3 of about 190 Order a Riffle Datalogger - Deadline 16 March 2017

[Patrick Hixenbaugh]

Greetings,

Liz and I are happy to announce that Public Lab is offering the Riffle Datalogger for sale for a limited time. The Riffle is an open-source datalogger, designed to fit inside the neck of a standard water bottle for water monitoring purposes. It can log many types of sensors with multi-week battery life, records data to a microSD card, and is based on the Arduino Uno.

We're facilitating a group order by March 17, 2017, from a board manufacturer, and our price at-cost is $60 for the board, or $40 each if enough orders are reached.

If you are interested, please see the listings at the Public Lab Store: http://store.publiclab.org/collections/water-monitoring

• The Riffle. Depending on the number of orders we receive by March 17 we may be able to offer discounts for orders of 2 or more riffles. Riffles will cost no more than $60 each. Buy multiple riffles to use in separate projects, or to split the cost with friends.

• Riffle accessories and Bootloading. For $13, Public Lab staff will install the bootloader and include all necessary accessories.

Please pass this along to any colleagues who may be interested in open-source, DIY monitoring. And let us know if you have any questions.

Thanks,

Patrick Hixenbaugh

P.S. See more examples of the Riffle in action, including as a methane gas sensor, at publiclab.org/tag/riffle


--

Patrick Hixenbaugh
University of Maryland, Baltimore County, 2014.

Chemistry / Environmental Science

+1-240-242-7449

https://publiclab.org/profile/pdhixenbaugh

[Chris Fastie]

Patrick, thanks for making this happen. I was curious about alternative data loggers so I started a comparison table with three other possible approaches to logging environmental data. They all have a real time clock and log to a micro SD card as the Riffle does. All of them are based on Arduino and will run more or less the same sketches. These are all open source hardware.

1. EnviroDIY Mayfly Logger. Designed at the Stroud Water Research Center and commercially available through Amazon but currently out of stock.
2. Adafruit Feather M0 and Adalogger FeatherWing RTC + SD Add-on. These are two commercial products which snap together.
3. Cave Pearl Project logger. Ed Mallon's design for a DIY data logger made from very inexpensive Asian clone components (Arduino Pro Mini, SD card board, RTC board). Requires soldering and care.

The important differences among these loggers probably includes how long they can log on battery power. All of these loggers have not been tested in multi week deployments, so we can't be sure about this endurance question, but Ed Mallon's logger probably outlasts the others by many months. Another difference is memory and computing power. For recording the data from a few simple sensors all will perform well, although the sketch I used on the Riffle just about maxed out the program memory. The Adafruit Feather option offers lots more memory for more complicated sketches. The Mayfly and Feather both offer easy upgrades to connectivity via cell network, WiFi, and other radio options.

I have used only one of these loggers (Riffle) so the table below is just some basic information I found online. There might be other features that are more important to a particular project and some important differences that I don't know about. It would be good to learn what other features to compare, so folks can make a good decision about meeting their needs. For example, if you don't need to log unattended for more than a month or two, you could order the Feather boards today (e.g., from Amazon) for about $30.00. It would also be good to hear about other similar loggers.

Chris

[Patrick Hixenbaugh]

Chris,

Thanks for this! Reading Ed Mallon's blog and design notes were incredible. It seems like the biggest difference there is the construction of the PVC watertight enclosure -- which adds complexity but also flexibility over the riffle's ability to fit inside a watertight bottle. Judging by John Keefe's sensor-journalism project, the FeatherM0, being only 4 mm wider, might fit inside one of the wider-mouthed bottles generally available. I also noticed that the cave logger seemed to be using multiple AA batteries. Could the Riffle's battery life also be extended by using more, or larger, batteries? That could be especially useful if one paired it with wifi or cell phone connectivity.

The real exciting thing for me is, when I started down the road of looking for open source water quality dataloggers, I couldn't find any that were readily available. Knowing that there are all these options now, including the Adafruit solution which is inexpensive, and the Mayfly option, which has incredibly full features, there are many ways someone can start logging data! Did you post this chart up on the public lab website / water quality area? A similar chart down the line could be a list of sensors (temperature, turbidity, conductivity, etc.,) that interface with these, and their pros and cons.

I suppose the most exciting thing for me is the Riffle's ability to fit right inside that watertight bottle, and made into a logging sensor relatively quickly. I am really eager to pair it with one of the conductivity sensors from here: https://publiclab.org/wiki/conductivity_sensing and see if it measures conductivity steadily over time. I really think that getting an accurate measure of this will let all kinds of people keep track of their local stream health, as it's affected by road salt, fracking fluid, or something else. Hopefully they can get help using these types of dataloggers at public lab. :) There are a series of guides on sensor types at the Riffle wiki, which would be useful guides for somebody using any of these loggers.

And if anybody reading this would like to try out the riffle, the link again is here: http://store.publiclab.org/collections/water-monitoring and the deadline for getting in on the order it is March 17th.

