Still Dragon 240v Controller Fine Tuning?

[Yummyrum]

So much so that I couldn't resist

You show a lot of potentiometer.

Your pun game is strong

Of force it is

[flht01]

I've built two, one from a parts list sourced out thru several vendors and one of the still dragon kits. The one I built from sourced parts has a cooling fan with vent holes, separate switches for the element and cooling fan, single control pot, lights to show when their powered up etc..., and the other is from the basic sd kit.
I don't have a preference between the two, both give me the same results. My opinion would be to buy the kit and put it together with the parts supplied. You'll save a few dollars and, after running it a time or two, you'll be able to get repeatable results. Just use it like you would a regulator and you'll be happy with it.
I used to have all the wiring diagrams (two computers ago) but I'd have to try to dig them up. Let me know if it would help and I'll start looking.

[LWTCS]

StillDragon.The.DIY.Controller.Kit.Build.Instructions.v1.0.20131020-1.pdf

(359.95 KiB) Downloaded 502 times

[OtisT]

So much so that I couldn't resist

You show a lot of potentiometer.

Your pun game is strong

Of force it is

Ohm my god. The puns are getting out of hand, but watt can you do about it?

[WithOrWithoutU2]

You show a lot of potentiometer.

Your pun game is strong

Of force it is

Ohm my god. The puns are getting out of hand, but watt can you do about it?

Hopefully nothing gets to shocking.

[The Baker]

I got my electronics technician to assemble mine.
Fairly simple. Not too expensive even though we fitted fairly long, heavy cables to access the 15 amp socket
(I think I wrote that right; for the 3600 watt [hope that is right too] element).

Right.

He IMPROVED the unit.
Added a fan.
400 dollars later....

Okay he had to shorten the cable and raise the socket to make it accessible but...

Right when four inch COPPER ferrules became available and I ordered four of them and six of the copper two inch ferrules and
had to arrange a direct deposit with the treasurer and all my fiduciary sins were recalled...
Rotten timing.

Geoff

[WithOrWithoutU2]

Well, in my typical fashion, I've decided to go ahead and try to build one myself. I swear I have a sickness. I see shiny things and just can't help myself. I HAVE to get the bells and whistles or else I feel I am missing something. I know if I just got the Still Dragon Controller as is it would have been perfectly fine. But like I said, I have a sickness.

I have an electrician friends that has offered to help oversee me building it and will lend me the proper tools and even has the plugs and wires for me. Most importantly, he will use the proper testing tools to ensure I do not start anything on fire, or fry my equipment when I plug it in. Plus I know I can ask for help here along the way.

I have purchased:

Still Dragon Large Box kit
A 47k Ohm potentiometer for fine tuning
A mini breaker swtich
A fan
An AC 110V 220V Digital 100A watt power meter volt amp Ammeter Voltmeter 80-260V

Normally, all the parts would be here by this weekend. But with this Corona Virus, shipping is really delayed and I will not have all the parts until late April. It give me plenty of time to really reread all the various post and plan it out.

I truly hope I can accomplish this. If I do, I plan to make an idiots guide for others in terms that a non technical person can understand. I am usually pretty good at documenting steps for others. God knows if I can pull this off, anyone can.

PS. Special thanks to Larry for offering to arrange to have someone build out the Still Dragon for me. You've been very helpful. But I am gonna give it a go on my own. Good chance I may end up taking you up on the offer after I mess up my build myself. LOL

[shadylane]

I have an electrician friends that has offered to help oversee me building it and will lend me the proper tools and even has the plugs and wires for me.

Good deal
The Plugs and wires are at least 50% of the building cost

[Halfbaked]

LWTCS I wonder if SD were to put an amp and other voltage meter in wonder what they might would suggest?

[LWTCS]

LWTCS I wonder if SD were to put an amp and other voltage meter in wonder what they might would suggest?

Halfbaked, A couple years ago I did try and vet a few different affordable options. They all proved to be pretty unreliable in that the amp meters had high failure rates.

I'm fairly certain (at that time) that I would have lost my arse replacing faulty meters.

Sorry I don't have a reliable recommendation.

[Halfbaked]

Thanks. I fig if anyone knew what ss might recommend you might

[Ronh]

Any recommended brand for the linear 47k ohm pots? I just wired up my still dragon controller today, running it on 110v so I put a 250k ohm pots in. I only get change in my lightbulb between 50 and 100% on the pots. Also, what’s the purpose of the junction wire running between the posts on both pots? My understanding of pots wiring was only two of three posts were utilized ?

