Related Experiments:

• Raspberry-pi: experiment 13. Wind speed and direction meter (anemometer)
• Raspberry-pi: Experiment 13. Thermal sensor and more
• Raspberry-pi: Experiment 13. Few more experiments with batteries
• Raspberry-pi: Experiment 13. Anemometer. Less power consumed more produced and preserved

Experiment Goals:

1. Learn working with new type of wind direction and speed sensors

2. Make a prototype which may be used for data collecting at different locations, having the following features: direction sensor calibration, storage of compressed wind data

3. No power saving features at this stage. It shall work from 220 V power source.

Components:

– F200-201 – Wind Speed Sensor (ebay)

– F200-202 – Wind Direction Sensor (ebay)

Schematics:

TBD

Software:

https://github.com/pageal/RPi-Wind/blob/master/05_wind_speed_meter_f200.py

Pictures and story:

– 5V and 12V power supply
 

– Sensors are installed

– RPi is connected and activated

– All is initially tested and placed outside for SW development and testing (using WiFi and VNC)
 

– Data capturing, display and compression:
 

Data Analysis:
Measurements by order

Number of measurements per direction

Summary speed per direction

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Goals:

– to learn using Arduino uC, relay and motion sensor

– using Arduino Pro mini, to make our corridor lamp automatically switching ‘On’ if motion is detected in the area of the entrance-hall. Switch ‘Off’ – by timeout.

– finally installed prototype shall be extendable (ex. by RF components sending motion detection to central PC) and allowing easy and safe maintenance and upgrade.

Note: As a result of this post being reviewed and discussed at Hackaday, I’d like to note (thanks the reviewers) that using Arduino in this experiment is NOT necessary, as the project was not finally extended with RF transceiver as planned. RF transmission of “LAMP-IS-OF” activated IR sensor and turned the lamp back ON, and lack of time were making me finishing this experiment in the middle. Thus, the not is as following, again:  for just lamp switch on-off solution Arduino is actually not necessary. The reason is a presence of “Time Delay Adjust potentiometer at HC-SR501 Motion Detection sensor used here, which sets how long the output remains high after detecting motion (anywhere from 5 seconds to 5 minutes) so that it may be used for driving of the enable pin at the relay.

Components:

– HW: Arduino Pro Mini’s clone Funduino

– HW: Relay (one relay is enough, but I had only two-channel relays) Theory 

– HW: Motion Detection sensor

– HW: 220V->5V AC to DC converter (taken from old power supply)

– SW: sketch

– Mech: old plastic box

– Mech: spare Raspberry-Pi camera case (for motion detection sensor)

Wiring:

Description:

– Learning to use Arduino lead to creation of the appropriate ‘Getting-Started’ page

– Then was a turn to try and use relay with Arduino GPIO.

– motion detector also was connected to another GPIO pin configured to be treated as input.

– after enabling of the components,  bread-board based complete prototyping and after completion of the Arduino SW sketch, there stage of  final assembling begun.

– motion detector sensor was placed into special case which will allow to install it at some distance from the switching module and the lamp itself so that the sensor will provide sufficient coverage of the entrance hall and will not react on motion at the adjacent guest-room

– AC-related components were attached to the top cover of the box and connected to the 220V AC source

– then digital components and wires were prepared at the bottom cover of the box

– then all was assembled in place and sealed.

– all appears to be working as expected

And here how the final product looks like

VIDEO_01[ENG] VIDEO_02[ENG] VIDEO_03[ENG] VIDEO_04[ENG] VIDEO_05[ENG]

Related experiments:

• Raspberry-pi: Experiment 13. Anemometer based on sensors f200-2012
• Raspberry-pi: Experiment 13. Thermal sensor and more
• Raspberry-pi: Experiment 13. Few more experiments with batteries
• Raspberry-pi: Experiment 13. Anemometer. Less power consumed more produced and preserved

Experiment Goals:

1. To learn how to connect the wind-direction and wind-speed sensors so that reasonable signals will be generated as a reaction to sensors’ rotation.

