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Instruments
Guy Fraser edited this page Jul 27, 2017
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- Likely a BNO055
- Determines albedo by comparing values between the Pyranometer and Pyrgeometer
- Could potentially make life easier by just having two dedicated thermopile sensors?
- Must ensure that solar radiation does not affect the Pyrgeometer during sunset and sunrise
- Deduce from barometer or GPS?
- Measures wind speed and direction
- Probably use 3 or 4 barometers to detect air pressure on different sides of sensor array
- Would be better to use ultrasonic or microwave for better harsh weather survival
- Will probably need housing behind hydrophobic membranes, or use IP67 MEMS chips
- If possible, also detect vertical wind speed - to determine Eddy covariance flux, which can be used for Atmometer calculations
- Measures rate of evaporation to atmosphere
- Can be estimated mathematically
- Useful to determine how much watering is needed for crops
- Measures atmospheric pressure
- Also investigate QNH = atmospheric pressure adjusted to sea level
- Detects nuclear denotations (optical, x-ray, infrasound, etc)
- We extend concept to detect anything that makes a bang (car backfire, lightning, gunshot...)
- Measures incident EM radiation
- Variants can be used to measure microwave radiation
- See also: Radiometer
- Measures height of cloud base
- Can possibly be roughly derived from dew point
- Measures angle above/below horizon
- Useful for initial setup, and also hand-held use
- Uses the IMU
- Operates during twilight (sunrise, sunset)
- Measures particulate at different layers of atmosphere just above earth shadow
- Can more info be gained via the spectrometer?
- Measures ionising radiation
- alpha; sensor must be exposed to external environment
- beta; sensor must not be obstructed by metals
- gamma; sensor must not be obstructed by dense materials
- muons; doesn't matter where sensor is
- Note: Upper UV wavelengths are also ionising, see UV radiometer below
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Tdb, can be measured using a normal thermometer freely exposed to the air but shielded from radiation and moisture.
- A photometer specifically tuned to light frequencies and heuristics of flames
- Can optically detect fire up to (unknown) range, quicker than particulate sensors
- Some false-positive issues
- Useful for detecting risk of forest fires
- Detects approximate direction and range of CG/GC lightning strikes
- Unreliable for detecting IC/CC lightning
- Must not be EM shielded
- Maybe also do optical lightning flash check?
- Likely a MTK3339 v3 or above
- Likely a BNO055
- Determines duration and intensity of sunlight
-
bright sunshine hours - test every 36 seconds for specific criteria:
- Sunshine duration is defined by WMO as the time during which the direct solar radiation exceeds the level of 120 W/m².
- Global solar intensity
- Could be derived from Pyranometer and/or Heliospectrometer
- Spectrometer that points at sun
- Determines amount of optically active aerosol particles and gaseous constituents in atmosphere
- Ideally also monitor PAR - Photosynthetic Active Radiation
- Will likely incorporate Pyranometer
- Movable platter of sensors that tracks the sun
- Needs to be x and y axis movement, eg. to track Analemma
- Azimuth (Sun) Tracker
- Determines location of the sun and points instruments at it, like sunflowers face the sun
- Will require moving parts unless better solution can be found :/
- May require Monochromators
- Required for: Heliophotometer, Heliospectrometer, Pyrheliometer and Pyranometer
- Also known as psychrometer, humidity
- Measures water vapour (humidity) in atmosphere
- Sensor requires access to atmosphere (ie. no hydrophobic membrane)
- Replaces red channel of normal photo with NIR
- Why not replace green channel? That way, the greener a plant, the more growth. ;)
- Shows plant growth easily (video)
- Likely a BNO055
- ~Specific Humidity
- Calculate saturated & actual
- Measure light pollution at night
- Qualifies cloud cover
- During daytime, thermopiles can be used (apparently these work at night too?!)