[cranky]

running it on 110v so I put a 250k ohm pots in.

Is a 250k pot what the SSR is supposed to use? Mine requires a 500k pot, I'm speculating that regardless of 110 or 220 it would require a 500k pot or would function exactly like yours is.

[OtisT]

LWTCS I wonder if SD were to put an amp and other voltage meter in wonder what they might would suggest?

I’m not speaking for SD, but in my opinion I would recommend just a simple, old school, analog amp meter rated for your power needs. No need for a volt meter. I bought two fancy but cheep digital meters that showed me amps, watts, etc. (The first one failed so I returned it for a new one that failed also.) Both worked for a short time at the beginning of use but soon would overheat, which messed with the liquid crystal display causing it to go dark. I’m sure there are some good digital meters out there, but I’m done with them for now.

Otis

[The Baker]

LWTCS I wonder if SD were to put an amp and other voltage meter in wonder what they might would suggest?

I’m not speaking for SD, but in my opinion I would recommend just a simple, old school, analog amp meter rated for your power needs. No need for a volt meter. I bought two fancy but cheep digital meters that showed me amps, watts, etc. (The first one failed so I returned it for a new one that failed also.) Both worked for a short time at the beginning of use but soon would overheat, which messed with the liquid crystal display causing it to go dark. I’m sure there are some good digital meters out there, but I’m done with them for now.

Otis

Maybe they would work fine with the fan my electronics man installed in my SD controller when I got him to assemble it.
(I didn't ask him to do that, apparently it works fine as is, so it cost me a couple of hundred Australian dollars for his 'improvement'.)

Geoff

[OtisT]

LWTCS I wonder if SD were to put an amp and other voltage meter in wonder what they might would suggest?

I’m not speaking for SD, but in my opinion I would recommend just a simple, old school, analog amp meter rated for your power needs. No need for a volt meter. I bought two fancy but cheep digital meters that showed me amps, watts, etc. (The first one failed so I returned it for a new one that failed also.) Both worked for a short time at the beginning of use but soon would overheat, which messed with the liquid crystal display causing it to go dark. I’m sure there are some good digital meters out there, but I’m done with them for now.

Otis

Maybe they would work fine with the fan my electronics man installed in my SD controller when I got him to assemble it.
(I didn't ask him to do that, apparently it works fine as is, so it cost me a couple of hundred Australian dollars for his 'improvement'.)

Geoff

I have a fan. Nothing else in the housing gets hot like that.

That is one expensive fan you have. I think my 220v 3” wafer fan cost less than $9. At first I had it attached to the controller output but at low power settings there was not enough power to spin it up. I wired it to power input and it blows way more air than needed to keep things inside the box cool.

[The Baker]

Otis, it was not the cost of the fan but the electronics man's bill for fitting it.
That and resistor and a fuse and...

Can't win them all!

Geoff

[The Baker]

Otis, it was not the cost of the fan but the electronics man's bill for fitting it.
That and resistor and a fuse and...

Yeah this is wired to 'the power'.
It's on all the time.

Can't win them all!

Geoff

[Ronh]

running it on 110v so I put a 250k ohm pots in.

Is a 250k pot what the SSR is supposed to use? Mine requires a 500k pot, I'm speculating that regardless of 110 or 220 it would require a 500k pot or would function exactly like yours is.

Honestly I don’t know. I know on some other threads about controllers people stated that the 500ohm pots on 110v was the reason for really gross controls. I’ll swap the pots back around and see though now that you say that. I didn’t even try it with the supplied pots.

[cranky]

Personally I'm not a fan of analog. I bought a vol/amp meter off Amazon plus another one for a spare in case the first one failed. It's wired to only read voltage at the switch, not across the element, so it only confirms that I have full power once the switch is flipped, then the amp meter tells me all I need to know. I've never had a problem with my meter, the spare meter, SSR, and switch I purchased when I built it are all still sitting on my desk where they have been for the past 5 years.

My fan is an old computer fan wired to a wall wart and works just fine and was free. I also have a whole stack of those sitting on my desk

[Halfbaked]

Sorry folks. I didn’t mean to hijack this thread. I like this discussion.

Otis, cranky, Baker Ronh and everyone else. I will make a new thread. Comment in it.

