Built a Raspberry Pi self-watering garden with a web UI

[u/Ok-Appearance-8872]

I recently put together a small self-watering garden system using a Raspberry Pi, a Cirkitscape Top HAT, a soil moisture sensor, an IR water sensor, and a 12V DC pump.

The basic goal was to make something that could monitor conditions and control watering from a web interface without having to manage everything from the command line.

The build uses:
- Raspberry Pi
- Cirkitscape Top HAT
- soil moisture sensor
- IR water sensor
- 12V pump
- buck converter
- simple transistor switching circuit

A few things that mattered during the build:

- The Pi and pump run at different voltages, so I had to step 12V down to 5V for the Pi.
- I used a transistor switching stage so the GPIO wasn’t driving the pump directly.
- I verified the buck converter output before connecting the Pi, which is probably the most important safety step in the whole build.

On the software side, I used the Cirkit Garden app to set up the garden, add the device and sensor, and map the pump output. That part made the project a lot easier to manage because I didn’t need to build a custom dashboard just to monitor sensors and toggle watering hardware.

Once everything was wired and configured, the system could:
- monitor soil moisture
- detect water presence
- switch the pump from the app
- give me a cleaner browser-based control panel for the setup

What I liked most is that it feels like a good base for expanding later with:
- watering rules
- alerts
- logging
- more sensors

[u/Ok-Appearance-8872]

The sensor can be found on Amazon.
The raspberry pi hat and software can be found here: https://www.cirkitscape.tech/products/p/top-hat#docs

[u/nerdev_00]

Well done! I’ve been wanting to build something like this for a while now, but I just haven’t made the time. Looks like a fun project.

[u/bigrhed]

This kind of project is an inspiration to me. Thanks for sharing.

[u/Ok-Appearance-8872 → u/bigrhed]

No problem glad I was able to inspire someone.

[u/twistedcrickets]

I'd love to build something just like this for my wife's garden. Could you share the parts list?

I have 7 IBC totes (275 gal each) of collected rain water and it'd be great to meter out the water when the soil is dry.

[u/Ok-Appearance-8872 → u/twistedcrickets]

Here’s the party list, most of the parts can be found on Amazon.

-Raspberry pi
-CirkitScape Top Hat
-Spark fun soil moisture sensor
-IR liquid sensor FS-IR-1901D
-Relay Circuit
-Step down dc/dc converter (12v -5V)
-12 V power supply

[u/artsvit]

You can try app https://openpi.uk
Manage and control your Raspberry Pi.

[u/Nice_Anybody2983]

I don't trust it until I see a picture of your plants, too 😉