Okay, this issue is being kicked around at the HUKY forum and it doesn't seem to be easy to figure out what the critical diagnostic questions are so that the people with 'maybe it's a grounding problem' can figure out how to know that and THEN how to proceed.

(I never had the issue with my HUKY, so I am helpless to make any kind of suggestions.)
So if you did and now you don't and know why, let us know, please.

Thanks.

I'm a little confused. Is the problem with Artisan?

If someone is experiencing spikes and erratic readings in Artisan on a Huky and changing the Artisan settings doesn't address the problem.

Under these circumstances I would try grounding the roaster. It's very easy and cheap to do. I might even try grounding BEFORE messing with the Artisan settings.

johnny4lsu wrote:I'm a little confused. Is the problem with Artisan?

Well that's not clear.
The problem shows up in Artisan, yes.
Whether the problem is "with" Artisan, I guess is part of the question.

Since I expect Artisan talks to the logging board digitally, I find it hard to imagine that Artisan has anything to do with it. Thermocouples have extremely low output voltages and so the input circuitry must be very sensitive. Depending on the design, it may also end up very sensitive to noise. Connecting a ground from the roaster to the logging board may help. Running the laptop on batteries so it's not connected to the wall may help. Shielding the thermocouple wires may help. If you do that, start by connecting the shields to only one side, probably the logger side will work best, but you can also try only the roaster side to see if that works better. Make sure the thermocouple wires are routed far from any wires carrying power and if they have to cross, make sure they cross at right angles. And as someone mentioned earlier, a ferrite bead over the thermocouple leads may help. I'd go so far as one over both leads and two more over the individual wires if the one alone doesn't help enough.

All Artisan can do is filter the results which will tend to average out the noise and give you a cleaner looking graph.

Ira

All possibly true, but:
this thread is asking for actual experience with and satisfactory methods of dealing with a probable/possible grounding issue that happens with the HUKY and shows up in the Artisan profiles. And 'HUKY' includes it's probably appendage, an exhaust fan being controlled by a Variac (so two more plugs).

Hi SJM, me again... the one with the huky/artisan noise...

To level set everyone, since getting my huky its been quite a bad experience overall but particularly because of the huge amount of difficulty I've had trying to solve the noise I get in artisan (with my hottop I tracked my RoR curve to see how the roast was progressing in real time, with the huky/artisan setup this is nearly impossible). This has been quite the battle and now I'm trying to understand "rules" or "laws" I can use to see if I have grounding issues, or to see what the heck the problem is.

Things I've tried

1. Grounding the roaster - galvanized wire ran from back of huky to ground slot on powerstrip - I've used an outlet tester to make sure all outlets are grounded, they are. I even tried using a copper wire. I THINK I have it grounded it properly?
2. Making sure the thermocouple wires aren't near power cords.
3. Doing preheat tests - with no heat, no motor, and no fan, click start in artisan and monitor temps. Turn on fan, should a spike occur if I have grounding issues? Turn on motor, should a spike occur if I have grounding issues? Nothing happens when trying to "trigger" spikes using those events.
4. More preheat tests - applying just gas, no fan or drum motor, I get RoR fluctuation of 5-10 degrees F. Turning the motor on will drive ROR down, and then it comes back up and settles at the same variance. Turning fan on with no pipe connected doesn't really do anything. Turning fan on with pipe connected (and variac set to above 50) results in a BIG spike, and the ROR doesn't really stabilize.
5. When adding beans and doing an actual roast - thats where the ROR swings big time - the RoR curve looks like a polygraph test. Sometimes its worse, I can't nail down a method to the madness.
6. At one point I tried disconnecting thermocouple wires from my phidget and plugging them into a k-type meter that I used when I had my freshroast (no computer, that was freeing hehe) - I did this to see if I had big BT fluctuations during a roast. Well, I didn't have them at all during preheat. When the beans charged into the roaster, I started getting fluctuations but only 5-10. A question I had about this was, is that normal due to the bean mass hitting the probes... or was that representative of noise?
7. I've tried using a usb isolator - makes no difference
8. I've tried using a different computer - no luck
9. I've rubbed my belly and patted my head while doing a rainman dance - this kinda helped


Artisan Settings
sampling interval - 3s
deltaBT interval - 6s

Regarding point 4 - this is for electrical noise expert, I would THINK if the fan or drum motor was indeed causing spikes, then I could use that cold roaster test to prove that. Meaning, shouldn't I see spikes while flipping the fan or motor on/off.

I'll try to add pictures of the various test graphs in artisan. My whole string of trial/error and frustrated posts is on the huky forum....

If anyone is super knowledgeable about this stuff, maybe its easier to get your help over the phone?

keno wrote:If someone is experiencing spikes and erratic readings in Artisan on a Huky and changing the Artisan settings doesn't address the problem.

Under these circumstances I would try grounding the roaster. It's very easy and cheap to do. I might even try grounding BEFORE messing with the Artisan settings.

Just the drum motor? what about the fan? the Variac? the laptop?

Also. In this link, http://www.phidgets.com/docs/Thermocoup ... ction_Type
they mention that grounded thermocouples can introduce ground loops.
The original thermocouples that Mr. Li supplies with the HUKY are ungrounded.
If grounded thermocouples have been installed, should they just be changed out, or would there be another work-around?

I just grounded the entire roaster and that took care of the problem I was experiencing. I wasn't using a variac, just a dimmer switch to control the fan. The dimmer switch might have contributed to the problem as a friend with a Huky who used a variac did not have a problem with his. I remember reading that some people found that running a laptop off the battery instead of the power cord can help. I never had to mess with the thermocouples but that could
be a next step if grounding the roaster doesn't work.

Right - dimmer switches are known to introduce alot of noise.

Laptop always runs off the battery.

What method did you use to ground the roaster? Copper and galvanized wires from screw on huky to shoving it into the ground hole in powerstrip has been unsuccessful.

On a completely positive note - a natural ethiopian I roasted wednesday night and cupped this morning...is amazing.. happy friday. My hottop roasts could not come close to how good my city roasts have been on the huky. That's whats actually important, buttttt me fighting the logging and general kludgeyness of the huky is a big bummer.