Design and Implementation of Nutrition Control System for Optimization of Hydroponic Plant Growth

Hydroponic farming requires special attention and treatment of plants. Nutrition is an important factor in its growth. Nutrients or nutrients in plants are obtained from fertilizers that contain complex minerals. The development of agricultural technology can help sustain plant growth, especially in controlling nutrients for plants. In 2017 a monitoring and control system tool was also developed using the capacitance principle by producing an accurate level of ppm and EC readings that are close to the TDS meter reading value as a reference for measuring instruments using the PID method. However, this research was only intended for a particular plant, considering that the problem was the manufacture and development of a nutrient control system by adjusting the output of the A/B Mix liquid fertilizer to obtain the TDS (Total Dissolve Solid) value in accordance with the needs of hydroponic plants in the irrigation tank. The method used is Arduino-based Close loop Feedback Control. The components that support this control system are gravity analog TDS sensor as feedback element, Arduino Mega 2560 as controller, peristaltic pump as actuator, and mixing tank as plant. The results of this study are the reading of the control value TDS of 1025.73 ppm with a set setpoint of 1000 ppm so that an error occurs of 0.02573 or 2%.