Add some averaging over time. Loads of benefits. Smooths out the noise from the sensor, eliminates the slop from the movement of the fuel and gives you a finer resolution because you benefit from the proportion of time spent reading at each course reading.
That's a great suggestion - also put a wait state at the bottom of the measure loop 100ms or so - they sometimes go crazy fast and throw spurious results - then use Robin's suggestion of some averaging - its not like you need fast time resolution!
Nice article. I’ve rigged up a 5psi sensor (giving over 1000 pressure points from 0-4m). With some heavy duty smoothing Arduino code to accept up to 5 sensors/tanks the readings remain rock solid in my water pipe tests even when shaking it around. Next step to try it in boat.
Love the Irish Jersey, I am really enjoying all your videos while on lockdown here in Ireland. I own a Princess 37 grp cruiser on the River Shannon and really enjoy the tips. Keep it up , Thanks.
Yet another string to your bow that you are showing us! Mechanic, welder, boat handler, knot tyer, painter, diver, fisherman and now computer programmer. Waiting to see something that you can't do. Good news that it might just be growth on the prop causing most of your vibration/oscillation issue. Can't wait for Renko to be back and a decent cruise that doesn't end up at a shipyard.
Navy convention is for port to be even and starboard to be odd. Ships use tank curves and measure depth to derive volume. Depth can be measured through pressure, echo/radar, or dipstick/sounding tape.
I would concentrate on getting a more suitable pressure sensor. Using the current one and amplifying the reading by using a 1.1v ref plus mapping means the reading will be all over the shop when you're under way. Using a new sensor plus smoothing code (in the arduino website) and I reckon you're on to a winner 👍 Keep up the good work 🚢
@@DangarMarine Maybe an ultrasonic distance measuring sensor like those in rear bumpers? Sloshing fuel will require average over many seconds I expect.
@@MiniLuv-1984 I agree about ultrasonic sensors - might be less accurate due to sloshing but there will also be no contact or extra leak point. That said, there likely isn't a hatch for you to bolt the sensor to like in a car, something which would make a float sensor equally difficult to instal.... Along with some other commenters, I worry that the resolution of a pressure sensor might be heavily affected by barometric variation.
Nice one! To smooth out the data, a simple first order filter works well. filtered value = (filter const* prev value) + ((1- filter constant)*current value) Grab the "blink without delay" sketch from the arduino examples and take samples every 200-300 milliseconds. Filter const can range from 0 to 1 (no filtering to infinite filtering). Start with .85 to .95 and things should settle down nicely even in rough water. You can fiddle with the algorithm to detect a refill or a leak, but that isn't necessary. Again, excellent presentation -- Thanks!
Absolutely love this channel for the sheer variety of content you offer 👌 wanna paint a boat? Build a Detroit? Wire Any 12/24v system? Do anything boat related? Code a bloody Arduino? Come to Dangar marine! Please Keep it up mate
Just found this channel this morning and I have spent the day binge watching. Love the work and I have lived the ups and downs of boat projects. I have only seen one thing that I can suggest a tip on and that is put a drop of none acid silcone under your heat shrink. Water proofs it a bit better and gives the bare wires a bit of support. Wires snapped at a terminal is always a problem on yatchs.
Good technical information, updating old systems with more reliable gauges. Enjoyed the simple practical experiment. Thanks for another professional tutorial.
Hey Stu that was rather interesting and I can see where it could be very useful. Diesel is lighter than water, I trying to remember numbers I haven't used in 30 odd years... water is .48 psi per foot of head. Diesel is .45 psi per foot of head I think it is, this should help you work out the range you need for your sender or transducer for your fuel level computer.
Hmmm, not sure what you are getting at , I haven't watched entire video yet......the computer board at the beginning made me start looking at the comments ..... but one foot of water head is .433psi in a manometer tube. You numbers give the difference between water and diesel I think? ( we used to use a 'manometer pressure' to check fuel tanks for leaks before installing in the boats) Cheers Warren
Just ordered an Arduino style kit on Amazon, want to give this a shot now. Around U$18 for the starter kit with electronic sensors, components and other bits and bobs. Thank you, Stu. Love your channel.