--
Post to this group at plots-waterquality@googlegroups.com
 
Public Lab mailing lists (http://publiclab.org/lists) are great for discussion, but to get attribution, open source your work, and make it easy for others to find and cite your contributions, please publish your work at http://publiclab.org
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "plots-waterquality" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to plots-waterquality+unsub...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[Chris Fastie]

Patrick,

I put the comparison table at Google Docs. I think everyone should be able to edit it. Please add columns, etc., even if you don't know the info that goes in them. Somebody might know.

Ed Mallon's enclosure is a work of art, but the big difference between his logger and the other three is that 1) the parts can be easily purchased for $10 (eBay sellers in Asia), and 2) you have to solder everything together. It is very great that Ed has made this option available to everyone. And his is the only logger of the three that has been field tested for multi month logging deployment (although I bet the Mayfly has been field tested too).

That's a good question about using bigger batteries. I added a column to the spreadsheet for Input power. I don't know what all the options are for each logger.

I think all of these loggers can get data from lots of different types of sensors, especially the typical inexpensive sensors most people use with Arduinos. But maybe the Grove sensors require some special circuitry.

The Adafruit feathers are not much wider than the Riffle, but with the Adalogger Featherwing (shield) added, it is no longer a single thin PCB but is maybe 18mm thick:

It might still fit into some plastic bottles, but not a personal water bottle. I have not heard that anyone has field tested a submerged standard water bottle with connected external sensors for more than a week or two. I would opt for something studier than that with a more robust top for installing a cable port.

A powerful feature of the Feather boards is the variety of communication options. Instead of the basic Feather M0, you can start with a Feather that has a cell phone module, WiFi, LoRa radio, Bluetooth, packet radio, or others. These cost more, but are ready to send data instead of (or in addition to) saving to SD card.

Lots of logging options,

Chris

[Stevie Lewis]

Ah this chart!! Yes! The comparison is soo helpful. 

Sidebar:

Wondering about clear ways info like this can live on the wiki upfront. Maybe under a tag for a method? Or right on a method page. Some work going on for the methods pages right now here.

-Stevie

[Liz Barry]

Hi everyone, 

it's so great to see this table developing. Shannon Hicks has also contributed a lot of information about the Mayfly (on specific comparison points with Riffle, and also general info) that Patrick, Abdul and I have in our emails and would like to put it somewhere publicly. 

Let's continue this discussion during the 3pm ET / noon PT meeting online here: https://www.uberconference.com/publiclab or also by phone here: 

NUMBER857-216-5974

PIN10864

Talk to you soon!

Liz

--

Liz Barry
director of community development
@publiclab

publiclab.org

+1-336-269-1539

Love our work? Become a Public Lab Sustaining Member today!

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to plots-waterquality+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.

For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

--

Post to this group at publiclaboratory@googlegroups.com

 
Public Lab mailing lists (http://publiclab.org/lists) are great for discussion, but to get attribution, open source your work, and make it easy for others to find and cite your contributions, please publish your work at http://publiclab.org
---

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Public Laboratory for Open Technology and Science" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to publiclaboratory+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.

[Patrick Hixenbaugh]

Hi Liz,

I'll be unable to make the 3pm call today, but can check later tonight what was said and what the action steps are.

On my plate is to get the world out further on the Riffle to other groups.

Cheers,

Patrick

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to plots-waterquality+unsub...@googlegroups.com.

For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

--

[shi...@stroudcenter.org]

I'm the creator of the Mayfly board, and as Liz stated, I have talked to lots of Public Lab people about the Mayfly, and brought some with me to the past two Barnraisings at LUMCON.  I just updated a few of the cells regarding the Mayfly's capability in the Google spreadsheet Chris shared in the link above.

Since people are asking about the power requirements of the Mayfly and how it compares to the Riffle:  

The Mayfly processor (1284p) is more powerful in terms of processing power and features than the 328p, but it doesn't actually use more electrical power.  In sleep mode, the logger draws less than 250uA (or 0.25 mA), or with a microSD card in the socket it draws around 450uA (0.45 mA).  This is exactly the same sleeping current the Riffle uses as stated here: https://publiclab.org/wiki/riffle_design_philosophy#power-and-battery-life

When the Mayfly is awake, it only draws about 6mA when sitting idle, compared to the 45mA an Uno pulls when idle.  

So you could potentially use a Mayfly for months on a battery if you sleep it and keep the wake periods short.  However, using something like the GPRSbee cell module like we have on most of our loggers, or lots of sensors with long sample periods, will use more power, so we include a small solar panel on our stations to keep them charged.  If you're just recording data from a conductivity sensor onto the microSD card and not transmitting anything, then it would last months on a single battery.

We will have more boards and kits available on Amazon very soon, we're just dealing with a supply issue with the manufacturer.  We will also have some useful custom adapters for connecting sensors and a protoshield that breaks out all the pins in the headers.

