Arduino Garden Controller - Automatic Watering and Data Logging
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 เม.ย. 2015
- Gardening in the modern age means making things more complicated and arduous, with electrons, bits, and bytes. Behold: the garduino. My brother got me an arduino microcontroller board for Christmas, which to me was a solution looking for a problem. I finally found the problem: fresh herbs are expensive at the grocery store. But apparently not as expensive as adding a bunch of sensors and electronics to your garden.
Build one yourself or just poke around in the code: github.com/gradyh/GradyHillho...
Thanks to my brother, Graham, for the Arduino board and editing the narration. Thanks to Chris from TH-cam channel AvE ( / arduinoversusevil ) for the tips on soil moisture sensors and water hammer. Most of the parts in this build came from www.adafruit.com.
Combining microcontrollers and gardening is a really popular idea. I think that’s because gardens have very simple inputs and outputs that are easy to wrap your head around. I guess people (myself included) see a notoriously simple and relaxed hobby and can’t help but feel compelled to overcomplicate it. But just about anyone can connect the dots between "Garden needs water" and "I am not a responsible human being who is capable of remembering to water a garden every day" and realize, "Hey, I can use technology to overcome my personal shortcomings," and more than that, "I can bend technology to my will and that will feel good to my ego and my sense of self-worth." After all, no one’s hobby is to buy an irrigation controller off the shelf of a hardware store. Thanks for watching, and let me know what you think.
A few technical details below... If there's anything I didn't address, feel free to shoot me a question in the comments.
Moisture sensors that measure the resistance or conductivity across the soil matrix between two contacts are essentially junk. First of all, resistance is not a very good indicator of moisture content, because it is highly dependent on a number of factors which might vary from garden to garden including soil ph, dissolved solids in the water, and temperature. Second, most of them are of poor quality with contacts that easily corrode. For the most part you'd be lucky to get one to last through an entire season. Capacitive sensors are generally more accurate because they are just measuring the change in dialetric properties of the soil which is less sensitive to other environmental factors. They also don't require any exposed conductive surfaces which means they can last a bit longer in the harsh environment of your backyard. My soil moisture sensor (and soil temperature sensor) came from www.vegetronix.com.
The arudino’s analog inputs read voltage, so to use a resistive sensor (like the photoresistor I used to measure sunlight), you have to set up a voltage divider. This is just a really simple circuit which divides the voltage drop between your sensor and a known resistor. You know the current is the same for both, so you can calculate the resistance of your sensor using ohm’s law. The only problem here is that a photoresistor’s relationship to illuminance is log-log, that is to say it spans several orders of magnitude. So if you use a big resistor (5k - 10k ohm) in your voltage divider, your sensor will be sensitive to low light levels, but you won’t be able to tell the difference between a sunny day and an overcast one. Since this thing’s going outside, I used a 100 ohm resistor, which should hopefully give me good differentiation between levels of brightness in the daylight.
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"I want to make cool graphs"
I totally understand
Us geeks love graphs. This is a universal truth.
That feeling when you turn hundreds of raw data points from your physics lab into beautiful graphs. GAHH! So beautiful.
And why not ? Pedal to the metal , does not answer it all . If you know where you are on the power curve , you can understand what to do with the pedal / gear shift .
Most relatable video ever
Right? This guy gets it, and has earned a subscriber.
".. and moreover, I can bend technology to my will and that will feel good to my ego and self worth."
Instant sub
Sameee
"I wanna make cool graphs" I HAVE FOUND MY PEOPLE
avengers, assemble!
I identified with that statement too much 😂
@@BobJones-bh9qz Me too
This resonated with me!!
"LOOK AT THIS GRAPH" - Nickelback
can we just take a moment to appreciate the script of this video, absolutely impeccable
Yes a treat to watch and listen
"as a civil engineer i would have been happy with anything between 80 and 120"
Jack Barnes but, why?
sin(x) = x approximation LOL
@@jackz4665 good enough for govt work.
@@jackz4665 he means the 20% acceptable margin or error that is common in the industry, his measurement was 99% so anything between 79% and 119% humidity would be within the acceptable margin of error :)
@@jackz4665 When you enter the real world you'll be aiming for a +/- 30% accuracy on what you're doing. I'm designing a 4000km rail line at the moment and in preparing a BoQ and cost estimate for the client on utility relocations we gave a disclaimer of +/- 50%!! Accuracy is for mathematicians, not for people billing a client by the hour.
This was beautiful. Same conclusions that I come to with most of my projects... "Lets take this really simple thing, and make it much, much more complicated, because I can."
+Hoffman Engineering Story of my life.
I can relate
far too relatable it hurts
Sounds like Dilbert.