Refurbishing a soldering iron tip: File the tip back to clean copper and re-tin. When using a soldering iron, dip the hot tip into flux paste or Bakers Fluid or clean with a soldering station pad to ensue a clean uncontaminated tip. Cleanliness is the secret to trouble free soldering. I hope this helps
@@DangarMarine do not file, you will ruin this tip for good. Soldering iron tips are made of copper clad in iron. If you file away the iron coating, the bare copper will corrode very fast. Immerse hot tip in pipe soldering flux, which is mildly acidic and clean with steel wool, repeat until your tip is fixed.
Those Arduinos are amazing little devices. I built a home/yard security system that detected intrusion and plotted motion on a diagram of the house on my laptop using a kit made by them about a year ago. Works great. The sensors that showed a door or window opening was straight forward. The motion sensors were accurate +/-6 feet and had to be majorly tweeked by adjusting values in the code for it to show accuracy of +/-2 feet on the laptop diagram. I think you may have to do same to get an accurate reading on your fuel gauge. What I loved was all the code was availible on their website and the whole thing was sold as a kit online that cost about $150 (U.S.). Hope it works for you. Once you work out the tweeks, it should. Awesome video. Definately different and not boring. See you in the next one.
Yes, my plan is to use the Arduino for the boat's security system too. Have GPRS / GPS shield for it so it can be tracked and send SMSs to me if any alarms go off.
Hi Stu, You talked about building up the thickness of antifoul . With my experience over 15 years with a displacement cruiser. Less is more. Only apply enough to work between your regular out of water maintenance period. As it is design to release and wear away. I have found that build up of old antifoul to thick and painted over will eventually loose adhesion and flake off taking your new coating with it. I found that it was better to sand old antifoul well back .Good idea to each time you put a new coat of antifoul is to use a different color so you can sand back to the last old color. Love watching your projects.
I do like the idea of using different colours, but being a steel boat I also like the idea of being protected from the odd scratch not going down to metal.
That was great Stu, a completely different part of the whole project that is totally nesescary. The way you explained it made no sense first time around, but I can go over it till I get it in my head! THANKYOU!
Not your usual output as you say, but interesting none the less. I enjoyed it! Running a boat requires lots of different skills, and this is a great example of that.... boating is not just spanners, welding spatter, paint fumes and oily rags!!
Great work Stu ... was not expecting this one but makes sense. Can then expand later for weather, water speed by power created from a turbine put relative to kn etc.
Definitely have not given up! This project is awesome. I was so excited you got to take the first sea trial. The dottie(sp?) updates really round out the video also.
another sensor you can try is " Laser Distance measurement with 6pin VL53L0X " or the ultasonic distance sensor , mounted in top of tank , bounces signal off liquid level .
Could not be more excited about using the Arduino to measure system pressures and temperatures. Just had an undetected cooling failure that has cost me $15k US on an older IO drive resulting in a fire. Imagine if I had the Arduino checking the exhaust water pressure and temp then sounding/flashing an alarm if it's out of spec. Totally appropriate subject for your channel. Many Thanks.
For sure, there is so much you can do with the Arduino, and as your situation shows, you really can't have enough monitoring of temperatures, pressures, volumes and voltages to keep things safe and running well.
I'm a computer nerd and programmer by trade (game dev, mobile lately) so seeing you peck around in code was actually enjoyably entertaining. Analogue, lol
Thanks Stu! I've been thinking about dipping a toe into the Ardwater. Coming to the end of a major project at the moment, maybe now is the time. They seem to be pretty unlimited in what they can do.
Hi, enjoyed the technical video. Shocked to see the amount of barnacles on the prop, of course it will disturb the balance of the prop. Great video 👌🇬🇧
I like it a lot. I’m actually building my throttle and gear change with an arduino. I also have to flatten out the input of the joystick. You can do that by comparing the previous value with the new one and only apply a change if the difference in value exceeds a certain number. This number is a variable where you can play with to fine tune!
This was a great video Stu! I took an automotive electrical class and it covered much of the electrical content you've encountered on the boat and some content of this fuel guage project.