-Shannon

[Chris Fastie]

I just came across this product that might be of interest to those looking for an easy and inexpensive data logger. It is a data logger shield for an Arduino Nano. It provides a micro SD card slot and a real time clock. So you can seat a Nano into it and have a ready-to-go logger. It costs $4.00 and a Nano is another $3, so you could have a data logger for $7.00 with no soldering. It has breakouts for certain types of sensors, and male and female headers for all the Nano pins.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/TF-Card-Data-Logger-Shield-Data-Logging-Recorder-Module-For-Arduino-NANO-3-0-/112334998809

No telling how long it will last on battery power, but it doesn't cost much to find out.

It might fit into some of the larger drink bottles.

Chris

 

[Jeffrey Warren]

wow, that's awesome, great find, Chris! Are you ordering one?

--

[Chris Fastie]

I guess I won't be able to resist ordering one or two.

Also, I posted an update last week on the GPS and sensor data logger I have been working on. 

https://publiclab.org/notes/cfastie/03-31-2017/u-blox-gps-board

Since then I have made it work with parts that cost a total of $28.

Chris

[Patrick Hixenbaugh]

Hey all,

How would one go about finding code to work with this datalogger? I'm Interested to see what sketches for this look like!

--

Post to this group at plots-waterquality@googlegroups.com
 
Public Lab mailing lists (http://publiclab.org/lists) are great for discussion, but to get attribution, open source your work, and make it easy for others to find and cite your contributions, please publish your work at http://publiclab.org
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "plots-waterquality" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to plots-waterquality+unsub...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[Chris Fastie]

Patrick,

That's a good question. I have not come across any sketches for this Nano logger. But with a Nano added, the device is like any Atmega 328p Arduino with added RTC and uSD card. In other words, it's essentially a Riffle. It does not have the power management features of the Riffle (you probably can't charge a battery, and it probably requires 5v+ input) but otherwise it's very similar hardware. The first thing I would try with it is to load some of the Riffle-getting-started sketches. 

It looks like the Nano logger has the SD card connected via SPI and the RTC connected via I2C. If this is the same as the Riffle, the sketches might be more or less interchangeable. Otherwise some pin numbers will have to be changed, or more likely, many hours will be spent fiddling and asking myself why I keep ordering things from Shenzhen.

One thing I don't understand is whether the I2C bus is available for sensors if the RTC is already hard-wired to pins A4 and A5. Same with the SPI bus which has the SD card connected. Can the SPI bus be used for a sensor if the SD card is hard-wired to it?  

Here is the circuit diagram of the shield.

Chris

[Bob]

I think the SPI bus would be available for use with another sensor, it should only require a separate CS Select pin. Then modifying your code to use this pin. The I2C might also allow for additional devices as long as their device IDs are unique on the bus. But I have no experience with the board (yet) so I could be mistaken.

[Chris Fastie]

Thanks Bob,

I forgot about the CS pin (by default pin 10 but can be assigned to several others). For I2C we would want to determine which address the RTC was using and explicitly define the address of any I2C sensors. Sounds easy. Also sounds like you ordered one;^)

Chris

[Chris Fastie]

The Nano logger shield breaks out a few pins including the "SD_SC" pin. I'm not sure what pin that is or why you would want access to it. The two I2C pins (SDA and SCL) are also broken out. I guess these are just pins A4 and A5 but I'm not sure.Three other pins are broken out including L1 and L2 (LEDs?) and "1307_SQW." Anyone know what 1307_SQW is? I'm sure choosing these six pins to break out makes perfect sense to someone.

Chris

[Bob]

1307_SQW might be the RTC 1Hz square wave out. 

--

[Chris Fastie]

Good catch Bob. The real time clock IC on the shield is a DS1307. Here is Adafruit's tutorial on their DS1307 break out board kit: https://learn.adafruit.com/ds1307-real-time-clock-breakout-board-kit

[ggall...@yahoo.com]

I am using STM32F303K8 32-bit ARM chips on Nano footprint boards. $11.00US from Digikey or Mouser on laser etcher/cutter project. 72MHz with hardware float point processor. They are 3.3V only!!!

On Wednesday, April 5, 2017 6:14 PM, Chris Fastie <cfa...@gmail.com> wrote:

Good catch Bob. The real time clock IC on the shield is a DS1307. Here is Adafruit's tutorial on their DS1307 break out board kit: https://learn.adafruit.com/ds1307-real-time-clock-breakout-board-kit

--
Post to this group at plots-wat...@googlegroups.com

 
Public Lab mailing lists (http://publiclab.org/lists) are great for discussion, but to get attribution, open source your work, and make it easy for others to find and cite your contributions, please publish your work at http://publiclab.org
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "plots-waterquality" group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to plots-waterqual...@googlegroups.com.