I started working on an upgrade camera lens for the robotic arm and also the regular security cameras. These lens are very cheap and easy to buy online. They also give you 3 separate sizes for different options.
Measuring the new lens.
I got a varaity of colors.
Checking the UV coating.
The first mount ended up being for the 3D printer which broke constantly.
This was the first version mounted for the robotic arm. It slipped a bit and a custom mount was later built.
The biggest limiting factor has been the enclosures for the devices. There haven’t been any. Todate there were all boxes or prototypes that needed and upgrade. A 3D printer was purchased from Amazon to be able to customize and buildout the enclosures. By far building out a 3D printer is a highlight I recommend anyone try once.
One of the axis mounts for the slide rails.
One of the tiny parts for the printer
The converted mixer frame into a 3D Printer Bench.
Test printing a cube
A spool feeder was one of the first parts I was advised to build.
Due to space issues and just wanting the beast out of the living area, I broke down the mixer and rebuilt it as a maker bench a few weeks later.
It was time to tear it down. It went quickly and into easy to manage pieces.
Broken casters were a bad design flaw. I needed to use larger ones with more weight load.
Designed and built a simple airflow system using 6″ inline duct fans. These were on the cheaper side from Amazon and are noisy. Future testing will find out if there are insulated models in the economy range.
For the first test I used the HVAC to dry a damp flower.
Started working on the soil sensors to be used on seedlings. Could also be used on full plants but the depth/length of the sensor might not work on adult pots.
Soldering the sensor up.
The sensor being held in a toolkit.
Created the first generation of the sensor integrated into the system.
The sensor registering with the system.
The system server matches with the
The system hadn’t been worked on for a month or so due to work. When everything was brought online it was discovered a massive electronic shock had occurred on all the devices and the chips were all friend. A complete system wipe and rebuild was needed.
Every chip ended up being burned out.
Designed and made some simple light reflectors for T5 fixtures out of simple cardboard and mylar reflectors.
Hot glued the fixtures to the cardboard. The heat generated ended up being an issue. Zip ties were later used.
With mylar attached.
Placed in the tent.
The nutrient mixer had been a manual process to date and it was time to program the software to govern it. Very tedious process involving a lot of calibration.
System plugged in and running.
Microprocessor talking to the microcontroller.
System doses a perfect 10 ml
Wired into the grow.
The grow with the camera, power and feeding all running.
To advance the power automation a 2 port version of the power jack was built using smaller components. This ended up being an issue as it got smaller there were many wifi connection problems stemming from having to power the wifi antenna. In an updated version we replaced the microprocessor with one that had onboard wifi.
Putting the pieces together.
Hard twists for the high voltage.
Wiring the microprocessor.
The new jack coming online but as a 4 port jack for now.
The final jack.