- At night, a Seebeck TEG sandwiched between two metal plates could be used
- Measures solar radiation
- Likely components would result in wider range of wavelengths examined (Solar Spectral Flux Radiometer)
- See also: Heliophotometer, Heliospectrometer
- Like a Pyranometer, but ground facing
- Must ensure sunlight at sunrise and sunset doesn't interfere with it
- See also: Abledometer
- Measures direct beam solar irradiance
- Points directly at sun
- Likely part of the Heliospectrometer
- Determines dew point
- Can be derived from RH and temperature
- Alternative calculation (PDF)
- Code
- Measures acoustic noise pollution
- A specialised sound level meter
- Determines composition of target substance - there will be two of them:
- Liquids/Solids - a sensor at top of array that can be pointed (when handheld) at target substance
- Just re-use the heliospectrophotometer with an IR light source next to it?
- Gas (air) - a sensor inside array that inspects air flowing through the sensor
- Liquids/Solids - a sensor at top of array that can be pointed (when handheld) at target substance
- Need to work out how to calibrate
- Measures azimuth, horizon and elevation.
- Useful when mounting sensor in fixed location, or hand-held mode
- Uses IMU sensors
- Infrared images
- Measures heat
- There will be a whole bunch of these, often built in to other sensors
- Measures UVA and UVB
- Likely need sky and ground facing sensors
- Can be calculated (PDF)
- Info about WBT
- Useful for predicting frostbite risk
Not sure if initial version will have these as they are difficult to implement and/or power...
- Like an omnidirectional PIR, but with radar, rage = ~4m
- Can't "see" through glass
- Useful for animal detection (but current options can't directionally locate)
- Can determine height and velocity of clouds using two fisheye cameras
- Cameras need to be >300m apart based on existing research = problem
- Compares two fisheye sky images to determine altitude
- Compares images after short delay to determine velocity
- Measures drop size, distribution/spacing and velocity of hydrometeors (rain, hail, etc).
- See also: Pluviometer
- Sensors found so far are quite big (most the size and shape of a leaf, or bigger)
- The whole concept of leaf wetness is borken. Instead of trying to make leaf-shaped sensors, there should be a standard (simple!) generic sensor (maybe with a few angles and textures) to measure evaporation, and then work out how that relates to different plants on a species by species basis.
- Detects microwave-reflective objects up to 16 metres away
- Works in harsh conditions, including zero visibility
- Determine amount of particulate suspended in the air
- Would need special (often large in size and power consumption) sensor for PM10 and PM2.5
- Could potentially use TOF camera for larger particles?
- PM Sensor
- Dust sensor
- Also known as: Ombrometer, Udometer, Rain guage
- Measures precipitation intensity by weight
- Could use something akin to Pythagoras cup (which is is actually a Tantalus cup), or determine based on readings from disdrometer?
- Measures changes in refractive index of the atmosphere (Cn2)
- With additional sensors can calculate sensible heat flux and latent heat flux (evapotranspiration)
- Could potentially use TOF camera to remove need for remote receiver?
SDR (Software Defined Radio)
- Probably do this as later upgrade or addon?
- will need FPGA
- will chew power and generate lots of heat
- will need lots of active telemetry
- General radio spectrum scanning
- Aircraft tracker: Mode-S / ADS-B / MLAT signal reader
- Ship tracker: AIS
- Are there simpler ways to do aircraft and ship tracking?
Note: Ground-based sensors listed below could potentially be merged in to one device to minimise power, processing and telemetry complexity
- Measures earth movements (eg. earthquakes)
- Ideally requires a Geophone
- Probably want this as separate add-on module?
- Use accelerometer as rudimentary seismometer if not present?
- Add-on remote sensor
- A tube with humidity/pressure/temp sensors to determine actual evaporation from soil
- Add-on remote sensor
- Measures soil moisture
- Add-on remote sensor
- Measure soil pH
Note: Following liquid sensors could be combined in to single unit?
- Measures particulate in liquids
- Add-on remote sensor
- Measure liquid pH
- Measures rate of flow of liquid
- Including non-contact