LED Chicken Coop Lighting Project

[ScottandSam]

I thought I read somewhere last year that chickens lighting don't work with leds. I read it has to be incandescent lights.
Anyone?????
Scott

 

[Bobb Craig]

From everything I have read, and as chickens use different parts of the light spectrum than humans, it would seem to me that LEDs would be a better choice. I am just not sure that the extra coding to create sunrise and sunset, as well as keeping red lights on at night is necessary. From the articles I have read, ( http://www.ledsmagazine.com/article...can-boost-poultry-production-and-profits.html );( http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2011/09/supplemental-light-in-coop-why-how.html );( http://scoopfromthecoop.nutrenaworld.com/winter-lighting-for-chickens/ ); the constant 15-16 hours of "real" daylight to 8-9 hours of darkness is more important, along with an occasional change to the time that starts and stops (changing with the actual sunrise/sunset times) is the best way to keep the girls laying, which I realize some folks are opposed to. Our 9 hens are currently molting, so not having the extra light is probably best for them now. I have also read many articles on simulating natural lighting condition in fish tanks that appear to keep those life forms in much better form.

Has anyone used the new RGBW LED's to try and simulated the "natural" light conditions that chickens use?

 

[ScottandSam]

Thanks for the link I'll have to read tonight.

Scott

 

[jthornton]

I know there are probably easier ways to accomplish what I've done here... But I like to tinker and I had most of these parts laying around (except the LED lights themselves).

The programming works like this:

Real Time Clock with battery backup accurately keeps track of time.

Every night at 12:30AM the Arduino calculates the sunrise and sunset based on my latitude and longitude.
(LAT+LON are hard coded in at this point. If I were to do it again, I would replace the clock and use a GPS chip for both Time, Lat, and Lon)

Based on SUNSET time, it turns the lights on 14 hours before. So if sunset is at 6PM, it turns the lights on at 4AM.

Based on sunrise time, it turns the lights off to conserve power.

If number of daylight hours is more than 14 hours, it does nothing.


There were a couple of prototypes on breadboards before this iteration - but this is the product that got installed in the coop.



I set the lights to take 15 minutes to fade-on in the morning to make their wake up call a little less jarring.

Phase 2: I've set the whole thing up to run on 12V (right now I'm using an old 12V laptop power brick to go from AC->DC) . I plan on setting up a 12V battery and a SOLAR trickle charger to keep it topped up.

Thanks for looking. Happy to answer questions or entertain suggestions/criticism

This is a fantastic job on lighting. I currently have an Arduino nano controlling my automagic chicken door from a timer. Which works OK but you have to keep adjusting the timer as the sunrise and sunset changes. What I have on my desk is the replacement for that setup using a Nodemcu ESP8266 WIFI development board to replace the Arduino nano. I've coded it to get the current NTP time from an internet time server each night at midnight and update the clock. The ESP8266 also serves up a web page with door status and coop temperature from a 1 wire DS18B20 temperature sensor. I'm adding some auxiliary heat for cold winter days and the ESP8266 will control them. Now thanks to you I'll be adding lighting to the coop.

JT

 

[Bobb Craig]

JT,

Just wondering if you had seen any of the following web sites. We live in North Dakota, where Sunrise and Sunset do some major shifting, and I was also looking for a coded way to adjust the on/off times.

https://create.arduino.cc/projecthub/sfrwmaker/sun-and-moon-times-cd1629

http://paulorenato.com/index.php/125

https://arduinodiy.wordpress.com/20...d-sunset-on-arduino-or-other-microcontroller/

Bobb

 

[Bobb Craig]

For your reading pleasure ...
http://web.uconn.edu/poultry/poultrypages/light_inset.html
https://poultrykeeper.com/general-chickens/light-for-layers/
http://articles.extension.org/pages/66177/lighting-in-housing-for-small-and-backyard-poultry-flocks
http://midwestpoultry.com/wp-content/uploads/Botting-Danielle-Understanding-Poultry-Lighting.pdf

 

[jthornton]

JT,

Just wondering if you had seen any of the following web sites. We live in North Dakota, where Sunrise and Sunset do some major shifting, and I was also looking for a coded way to adjust the on/off times.

Bobb

Hi Bobb,

Yes I've seen them and messed around with them. The calculated ones always seem to be off. I've found the Dusk2Dawn library to be the best for me to get sunrise and sunset. I need to start a new thread to discuss coop automation.

That's some good links on poultry lighting, thanks.

JT

 

[Bobb Craig]

Thanks for the information on the libraries.

 

[canner]

I know there are probably easier ways to accomplish what I've done here... But I like to tinker and I had most of these parts laying around (except the LED lights themselves).

The programming works like this:

Real Time Clock with battery backup accurately keeps track of time.

Every night at 12:30AM the Arduino calculates the sunrise and sunset based on my latitude and longitude.
(LAT+LON are hard coded in at this point. If I were to do it again, I would replace the clock and use a GPS chip for both Time, Lat, and Lon)

Based on SUNSET time, it turns the lights on 14 hours before. So if sunset is at 6PM, it turns the lights on at 4AM.

Based on sunrise time, it turns the lights off to conserve power.

If number of daylight hours is more than 14 hours, it does nothing.

Original High-Tech schematic.


There were a couple of prototypes on breadboards before this iteration - but this is the product that got installed in the coop.
I used old RCA jacks for power and LED hookups so I could seal the box that the electronics are in.


Here is the 12V LED light strip across the length of the coop ceiling.


Wiring and location of the box:



The girls and I discussing their stop-work order for lack of proper permits.


Right now it's powered off an extension cord. All the connections are in this bucket and then under the coop to keep things out of the rain.



I set the lights to take 15 minutes to fade-on in the morning to make their wakeup call a little less jarring.

Phase 2: I've set the whole thing up to run on 12V (right now I'm using an old 12V laptop power brick to go from AC->DC) . I plan on setting up a 12V battery and a SOLAR trickle charger to keep it topped up.



Thanks for looking. Happy to answer questions or entertain suggestions/criticism

Hi,
i know, this project is some years old, but is it possible to get the sketch, please?

Kind regards
Chris