DIY: Water Flow Meter For Monitoring Water Usage

cp225 water flow meter

I’m currently investigating what I need to get Water & Gas (Natural) monitoring added to my home. I already have Power via Energy Inc’s TED 1001 & Myro:Home. However, it would be nice to add Water & Gas to the mix so I can monitor and control its usage. Currently, I’m checking out different flow meters from Flow Monitors Inc. Anyone have any other brands that have an output that I could rig/modify/extend? The nice thing about the CoolPoint line is that they offer outputs that I can use to interface with my automation controller.

Universal Flow Monitors – CoolPoint CP Series Water Flow Meters

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You’re currently reading “DIY: Water Flow Meter For Monitoring Water Usage,” an entry on mavromatic.

Published:: Tuesday, May 26th, 2009 at 9:42 am

Author:: Danny Mavromatis

Category:: DIY, Home Automation

Tags:: automation, DIY, gas, hai, home, meter, myro, myro control, myro:home, natural, power, ted, water, water flow meter

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Jon Stevens

May 26th, 2009
10:13 PDT

Mavro,

I am trying to buy these at the moment from Europe –

http://www.alaxa.nl/english/index.htm

They work with RFXCOM and send 1 pulse per 1/2 litre I believe. I too have TED and now want to add water and gas too.

I am arranging a shipment over for myself and 1 other – if you interested let me know

Jon

neil

May 26th, 2009
13:00 PDT

I like this but this isn’t a usage meter but a flow meter. I have been using mechanical meter from watermeters.com but they are analog and do not have any facility for monitoring except good old pen and paper for logging!

Danny Mavromatis

May 26th, 2009
13:08 PDT

well, the one I’m looking at has outputs where you can “collect” the information. You need other hardware to actually make it useful… like software to take that output and do something with it. This is the just first piece to the puzzle — the “sensor”.

Troy

May 27th, 2009
8:40 PDT

Take a look at these flow totalizers:
http://www.mcmaster.com/#catalog/115/540/=222taa

Middle of the page. They have different options available to connecting to the output.

May 27th, 2009
8:55 PDT

Troy,

Good stuff! Thanks for the info. Have you used any of them?

Danny

RIck Big

May 28th, 2009
11:08 PDT

CoolPoint has a unit that totalizes.

http://www.flowmeters.com/products/index.cfm?task=serve_prod_pdf

The nice thing about this product is that it is industrial quality and has no moving parts. Products used in homes typically are cheap and inaccurate and need maintneance. This is not true of the CoolPoint totalizing meters. You get what you pay for.

May 28th, 2009
11:17 PDT

Yeah! I don’t want to go cheap on something that is tied into my water lines… sometimes DIYer’s want the most economical and cheap out, but, this isn’t where you cut corners.

May 29th, 2009
8:28 PDT

I used one several years ago but not for automatic data acquisition. We used it to fill out a sheet by hand. I was searching for a totalizer that would be compatible with acetone. Most are not. I bought one (don’t remeber which) that listed the wetted parts. The parts listed generally are compatible, but eventually (after a year or so) the unit failed. But the specs did NOT list the unit as compatible with acetone (my bad, I was taking a chance).

David Artz