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I am building new project, which I will power up the water tank heater from my smartphone. I have few safety though I want to ask here to get your opinion..

I am going to use AVR to run a relay, that will be connected to the main AC line. my heater takes about 11-12Amp on 240VAC.

  1. Which relay should I use? SSR or mechanical? I looked into these 2:

    I think the mechanical is better because I have physical disconnection, but I am afraid of "jumps" on the mechanical device (like de-bounce and such). what do you think will be better here?

  2. Relay mount - if I am going to use the mechanical T9A relay, how do you think I should mount it? it has no mount, maybe I will try to use terminal block like this to connect the legs:

Terminal Block

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  • \$\begingroup\$ I inlined the links and image for you. You'll be able to do the same with enough rep, just keep at it. :) \$\endgroup\$
    – JYelton
    Commented Mar 20, 2014 at 20:37
  • \$\begingroup\$ Can you find a DPDT relay with spade connectors? Then you can use something like insulation sleeve for spade connector over the connectors to make it safer. Remember, sleeve on before crimping spade connector with a purpose-made crimping tool. And a fuse. Disclaimer I am not an electrician. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Mar 20, 2014 at 21:41

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Some things to think about as you proceed.

  • SSR drops \$1.6V\$, according to your link. At \$12A\$, you are \$\approx 20W\$ dissipation with the SSR. I'd plan for even more dissipation to be safer. You need to consider an attached heat sink for it.
  • EMR relays can come powered either by the AC line voltage (using a shading pole or shorted turn embedded into one end of the armature) or some DC voltage. You could consider using an AC relay that operates from 240VAC and including a MOC3023 or MOC3063 (one triggers at the zero crossing, the other doesn't care) opto in order to turn it on safely. This moves the relay power requirement to your line instead of your DC supply for the AVR, though you still need 5mA for the opto. But the coil dissipation for the EMR you listed is 0.9W. And any power supply you use for your micro system will have to include that. That's a lot, by comparison. So "shifting the load" may offer an advantage worth considering.
  • If you want to get fancy (and since you are including a micro, you can do that), you could consider the combined use of an SSR and EMR. The SSR is triggered first and operates for some designated period of time while you then activate the EMR and wait for it to be engaged. Then drop out the SSR, leaving the EMR handling the load. A similar process turns things off, as well. You may be able to consider avoiding the heat sink on the SSR this way, if you can assure yourself that you won't overheat it. (Or you can get fancy and possibly even include a bimetal switch taken from a fish tank heater, for example, that will open if things get hot -- which may be smaller than the heat sink.) But another advantage is that the contacts on the EMR won't be subjected to arcing and so will probably last longer, as well. This is called a "hybrid" relay. You can google it. You will have to carefully consider your situation if you do this, though. It has advantages and disadvantages.
  • A relay I chose looked like this: JQX-40F 1Z 40A 110VAC. But I'm working with 110VAC here. But that provides another kind of mounting you might look for.

Just some thoughts to consider. Since you will be putting this into a proto box of some kind, mounting is probably best left to your ingenuity.

RESPONSE NOTES:

  • The EMR you linked specs \$\approx 1W\$ to hold it engaged. Actually, within spec, it could even be slightly more. At \$5V\$, that's \$200mA\$. Your DC power supply will need to support that load, plus whatever else is required of your DC supply. By comparison, a MOC3023 requires \$5mA\$ to operate an AC relay coil, which itself draws its power from the line and itself only uses perhaps \$30mW\$. It's lower power all around. I'm not telling you to use one. Use what you feel is best. I'm just suggesting an alternative to consider.

  • Don't use the SSR to power the EMR. I was offering a thought about using an SSR in parallel to an EMR. For more details, I suggest you google "hybrid relay" and see what comes up. In this case, you protect the mechanical contacts of the EMR using an SSR. There are some nice youtube videos illustrating the elimination of arcing under power using this method. But since what I wrote wasn't clear, I recommend you avoid this idea for now.

ADDITIONAL RESPONSE NOTE:

schematic

simulate this circuit – Schematic created using CircuitLab

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    \$\begingroup\$ Well, it's more like power the SSR for 1 second, but also start the EMR almost immediately, too. It will engage in less than 1 second and you can drop out the SSR, then. Whether all that trouble is necessary depends on what you consider important. My system goes into a wall where it isn't accessible and absolute lowest power dissipation plus preventative measures against contact wear on the EMR are of high priority. Your mileage will vary. \$\endgroup\$
    – jonk
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 9:38
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    \$\begingroup\$ The MOC's are dirt cheap -- get them on ebay for nothing, almost. They basically come in increasingly higher voltage tolerances and in zero-cross vs random. You want something at the 400VAC or better. I think the MOC3023 is random, the MOC3063 is zero-cross, and both are rated high enough. But you should verify all that. \$\endgroup\$
    – jonk
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 9:40
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    \$\begingroup\$ No, the AC relay actually is about \$2M\Omega\$. If you compute the \$\frac{V^2}{R}\$ for the power, you will find that it really is about \$30mW\$ for the entire coil. This is better than \$1W\$. They use a lot of really fine wire and are pretty impressive. Depending on other requirements, you might greatly lower your DC supply requirements, opening up more options for you to consider. Going from a couple of watts to \$100mW\$ can make a surprising difference in your available choices. \$\endgroup\$
    – jonk
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 9:45
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    \$\begingroup\$ I think someone already mentioned "snubbers" to you. That's the "small amount of power." It's pretty small and doesn't impact efficiency here. It's not going to be bad for any massive water heater I've seen. Mostly, this snubber leakage is about being a shock hazard when you work around it. It means you should be careful, yourself. \$\endgroup\$
    – jonk
    Commented Mar 22, 2014 at 19:00
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    \$\begingroup\$ No, I was thinking more like my "ADDITIONAL RESPONSE NOTE" above in the answer. Micro activates the SSR, waits 10ms or so, activates EMR, waits 500ms, deactivates SSR... holds.... then to turn off, activates SSR again, waits 10ms, deactivates EMR, waits 500ms, deactivates SSR... done. \$\endgroup\$
    – jonk
    Commented Mar 23, 2014 at 0:14
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If this is a home water heater, surely it has a thermostat which already controls a relay or solid-state switch for the heater. Why not use your AVR to switch or otherwise intervene with the thermostat circuit?

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  • \$\begingroup\$ I don't want to play with the boiler itself.. not there yet.. just learning for now :) \$\endgroup\$
    – gabi
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 11:07

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