@@DangarMarine most of them appear to have a flow rating that is way to high. From another youtube channel I found a bloke that used a Bio-Tech FCH-M-PP-LC Aggressive Chemical Low Flow Flowmeter. Might be worth exploring. Link added www.conrad.com/p/bio-tech-ek-fch-m-pom-lc-g-18-flow-meter-fch-m-pom-lc-001-35-lmin-150391
My fuel gauge was the antique analog method using a 5 foot long organic sounding rod which closely resembled a broom stick. This was calibrated whilst filling the tanks from dry at 50 litre intervals with a notch inscribed into said rod. This proved to be infallible, unlike electronic contraptions that seems find the fine sea air disagreeable. Even if the swab of a deck hand did loose one over the side whilst beating a marauding shark around the snout, we then substituted the handle of the deck brush, the draw back was every time he scrubbed the decks he stank of diesel.
Another method of measuring tank level is with a capacitive sensor. Several nice videos on how to build a sensor to do this. One nice thing about this is it likely could detect the presence of a significant amount of water in the tank because the dielectric constant for water is so much higher than for diesel.
Peter from Sweden already mentioned using a second pressure sensor to get an atmospheric pressure as reference. You actually can get inexpensive differential pressure senders/sensors from camping supply stores or get them from Alibaba for a fraction of the price here in Oz. You could also mount (glue) ultrasonic sensors on the outside of the tank and use the change in signal for the digital I/Os. If you space them according to tank volume, you avoid calibration issues. There are some of these things available for caravan tanks and don't cost an arm and a leg. (or direct import from Alibaba).
ok, do that many viewers really hate anything electronic so much that a warning had to be used?? C'mon folks, all of these videos are educational and great content! Thanks for the updates Stu, another great installation in the life of a trawler owner.....
@@DangarMarine well I learn something from every video....and even if I don't need it now, I may need it some day while on the water, so I appreciate everything you take the time to make. Please keep it up.
The sound of daffy walking at the end was like a pegleg pirate walking across deck. You should put an eye patch on her and video her on the boat, just for fun, haha. I love your yard too. It reminds me of my grandfather's doorless barn in the 60s. Nothing metal was thrown away, and chickens free ranging outside, but nesting boxes tucked in the nooks inside. I love the boat building, and even the electronics. I actually work with computers but if I had followed my passions in my youth, I might of been a shipwright of old tall ships.
You could try using an automotive MAP sensor. They come in 1, 2 and 3 bar varieties and are cheap. They won’t like diesel though so will need an air column. This is how your washing machine senses the water level, a tube to the bottom of the tank with a pressure sensor at the top and air in between.
Mate your genius! I’ve been struggling with a float switch on my pressure washer buffer tank for months, because it’s all mounted on a trailer it doesn’t last 5mins, pressure sender has no moving parts so should withstand bumpy roads and dodgy driving alot more. All I have to do is program it to send a kill signal to engine once a set minimum value is reached.
my head exploded !! the stupid runs deep in my family , but I have no doubt someone understood and will be able to help you more than I ever could great vid ….I think :)
The Arduino is digitizing the analog signal. So, when you switched to internal 1.1V reference, the detectable voltage difference becomes smaller, as you stated by a factor of 5V/1.1V = ~4.54. So, the electrical noise in and around Arduino's electrically un-shielded circuitry is now being seen and digitized along with your signal. You are dealing with signal + noise which is why the values are bouncing around. I would consider enclosing the assembly in a grounded (battery neg terminal is fine if powering from the battery) box. You can, of course, do averaging but that will slow the update to the display (you must collect n readings, then compute avg = (sum of readings)/n). If your analog pin read conversion rate is, say 1 per second, and you want to average 10 readings, your display will not update for 10 seconds UNLESS you write a running average algorithm , Not sure how the Arduino will handle that if you are using large n window. Then you can still get a 1 per second display update rate but NOT UNTIL the first n readings have been taken. Finally, the noise reduction goes as 1/square-root(n) so you can get a lot of that noise removed by large number averaging BUT that is a band-aide at best. First, isolate/eliminate the electrical noise sources and you may not need to average to get a more stable reading but if you still do, it will take far less averaging once you have minimized the electrical noise sources. Cheers and have fun! Good stuff!