It is like Kennedy said "we don't do this because it is easy, we do it because it is difficoult"
Oh my goodness, I was rolling through that entire narration. I'm planning on setting up a garden for my wife next spring, and I've already partially automated the watering in my head. And I totally relate to the "I like to make cool graphs. I now realize that this is what's really important to me." This video made my day, thanks!
After watching, I think it's my favorite video yet. Especially how low key the humor is. I love it!
"I want to make cool graphs" is THE quote that has finally solidified in my mind that I need to become an engineer. I'm 32, and I finally know what I want to be when I grow up.
Have you started the journey?
@@nyashamutama6951 I want to know too.
Ah, reminds me of the day I took off from work generating pie charts in SVG to go to a college math class and learn how to read pie charts. lol
But did anyone notice the adorable and happy 3 legged dog?
tripod is a pretty pupperino
Cathie Zimmerman love the dog
timetag pleasee
At 8:57
What. A cutie. Not to mention the cat getting onto the table full of electronics just to check out the empty box.
I appreciate the philosophical banter
MrMaestro14231 good.
thats right, i'm a total bad ass! now get lost.
+JOSEPH You're not a millenial, so you *must* have the reading comprehension to know that you're being aptly mocked.
reinux Simple point, if you cannot appreciate this video's honest portrayal the author's personal intents, then you are a chipmunk of a millennial who is shallow and has become zombified by his own technology. I am below 30.
+JOSEPH I have mixed feelings about the philosophical banter. It's honest, sure, but it's also largely tangential, and a lot of the analogies are seriously contrived. Much of it is filler.
It has nothing to do with being a millenial. No one is a "millenial chipmunk" just because they don't appreciate what you do or find the same things annoying that you do.
Being patient enough to sit through stuff like this doesn't make you mature. Being a millenial doesn't make you an authority on the failings of the generation. Being superficially self-aware about your millenialness doesn't make you a superior millenial.
"I dont know if it's correct, but I am using the correct units" LMAO
"As a civil engineer I would've been happy with anything between 80 and 120". Priceless!
I too would rather bash my head against code for a week than be a normal person and just water the garden when the alarm clock goes off. I'm a very busy man. Lots of TH-cam videos to watch, many ceiling tiles to count.
It would take nowhere near a week to write the code for this. Maybe a day, and saves you probably years worth of watering. So assuming you take 5 minutes to water your garden a day, and you water it every other day... it will save you 3 times the amount of time to code this thing in just the first year its installed. That time can then be used to build other stuff, cause engineering and stuff.
@@PeterKropotkin42069
Speak for yourself, my sum programming experience is that Google doodle awhile back lol
It would probably take me a week to get my head around an Arduino, maybe less if I enlisted my programming sibling to teach me.
speaking as a nerd myself who is in a post-nerd phase
watering plants daily is a good routine
its like taking a break from comp, reading and checking on plants, its on itself a learning experience
but i guess i understand when you're totaly focused on something else, like reading about some new topics or doing some "useful work"
I can spend the time I save being bored looking at the plamts grow
zazugee ohh so that’s what it’s called (I’m talking about the post-nerd phase, not trying to insult, just felt like I’m going through a similar phase).
Wow. Your dog runs great with three legs. You did a great job with your narration. Very few people take the time to make a hobby style video and write so informatively. Well done.
Man. Having watched so much of your newer stuff and loving it, this has to be my favorite video so far. Thanks for doing what you do!
"I want to make cool graphs"
Spoken like a true scientist.
"...so this is LEED silver accredited. To get the gold I think you have to use pallet wood and have a Pinterest account." This guy slips in the funniest, most nerdy jokes I've ever heard 😂 much appreciated 👌🏽
As a Data Analyst, my suggestion would be to divide the garden bed up into zones. With multiple zones, you could then alter the ratios / volumes of certain variables (I'm thinking water) to see what effect(s) that has on yield.
to have 4 times more graphs and being able to combine them in one big badass graph
Not just more graphs, you'd be able to get better averages too and you would be able to more closely simulate the proper irrigation each plant needs.
or you could use google to search for research that has already been done on optimal plant growth by reputable botanists/horticulturists/farmers and fine tune your "variables" accordingly.
Reputable peer reviewed research papers by gardeners. LOL
Hang on, I'm still LOL'ing
I love you right now, lol
- Glitch Gatsby, writer at After Retro
The introduction is very motivating for someone exploring (and failing) the countless projects that exist.
Thanks for putting this together. The bit about being a civil engineer that would be happy with anything between 80 and 120 moisture content of water really got me. Best of luck with your endeavors!
Your comments at the end, regarding solutions looking for problems are spot on. Maybe the best problem these solutions are applicable to is education. E.g., here people, especially kids, love gardening, once they get started. Add a little bit of tech and science and engineering, and they are learning... and not even aware of because they are having fun.
