In search for smart power strips that have 6 or more outlets, I was coming empty handed. A lot of them have weird proprietary software or just not that many outlets. So I decided to build one myself.
Kopp makes this really nice 10x (dumb) power strip that is internally made of separate outlets as opposed to the more common one-piece molded plastic with metal bars running along as contacts.
I disconnected the individual live connections from each and routed them through an 8 relay board, sacrificing two of the outlets to make room for the relay board and controlling ESP32.
Details
Banana for scale:
Files
Kopp power strip cover.stl
Outlet cover STL file. Fits a Kopp POWERversal power strip.
Standard Tesselated Geometry -
220.10 kB -
12/19/2022 at 13:51
Tasmota would probably be the right drop-in firmware for this. It already does what a power strip needs to do and much more.
because this is part of a bigger project and I intend to add an external SPI port for analog and digital IO expansion, I have however decided to go with the following:
Thanks! There is a 16A in-line fuse which will never blow since the breakers will trip way faster. The relays are 10A [china-]rated, a consumer product might need further protection but I am pretty sure I won't be plugging 2 kW loads in it ;)
Tasmota would be a good drop-in firmware for the ESP32. I am however using a custom firmware because I wanted some "special" features (this is part of a bigger project for a hydroponic garden). I will update the project soon with the github links!
Nice project. What code are you running on the ESP32? Have you considered a fuse to prevent overcurrent through the relays?