2. To Enable reading and analysis of the sensors’ signals

3. Connect all the anemometer parts and pack everything to a hermetic prototype for outdoor observation.

Components:

Electronics:
– Raspberry Pi Model A+ (ebay)
– EDIMAX Wi-Fi Adatper (EW-7811Un (ebay))
– (2x) 1W 5V 180mA Solar Power Panel, 99 x 69mm (ebay)
– (2x) SS34 diodes (ebay)
– (1x) ADC Pi V2.2 8-channel A2D converter from www.abelectronics.co.uk for reading the battery voltages
– (1x) Wind Speed Sensor – spare part for weather station (ebay)
– (1x) Wind Direction Sensor – spare part for weather station (ebay)

Mechanics:
– (1x) Empty chocolate box of medium size form Ferrero Rocher (ebay)
– (2x) unused parts of adjustable furniture legs (left from IKEA furniture) serving as stands for the sensors

Rechargeable batteries (connected in parallel):
– (8x)  rechargeable batteries AA 1.2V 3000 mAh (ebay)
– (4x) New Sun-PL653494 7.4 V 1800mAh (ebay) betteries
– (3x) Unknown rechargeable batteries (from “Move Power”)

Use-Case:

1. No external power for a long time

2. No physical access for a long time

3. No Wi-Fi + Internet infrastructure in near proximity

4. Anti-theft GPS module (optional)

Architecture: The diagram below shows the desired architecture. In this experiment Wi-Fi is used instead of GSM and the GPS module is not connected. However,  the capabilities of GSM communication and reading location and time with the GPS module were enabled at previous experiment. There is a plan to connect them in the final prototype.

Schematics:

Software:

https://github.com/pageal/RPi-Wind.git

Pictures and Stories:

– The prototyping process was preceded by a few experiments related to battery array strength and charging cycle. Results indicate that additional current is required from solar panels, thus more of these were ordered. When connected, they should provide about 1Ah (instead of 360 mAh now). So far the pack without any sensors survived alive about 48 hours transmitting its status.

-This charger is built from the two circuits remaining from the “Move Power” products taken apart in an earlier experiments. Thus, all the spare parts (except the case) from two bad-functioning devices were re-used.

– While connected to two USB ports, this charger allows simultaneous charging of two accumulators to 4.12V. However, building of cables which allow direct connection  of these accumulators to a USB splitter would allow simultaneous charging to 5V. Thus, this is in the plan. After the cables are built, the recharging cycle should shorten as there will be no need for several charge balancing sessions (when weaker accumulators charge from stronger ones). At least one such a session is necessary now to bring the battery array to about 5V.

– These are all the chargers working together for the purpose of charging the entire battery array before prototyping can start.

– The prototype was created mostly by using epoxy to glue together various pieces of the fixture. If necessary, the sensors may be unscrewed from the fixture. As a specification of the sensors was missing, several experiments were conducted to understand proper connectivity. The wind speed sensor appeared easier to understand as it has only two wires. The mystery of the wind direction sensor wasn’t cracked until this link was found with a schematics which described the connections between components. It was hard to imagine the black wire, which usually goes to ground, connects to VCC as does the red wire (but through a 10KOhm resistor).

– Here is the final interconnection, described in the schematics earlier in this post.

– Working prototype with RPi in its waterproof case.

Useful links:

• Raspberry Pi Model A+
• EDIMAX Wi-Fi Adatper (EW-7811Un)
• SS34
• weather station WH1091

Experiment Goal:

To enable the following features:
– capturing of live video by means of Raspberry Pi Camera module
– streaming of the captured video to custom PC Client

Constellation:

Components:

– Board: Raspberry Pi model B or higher (RPi-Model-B ebay/RPi2-Model-B ebay)
– OS SD-card: NUBS (preinstalled/self-made after download)
– Camera: Raspberry Pi Camera module  (ebay) or PiNoIr Camera module (ebay)
– Wi-Fi:  EdiMax EW-7811Un (ebay) dongle

Constellation: 

Useful Links:

• Getting started with raspbery pi camera module
• Using the vlc activex control in WPF
• vlcdotnet
• Python. picamera module