Just saw this on e-bay:
I wish I had that much money…
A Blast from the past
Sorry, I just found this stop motion video I took of Sarah and myself playing Super Mario Bros in Holland a few years back and thought I’d post it here so that it doesn’t get lost in the mists of time.
And so I can laugh at it in the future.
First real Arduino project – A thermostat
I am mainly writing this for myself. As I find that explaining a problem to other people even they don’t exist, helps me flesh out what I’m working on. So here goes.
After playing around with arduino and having a temperature logger which shows the min/max and current temperature as well as sending the temperature over the wire via serial back to the computer for logging purposes. I want to add a few feature to this.
- Larger screen (I’m a graph junkie and want to be able to see temperature over time, as well as for other reasons)
- I want it to switch on my home’s water boiler/central heating pump depending on various settings (if we are in, current temperature in hallway, do we want a bath?).
- Send this info to a computer/server so it can save historic temperature data, how long each has been switched on.
- Add a clock module to keep track of time better (rather than rely on the arduino chip)
- Be Controlled from a web interface (eg: tell the system I want a bath today)
- Eventually have a few people/temperature sensors around the house so that it’s a bit smarter about when to switch on heating.
Larger Screen
128x64 Graphic LCD KS0108
So I’ll start from the top with the larger screen, the current small screen I’m using is made for showing characters/text only on two lines.
I have got another lcd that is larger and aimed more towards graphics etc, hopefully this will make it easier to configure a GUI that makes sense for the things that I would like to do. Although it raises a problem with how do I connect this screen to the arduino along with the other sensors/buttons as the lcd screen will take up at least 13 pins on the arduino Duemilanove, so an upgrade to the mega version might be in order. Especially if I want to add other input/outputs such as the relays to control the heating and buttons to control the temperature settings etc.
Controlling mains power devices
Like the central heating pump and water heater. I need to investigate how these are switched on and off with the current old school device and try to mimic this with my new contraption. It might be worth just creating a simpler arduino project to do this based on the time so at least I can get more fine grained control of when the heating does come on. I’m currently looking at relays for mains power, while they seem straight forward I don’t want to fry myself so will need to take extra precautions.
Sending current information to the server
Ideally this would be two way communications wirelessly, I don’t want to be pulling cable through the walls just for a temperature graph. I have seen some cheapish one way wireless serial communications options for arduino which seem like a good first go. Then I can get historical data from the arduino sent wirelessly to a server that is always on, which can store the info somewhere meaningfully. Most probably with php to a mysql db. Then I can track the temperature and when the heating was switched on over time.
Clock module
If the arduino is only sending information one way having a reliable clock is vital to keep track of time without going off track too much per day. I have no idea how it will hook in but I have one and need to experiment with it still.
I will try to keep my progress on this updated, as the project continues.
Laying wooden panel flooring is hard work
Over the weekend I spent some time laying a new floor in one of our bedrooms.
The first step was getting the floorboards to be quiet, rather than squeaking loudly.
So I took up the culprits to make sure there wasn’t anything vital below that I was about to drill/screw into.
I am very glad I did as some of the more noisy floorboards were a few millimetres above some important looking pipes. After replacing the floorboards and then drilling and screwing them down rather than nailing them, it was time to start the process of laying the floor. Which can be seen in the video below.
It is much more tiring than it looks as I used a hand saw for most of it. But the most annoying was some boards/panels were damaged and kept coming apart so after tens of minutes trying to coax them in, I gave up and replaced the boards and ended up using the damaged ones for the edging strips etc that didn’t need to be joined as much.
So, super fun times. Although the room is looking better and better all the time.
My First Arduino
Arduino: Duemilanove - my hello world with the lcd
Today I played with my first arduino, a Duemilanove 328 with some leds and a small lcd. Went through the first few beginner
tutorials, was fun. Have now ordered some new parts of my first proper project I guess. Hopefully simple temperature clock. With a link to outside and inside temperatures and a 128×64 screen so you can see the time from across the room and a few buttons to toggle readings and hopefully some graphs.
When I get used to it plan to have a go with some robots, but then it starts to get a bit more expensive.
27th Enfield Scouts Summer Camp Photos
Another quicky to link to the photos: http://public.fotki.com/m_birlet/other_photos/s_birlet/2010/07-july/27th-enfield-summer-camp/
*Please note that there shold be 2900ish photos, and it will take a few days to upload, should be done by 2nd of August at latest *
password is the usual: teapot.
Hope you all have a good summer!
Enfield Scouts Challenge Camp July 2010
Just a quicky to link to the photos from this event.
link to photos from Enfield scouts channelling camp July 2010
Password is the usual: teapot.
Brownsea Island Campsite Panorama
I was experimenting with panoramic photos, need to work on keeping all the settings the same, could do with some more work. Anyway, here it is click on the image for the bigger version:
The photos were taken with no tripod, just free-hand, then merged with Photomerge in Photoshop CS4. Nothing done after.. Could have been stitched a bit better, maybe next time.
Brownsea Island Expedition Camp
Most of the photos are uploaded from Brownsea Island, should be finished by the end of the day.