RPi Smart Still: Version 1.4 of the software was released on October 8, 2024 and now supports Banana/Orange Pi clones running Armbian (Debian for ARM). The Raspberry Pi Foundation pulled off an underhanded money grab by making numerous features of their legacy models nonfunctional under Raspbian 12. Clearly, their plan is to convince people to throw away their older units and shell out the money for a new Model 5. Sorry, Homie don’t play dat!
Airhead: A new project underway and in the testing phases at this time. This is an upgrade for an Air Still or any clone that provides SCR/SSR based power regulation and temperature control, as well as timed distillation with a starting and ending target temperature. The SCR/SSR eliminates scorching issues when you have suspended solids in your wash (such as with Gin) because there is heat always rising which prevents suspended solids from falling out of solution.
My Brewing Buddy: This is a custom WordPress plugin that I’m developing for another business, but the service will be available to the public soon. Primarily intended for home beer brewers, but will eventually be adapted to support home distillers and wine makers as well. A new generation of brew/ferment recipe database and calculation service that is mobile web browser friendly, and integrates with CraftBeerPi (possibly BrewPi as well) and RPi Smart Still.
In other news, I’m now prepared to start selling assembled & tested RPi Smart Still Hats and will soon be offering LIDAR Hydrometer Reader kits and Airhead upgrade kits (minus the SCR controller that you will need to order from Amazon). I’m still kicking around the idea of selling turn-key RPi Smart Still controller systems, but there are a lot of variables to deal with. Reliable parts sources is the biggest obstacle since items regularly come and go on Amazon.
Be sure to subscribe to the Panhandle Ponics YouTube channel to stay current on updates and developments. If you have any questions or suggestions, comment on the videos or shoot me a message from the contact form!