Kind of sad that we have to "trick" kids into learning, because the word itself seems to imply something inherently negative
I love your sense of humor
Having watched your channel for a while I'm amazed that I haven't seen this before! It's exactly what I'm aiming for with a little more organisation and, consequently, more action!
Thanks!
I love your attitude towards gardening. What gardening actualy involves make you apreciate farmers work so much more.
"As a cat owner it would be nice to have something do what I tell it to"
i totally understand
As someone who lives with a cat, you never own them. It's more the other way around.
But he has a doggy too! Far superior creatures, they listen to instructions ;)
Totally understand!
Dogs have owners. Cats have staff.
I absolutely love your dry humor. I was laughing out loud at my desk from, "I want to make cool graphs" and, "I am not a responsible human being who is capable of remembering to water a garden every day."
Those ARE some nice graphs! Tons of data collected and displayed very clearly... well done.
You are my hero I’ve wanted to do this project for so long and this inspired me to finally get it going. Thank you so much!
This was the entirety of my masters work, instrumenting dirt to make cool graphs!
Great channel
I sincerely appreciate the approach to gardening to make simple through what might seem like an overly complicated ideal. The end goal is to do what wasn't even realistically possible even 30 years prior. Micro computers and localized sensors make garden micromanagement a reality. Although it may not be known what actually causes the failure of a plant, you can to a much higher degree, monitor the I/O of a connected garden than a non-connected one. Thank You For doing all this work, testing, graphing, soldering, installing, planting, etc. I am grateful to you.
the subtle engineering humor with this guy is amazing. of-course amazing engineering as well.
Dude, you are so on point on so many topics in this video. Well done, thoroughly enjoyed!
Snappy humor, informative content, and cool graphs! 10/10 would watch again!
Thank you for the inspiration, it is not just your cat that is fascinated with your projects.
I've watched tons of your more recent video and now I stubbled across this one. You have a lot of skills, woodworking, programming, gardening, engineering. Thanks for the video!
You're humor makes this even more enjoyable to watch than it already is. Lol love it!
Honestly, the narration got me amused the whole video, that was really nice. Good job!
I am impressed with the professional editing, narration and story of this video. Short, simple and inspiring. You've got a new subscriber as of right ......... now. :-)
Awesome vid, love the simplicity and banter phrases + science
I absolutely love the simplicity of the techno-speak of this video. Nice one.
7:54 Plants watched by Arduino watched by Man watched by Cat
watched by Camera watched by TH-cam's users
While the dog is about to take a dump at 8:08
watched by creeper behind the chair.
whatched by nsa
@end. Watched by us, watched by nsa.
Cool idea, but probably the best narration i've ever heard. I'm looking for a project for my Arduino--thanks for the ideas.
Kris Kasprzak ikr
+Kris Kasprzak yup very funny and informative
+Kris Kasprzak Yep, I gotta thumbs up this. Great video.
Grady, I really enjoy your channel and your factual and informative style. This was freaking awesome! Funny, revealing and totally relatable! Thank you for sharing.
That was an absolutely fantastic video. You put an incredible amount of work into it, it was very entertaining and very informative. Thank you so much for your effort.
You, good sir, have taken a deep look in the eyes of The one True Maker, and somehow managed to put it into words flawlessly.
Yes, many vegetables and especially herbs are fine with fluctuating soil moisture levels. A few root vegetables such as potatoes require steady, even moisture levels. They can split or develop hollow cores, or simply end up undersized. Great video! I'm definitely going to try this.
amazing friend, you are doing things that many engineers and plant research people ignore or take for granted that they are fine
I've been watching Grady's newer stuff for a while now. Didn't know about this. What a masterpiece
"I want to make cool graphs"
This made me an instant subscriber
oh man, that LEED silver joke was gold. lol that would kill at a TED talk haha :) thanks for the video!
If he had a few 3" 3 ring binders full of documentation for that I'd have pulled an ab muscle.
You did an amazing job with this video. Truly one of the best I've seen on TH-cam. Subscribed.
I think this was one of the most enjoyable videos I have watched lately. In addition to the wry humor, it was frank and informative. Keep up the great videos, I will check out more on your channel!
loved the video! you have a very nice combination of information and humor. I definitely subscribed.
I like your presentation and brutal honesty. Great job.
This is so up my alley, it almost hurts. Yet, for some reason, all I can think about is how adorable that dog at the end was!
You've come along way in 6 years. Well done! Great channel.
This video and your dry humor is awesome :D
"Arduino shields are ... like mario powerups" love this guy and channel
Fascinating and well-done! I’m just now getting into this on a hobby level so I enjoyed watching your approach to making your Garduino lol
Apparently one year have passed but I've just found this again and... Man, this os one the greatest vídeos I have ever seen.
That dog is definitely an electronic engineer. "I have 4 legs, if you round up to the next power of 2".
This is fantastic! Thanks for sharing. Imagine now combining 3D printed parts and robotics for a fully automated personal vegetable garden... Just a thought experiment.
