Public Lab Research note


Eye-Fi + BAP + Solar install = Win?

by natevw | September 12, 2013 16:41 12 Sep 16:41 | #9317 | #9317

What I want to do

Broadcast our progress as my dad and I install solar PV panels on my roof, using the balloon kit for a great perspective.

My attempt and results

So far it's going great :-)

solar.batsig.nl should offer a live feed of our progress over the next few days. Right now it's updating every 10s since I was testing range, but when this battery runs out I'll likely bump it to a 1m/5m interval or so. Source code is at https://github.com/natevw/fishgoblub/tree/solar

Questions and next steps

There's a lot of hops, so the live feed isn't always quite as reliable as I'd like. The biggest issue is probably battery life. I'm using http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/Battery_Intervalometer which seems to help, but I suspect the Eye-Fi is a significant additional drain, especially at the edge of WiFi connectivity.


10 Comments

Rad!

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This is the coolest thing ever! It's so exciting to see the image moving. How long do you think the balloon will stay up?

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Oh, one thing -- could you change the Balloon Mapping kit link to: http://store.publiclab.org/products/balloon-mapping-kit

Thanks!

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Thanks @warren! Fixed my store link — you might want to update the one at http://publiclab.org/wiki/balloon-mapping-kit then, too?

The camera seems to last around 3h. Hoping to keep the system rolling throughout the install, which will take a couple of days at least. Today's probably the most boring, just inventory and chalking lines and whatnot.

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OMG i have been wondering for months where people are finding that link!!!

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Great progress today, Nate. I just watched the 15th panel go up. Excellent broadcasting.

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Wow, it got dark fast, but it looks like you got all 20 of them in place. Nice work.

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The balloon was just launched this morning. All 20 panels were installed yesterday. Well done. Update: I counted wrong; only 19 went up yesterday.

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Thanks all! Yesterday was the fun day for watching, today's work is mostly in the attic and garage but I've got the balloon up anyway — got a garage sale having a balloon overtop can't hurt ;-) There's one more solar panel that will cover a hookup box you can watch for.

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Awesome, they have a customer for the garage sale.

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