- Resistors - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_AWCi3R
- Micro USB cable - https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_AlE0TB
