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13. Applications and implications

This week’s assignment:

Propose a final project masterpiece that integrates the range of units covered, answering:

What will it do?

Who’s done what beforehand?

What will you design?

What materials and components will be used?

Where will parts come from?

How much will they cost?

What parts and systems will be made?

What processes will be used?

What questions need to be answered?

How will it be evaluated?

Your project should incorporate 2D and 3D design, additive and subtractive fabrication processes, electronics design and production, microcontroller interfacing and programming, system integration and packaging.

Where possible, you should make rather than buy the parts of your project

Projects can be separate or joint, but need to show individual mastery of the skills, and be independently operable

The details

What will it do?

My weather station will collect data about the temperature, humidity, pressure, etc. and communicate with either the Internet &/or an indoor base station with a display.

Who’s done what beforehand?

Many people have designed similar projects before with different form factors and methods of data presentation, but I will be designing my own project, with inspiration from other projects.

What will you design?

I will design the outdoor/indoor station enclosures and any microcontroller boards, as well as the power-management system with a solar panel.

What materials and components will be used?

PLA or ABS will likely be used for the outdoor enclosure, with a wooden box for the indoor unit. The boards will be milled on copper PCBs, with additional SMT components used to assemble the boards. An LCD or other display may be used on the indoor unit to display info.

Where will parts come from?

The weather sensor, solar panel, and rechargeable batteries will come from the manufacturer/vendor (e.g. Adafruit/Digikey). Most other materials are already part of out Lab’s inventory.

How much will they cost?

The sensor costs ~$20, while a small solar panel should cost ~$10. These should be some of the only expenses outside of the standard Lab inventory.

What parts and systems will be made?

The enclosures and all boards will be made.

What processes will be used?

I hope to incorporate CAD (designing enclosures), laser cutting &/or CNC (indoor enclosure), 3D printing (outdoor enclosure), electronics design & production (boards), inputs (sensor), outputs (indoor display), embedded programming, and wireless communication (data transfer between units).

What questions need to be answered?

As detailed below in the “planned developments” section, I have yet to learn enough about wireless communication or interfaces, so I will work during those weeks to advance towards my final project. Also, the final form factor of the project will likely evolve as time progresses.

How will it be evaluated?

The project can be evaluated by whether it successfully collects accurate and appropriately precise data and presents it to the end use in the intended manner.

Current status

Details regarding my current proposed final project can be found here on my final project page. In recent weeks, I have designed a version of the popular Satshakit that will likely serve as a base device for my weather station. With that board, I worked with a TMP36 temperature sensor to run a serial output with temperature information. I also have worked with LCDs to display that serial output.

Planned developments

  • In networking and communications week, I hope to work with some form of wireless communication to send the temperature information wirelessly to the indoor “base station” for my weather station project.

  • During interface and application programming week, I hope to refine the integration of the two stations and the display of data to the end user.

  • Other developments include moving from the basic temperature sensor to one that can give data such as humidity and air pressure; creating the outdoor and indoor enclosures; and developing the solar power system for the outdoor station.

Timeline

Currently, my final presentation is scheduled for June 19, which leaves me:

My final exams are over at the end of May, so I have two weeks of relatively free time in June before my presentation to build and refine my final project, using my work in these last weeks of Fab Academy to help reach my goal.