HANDY HAZARD BUDDY
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Picking up from the last post, where I went over setting up the Raspberry Pi with the Grovepi+ and various sensors to make an environmental array which allows me to access data from the enviroment on a multitude of levels.
Now with the all the gear and code set up, I’m ready to make this thing portable somehow.
The sensors are such that would make a great network of safety and inspection programs. Think about having the ability to say:
Recieve warnings when the airs too toxic or Being able to detect fires on the other side of a door and Measure many potentially harmful gases.
Or perhaps
Give you a heads up if something/somebody that you cannot see is lurking nearby. Just as functionally cool, being able to navigate in the dark or With your eyes closed.
As well as certain environmental readouts such as sunshine (uv/infrared), temperature and humidy and altitude and air pressure which can all be useful for say environmental data collection or finding a perfect place to plant seeds.
So I thought making it WEARABLE would be the most practical way to package this thing so that your hands are always free for such outdoorsy tasks.
Once 100% complete, this would make a great tool for environmental inspection, firefighting,crime fighting, personal assistance. “My Handy Hazard Buddy”.
How to make your own pipboy
Drawing inspiration from the Fallout universe I figured theres gotta be a decent pipboy blue print out there somewhere which would be my best bet since I haven’t picked up 3d modeling yet but I DO have a 3d printer.
3 Attempts And 16 Hours Later
:/ …Yea it’s cool I guess. Hard to print on my machine so I only got half and the surface wasn’t exactly ideal for attaching sensors and It’s bulky. I wouldn’t feel safe relying on this thing in a hazard put it that way.
So I eventually ran into the raptor reloaded wrist and thought this could work great if I can find some general sensor mounts, some special ones for the ultrasonic ranger and PIR motion sensors, some latches to lock it shut, and a raspberry pi case that I can modify a bit oh and a watertight battery enclosure. And resize the wrist to better attach everything neat n’ sleak. Yea I’d be be in business. 🙂
A Smooth 36 Hours Later
The ultrasonic ranger with an attached, PIR motion sensor both can be adjusted to cover about a 270° twist.
Temperature and humidity,sunshine, indoor light, air pressure and altitude. Below that is the flame sensor and gas sensor and the 2 in the bottom middle are collision and air quality. Some Comdox 410 heavy duty Screws to attach them.
The RGB LCD backlight: to communicate information with words and colors.
Some raspberry pi m2.5 screws to attach the pi to the grovepi+ and the case as well as the sensors themselves to their respective mounts.
And a portable usb battery to power the whole thing and be swapped out and charged easily.
The original plan was to use a LCD screen but mine was acting a bit screwy so I control it with my phone using VncViewer until I get a new one.
Hell yeah this thing rocks. It feels balanced, comfortable to wear and as sleak as I can get for now(it’s only my first one after all). I’d take a stroll in a gas leak with thing heh 😉 and what’s more, for a more complete manifestation of it’s philosophy, it has parts that glow in the dark and parts that change color in the sun to react to the environment inside and out. Physically and digitally. Hallelujah.
Closer to Home
Been a while since i looked at this thing. Like a year…shame on me :). With my current experience level, i decided to give my Hazard Buddy a well deserved overhaul. I present the Hazard+:
Based on experience with the previous take, i changed the positions of the sensors to be more practical to natural movements. I.e. pir motion sensor always facing your blindspot no matter how you hold your arm.
I built the new chassis out of PLA+ which is stronger thsn regular PLAs. And added more sensor covers like the grove lcd i2c box, an air quality case(which is resized for the barometer s well) , a sexy temp/humid case, some general purpose mounts large and small, moisture sensor and a gorgeous sunlight sensor house and used heat changing materials among others to better reflect each sensor as well as to point out information to you even when the pi is off. And theres plenty of space at the bottom for a battery. Tho i still have no luck finding any sort of grovepi case so im still using the ugly modded one for now.
Sensors fit perfectly on the top and bottom slots of the raptor reloaded.
The moisture sensor is attached by magnet so as to read the soil in a more practical manner.
The wires are MUCH more organized than my previous attempts.
But my favorite touch would be the addition of magnetic latches 😉
All in all, id say this things coming out to be a highly worthy successor to my HAZARD series. Still a few bells and whistles to sculpt out before the look of this thing is complete but its pretty much fully operational. Sick!
Code
I updated the code a bit and added a new EXSense function that gives you constant random sensor readouts of the environment. Its a total scanner that will sound alarms if any one hazard is detected during its scan. So that you can sleep easy in a potentially hazardous environment 😉
And with that, we now have our very own wearable enviromental interactivity tool up and running for real world applications.
Wicked 😉
Well Thats it for this little saga..for now.
Feel free to comment and please, share your own Grovepi set ups. I’m always interested.
Cheers!