Brilliant video. I get the Rube Goldberg approach, a great example of a problem solving compulsion searching for an outlet.
My spontaneous smile when counting your dogs legs and the joy in his heart was more than worth watching an already worthy video.
Hobby electronics is more of a creative outlet than a "practical" skill for most people. Loved the video.
I cam looking for a cool project for my Arduino, what I got is a lesson in human dignity!
I don't know you sir, but you are one of the rarest responsible human beings on this planet. I don't care about your project that much after I saw the 3 legged dog at the end, and how he was happy fetching that tennis ball. Bless you!
The worth depends on how much you enjoy engineering. To me, a project like this seems totally worth it. Regardless of price or time.
Love the personality that is driving this whole video. It's entertaining and educational
That is awesome. That magic that you described with combining a board with a computer program got me into firmware!
"Hey, I can use technology to overcome my personal shortcomings"
SUB
Almost five years later i'm watching this video and thinking: "Ok, i need more videos about you garden."
Yes, that's what I just commented, really interesting!!
I loved the ending summary. Relatable.
Nice video. I'm also impressed with the speed and agility of that 3-legged dog at the end of the video!
"As a civil engineer, I would have been happy with anywhere between 80 and 120". I'm not sure exactly what this joke means, but it amused me anyway :-)
+Steven Pam Haha, yeah. I think it means 'as long it says that water is more wet than everything else I'm fine, even it says that it 20% more wet than water." kkkk
Steven Pam I think he was referring to the usual way dimensions are honored in the construction industry....
I took it as more of an inside joke between engineers.
Civil engineering has a very high tolerance for imprecise figures, sort of the bane of the typically extremely precise engineers in most other fields (like structural, aerospace, mechanical ect).
A hammer used to flatten dough is good enough for the civil engineer. But mostly because thats typically the best possible attempt given the funds, and complexity of data inputs and interactions with the things they deal with.
Eventually some just adapt to the state of deprivation.
ideally, the water content by volume, for a cup of water, should be 100%
+Mike Weatherl For that of course one would need to find a sample of water with no impurities, with water being about as close to a universal solvent as any liquid can get finding a completely pure sample of the stuff is nigh on impossible.
This was a super engineer memey type vid. Love it!
Love this video and your honest commentary. Thanks for making this! Just starting out with a Raspberry Pi so I will hopefully not kill all my house plants.
9min. Happy 3 legged dog. LOVE IT
When I get out of college and move somewhere permanent, this will be my life :)
Great overview with dry humor and a good perspective. Glad I watched this one.
brilliant, one of the best things you can watch in the morning
"I want to make cool graphs" spot on lol
Loved it, very funny, I was just talking to someone about building the very same thing but adding in something to measure minerals and soil quality.
CLIQUEIPTV cool! how?
he just need some NASA rover technology lol
That isn't all that variable, would you just have to measure that once?
Your dry sense of deadpan humor alone gets a subscribe on this GREAT video!!
First time at the channel. Thanks for doing all the footwork and giving us the Barney style explanation. Great commentary!
I'm also not a responsible human being. The only garden plant I've kept alive through a season was squash. It overtook my small garden experiment because I didnt realize it would grow so fast and shade out the other vegies.
Anyway, great video!
OMG THAT 3 LEGGED DOG IS SOOOOOO INSPIRATIONAL!!!❤️
"as a civil engineer, I'd be happy between 80-120%" quote made my day 😂
You are a great builder and follow your dreams. I am sure you have a very happy life. That matters the most. I love all of your projects and have learned a lot. Thanks for sharing your beautiful works. I have applied many of the ideas in the software I build for water industry. Please keep on the great work!
I love it! Both the content and your comments on why you do it!
This video was awesome. I would subscribe but I already am.
"Even though I check on it now more often than before I had the Arduino" HAHAHAHAHA CLASSIC!
This video is so honest and truthful about why do things like this, I love it !! Who doesn't like a cool graph? I'm glad that you figured out your driving force. I'm thinking about doing something like olla balls that are connected to the drip line, so sensor position will be critical.
Great video. I am doing just a similar project in our greenhouse. I also love weather data collecting which will be part two of my project.
1:52 beer, arduino, over-engeneering simple process and arduino i´m in!
This is a great video. Liked and subscribed!
the narration on this one is killer. loved it!
I like the practical sense of humor. Very practical with age and exspudimentation.
This video is hilarious and very interesting. Thank you very much for sharing! :)
Hey, it is awesome! Simple, cleawer and fun ☺
"Let's go through the individual parts"
*Great scott music starts*
Ironic.
Been thinking about doing something similar but on a smaller scale with a house plant. Well done, excellent video.
The golf analogy was the most accurate thing I have ever heard
Thumbs up for cool graphs!(and 3 legged dog :D)