@@אסףנוב shielded cable will help solve this in the uk its called belden cable its multicore cables wrapped in foil and i believe there is a bare cable which you can use to ground with, that will help with the noise problem
Most automotive applications use a slosh module to flatten their float driven analog systems, in this application the fuel usage is gallons per hour so I think your idea here is really good if their was more range to the sensor. A proximity sensor (like is used for monitoring industrial bins) might give that sensitivity but still there will be the slosh to deal with so a reading update every 3 minutes that only recognized usage... maybe you would have to reset at the fuel dock? I do not know code (as yet) Cheers
Yes, shielding is going to be important. I'd be happy with a 60 second update interval to cover a handful of rolls of the hull using this library playground.arduino.cc/Main/RunningAverage/
Fun stuff Stu, I really enjoyed that. Makes me want to try something like that myself. I agree that you need a sensor with a tighter range. Most of the range is wasted with the one you have.
My first thought was to have a smoothing function to average inputs. Then I see guys far smarter than me have already offered the same. Love me some subscriber help!
For a sender, try taking a look at stuff for HVAC monitoring or Barometric pressure measurement. If you put a hose Barb at the bottom of the tank and run a small hose up above the tanks, you can monitor air pressure instead of fuel pressure. There are barometric sensors (BMP180, to name one) that will give you insane resolution in measurement of small air pressure changes. Last time I did this, I epoxied some wires and the baro sensor inside of capped PVC with a barb. Worked awesome for water level sensing.
Thanks! You got me inspired to order the things I need for my project. Arduino based remote control for my autopilot. It's a Raymarine talking Seatalk :) I'll be using the same display shield you use to display what is happening and the buttons to control the autopilot + I'm adding a wireless remote also.
You aren't only a good boat mechanic you are a professor at technology also. I always measured diesel fuel tanks in gallons you got me lost on this percentage stuff.
Personally node red on a pi for any iot deployment. Can use it for so many other function. Can be configured for total boat management and control. Has some great ui tools and dashboards.
Also u could add 4 float switches to outside of ur tube for 3/4 1/2 1/4 and reserve. Just use couple of leds in the unit u mount display in. Plenty of io on the board and wouldnt need to change ur display as indicators are the leds. Easy to add to your sketch.
A rail to rail op-amp would allow you to use full the 5V resolution in the Arduino ADC with the lower voltage range from the sensor. Basically it would allow you to electronically tune the signal to match the ADC rather than mechanically tuning the tube and sensor.
Geoffrey Cox, that is exactly what I thought and what I use on my boat, much less likely to be affected by the breath of the sea getting into old Edwino, won't take days to set up and fit, that might work well on a ship but on a small boat leaping around when the tanks are half full I'm not so sure. Spot on with needing a register on the shaft couplings and those barnacles on the prop will be terrible, nice to see the D squad doing well though
Darned good idea. You might find you need to damp/smooth read display to get decent readings when the boat is moving/sloshing the fuel around. Should be able to do this in the Arduino code. E.g. measure every 5 seconds and show the average of the last 20 readings. The other thing worth thinking about from my point of view is moisture/corrosion. Arduinos are not intended for wet salty environments.
Good introduction to Arduino. Always wondered how they were set up. Looks to be a reasonably easy bit of coding. Of course if you had a raspberry pie you could do the same thing with multiple sensors and a colour touch screen interface. But the Arduino seems like a good simple solution. Thanks
Something like BSP (British Standard Plumbing), straight thread or NPT (National? Pipe Taper, same size but tapered) which use the internal pipe diameter as the bit to be measured. Pipes were originally iron. So there.
Awesome episode Stu! I didn't know you were so knowledgeable about so many different things. I have had an interest in arduino but the programming is kicking my butt! I'm sure with a little fine tuning you will have an awesome functional guage! Cheers!
If you use a pipe from the top with the sensor at the top it works well we use that system in water tanks on floor scrubbers if you google a Tennant t16 waste water tank you should find a good pick of the set up
Nice change! Something I want to add to my system is sensors. I've been learning from Paul McWhorter tutorials. Paul did a portioning level on LED light that will work for fuel level as well I believe. I 'm just learning to use a project kit he recommends. It looks like you went about the same thing as Paul but, he is an engineer who went about it differently. Same results though. Enjoy your video's.