[bluefish_dist]

I bought a power meter for $10-15 from eBay. Came direct from China. Have had not issues in over 2 years of daily use. The trick is have the voltage tap on the supply side. Ie check your line voltage. If you don’t I am told the meters fail quickly.

My first two meters were volt and amp only. Worked fine, but you had to calculate power manually. My last two meters have had the power displayed on the screen. This makes dialing in the power a lot easier. Just watch one number on the meter. I have found my mine voltage varies a little, but enough that it causes the power to vary.

I don’t use the whole kit from SD, just the power transistor. The rest was sourced from eBay. I also run a fan and as I did have one sst from an unknown supplier fail in about a year of daily runs. After that I kept a spare on hand and never had another failure.

[pickled]

I built a Still Dragon controller with a 6500W element.
0% output is actually around 40% indicated on the dial. At low output, the potentiometer is very sensitive. Even nudging the dial the smallest amount, will still change output around 100W.

[jdetechguy]

I went a little crazy with my Still Dragon controllers. We use the 5500 watt elements, but thinking to move to 6500 when the old ones pop. We have been using these for 3 years. One of them stopped adjusting, but we have not needed to fix it, since its stuck in full on and we use it to heat water. Nice little set for sure. I added some nice warning stickers too, to make it look professional.

mod Edit .please don’t use tapatalk to store your pics . I posted it directly here ( and rotated it for you ) this time .

[WithOrWithoutU2]

So here is my parts list and my diagram the best I can figure on how to wire. Been waiting on a buddy to help me, but with Covid and busy schedules he's not been able to help me oversee it. Please look at parts list and let me know if you see anything concerning. It will work off line that is 30 amps. Then please look at my rudimentary diagram for wiring. The Black, Red, and Green wires are from a 10/3 cable. The actual cable has Black, White and Green wires. But for drawing purposes I substituted white with red. I plan to use quick connects and when multiple wires are going to one terminal I plan to follow StillerBoys suggestion and solder the wires together then crimp onto a quick connect with some heat shrink insulation wrap.

Still Dragon Controller Kit

30 Amp Rocker Swithc https://www.amazon.com/Current-Switches ... 308&sr=8-3

LED AmMeter https://www.ebay.com/p/2118950088?iid=1 ... gJ07fD_BwE

Fan https://www.amazon.com/ZXHAO-0-07A-Spee ... 8MP0AMBY0A

47ohm Pot https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07P8 ... UTF8&psc=1

[WithOrWithoutU2]

Well I must say I am pretty happy to report, I think I have a working controller! Those of you that have been following this thread know, I started with little to no knowledge and even fewer tools. But with research and advise from you all, and a buddy in real life I have a functioning 240 controller. I've use it and a 6500w element tonight to heat up about 3 gallons of tap water. The 6500w element had it up to a boil in NO TIME.

The digital meter seems to be working as it displays the power and amps as I use the pots. I see the smaller increases with the small one, so I am encourage that I have it wired correctly.

Obviously, I the real test will come with a few full spirit runs to ensure the wiring does not short out or overheat.

Thanks to all for the guidance and encouragement. I have to say, this project has really given me a sense of satisfaction of "just doing it".

PS. Anyone debating if you should try to tackle this, you CAN with lots of research and planning. But if you don't have a single tool to even start...you will end up paying more than if you just buy one.

[jdetechguy]

WOW, I liked mine, until I saw yours. Great job.

[WithOrWithoutU2]

WOW, I liked mine, until I saw yours. Great job.

Thanks. Let's see if it hold up as long as yours. Sounds like you've been running them for a few years.

[BlueSasquatch]

PS. Anyone debating if you should try to tackle this, you CAN with lots of research and planning. But if you don't have a single tool to even start...you will end up paying more than if you just buy one.

Looks like you have some sort of T-track on the back of the box, to hold the heat sink, what's that row of connections in the middle? Also that fan you listed is sold out, can you recall what the ballpark price was on that?

[jonnys_spirit]

Your pun game is strong

Of force it is

Ohm my god. The puns are getting out of hand, but watt can you do about it?

Hopefully nothing gets to shocking.

I tried to resist the temptation but ohm my it was quite hard to stay under ground.

I'm assembling an SD kit to drive a 120V 1k5W Cadec hotplate element and wanted to keep the thread uhhhh - current.

Less is more IMO so i'll just use a single POT and no meters or other fan-cy parts and hardwire it into the element with an edison plug hanging off...

Cheers!
-j