You can recover your soldering iron tip with some fine sand paper or emery cloth. Then dip it in some flux if you have it then tin the tip the first time you heat it up. Then use a wet sponge to clean it after use to clean the tip between use.
Add some averaging over time. Loads of benefits. Smooths out the noise from the sensor, eliminates the slop from the movement of the fuel and gives you a finer resolution because you benefit from the proportion of time spent reading at each course reading.
Ah, good point! Duration is an extra bit of info the algorithm will take into account.
Can confirm, I had to do this for a scale I take measurements from over a serial port.
Came here to say this, will confirm averaging will do wonders for your results.
I second this suggestion from @Robin.
That's a great suggestion - also put a wait state at the bottom of the measure loop 100ms or so - they sometimes go crazy fast and throw spurious results - then use Robin's suggestion of some averaging - its not like you need fast time resolution!
Nice article. I’ve rigged up a 5psi sensor (giving over 1000 pressure points from 0-4m). With some heavy duty smoothing Arduino code to accept up to 5 sensors/tanks the readings remain rock solid in my water pipe tests even when shaking it around. Next step to try it in boat.
Nice work!
Love the Irish Jersey, I am really enjoying all your videos while on lockdown here in Ireland. I own a Princess 37 grp cruiser on the River Shannon and really enjoy the tips. Keep it up , Thanks.
Glad you like them!
Yet another string to your bow that you are showing us! Mechanic, welder, boat handler, knot tyer, painter, diver, fisherman and now computer programmer. Waiting to see something that you can't do.
Good news that it might just be growth on the prop causing most of your vibration/oscillation issue. Can't wait for Renko to be back and a decent cruise that doesn't end up at a shipyard.
Thanks mate, I'm looking forward to getting the boat back too and seeing how it goes.
As a former BASIC Stamp programmer, I found your Arduino segment very interesting!
Thanks for the warning. It prepared my brain for the kind of learning to expect. Challenged me to stick it out and try .
Navy convention is for port to be even and starboard to be odd. Ships use tank curves and measure depth to derive volume. Depth can be measured through pressure, echo/radar, or dipstick/sounding tape.
It's always good to follow conventions when you can, thanks for that!
Started off way above my head. By the end it made more sense to me. I feel like I have learned something new and useful. Thanks 😊
I would concentrate on getting a more suitable pressure sensor. Using the current one and amplifying the reading by using a 1.1v ref plus mapping means the reading will be all over the shop when you're under way.
Using a new sensor plus smoothing code (in the arduino website) and I reckon you're on to a winner 👍
Keep up the good work 🚢
For sure, have already found a few good options for replacement sensors. They are a lot more expensive but definitely worth it.
@@DangarMarine Maybe an ultrasonic distance measuring sensor like those in rear bumpers? Sloshing fuel will require average over many seconds I expect.
@@MiniLuv-1984 www.apgsensors.com/about-us/blog/the-best-fuel-tank-level-sensor
@@MiniLuv-1984 I agree about ultrasonic sensors - might be less accurate due to sloshing but there will also be no contact or extra leak point. That said, there likely isn't a hatch for you to bolt the sensor to like in a car, something which would make a float sensor equally difficult to instal.... Along with some other commenters, I worry that the resolution of a pressure sensor might be heavily affected by barometric variation.
Benny Burger have done literally this with water tanks on a mates farm.
Love the
change in pace, and well explained
Thanks Rod.
So different to grinding and painting. The whole build has been great to watch, totally awesome in fact
Nice one! To smooth out the data, a simple first order filter works well. filtered value = (filter const* prev value) + ((1- filter constant)*current value)
Grab the "blink without delay" sketch from the arduino examples and take samples every 200-300 milliseconds. Filter const can range from 0 to 1 (no filtering to infinite filtering). Start with .85 to .95 and things should settle down nicely even in rough water. You can fiddle with the algorithm to detect a refill or a leak, but that isn't necessary. Again, excellent presentation -- Thanks!
Absolutely love this channel for the sheer variety of content you offer 👌 wanna paint a boat? Build a Detroit? Wire Any 12/24v system? Do anything boat related? Code a bloody Arduino? Come to Dangar marine! Please Keep it up mate
Thanks Joel. :)
WOW. It is amazing how quick the barnacles form.
Particularly in an estuary.
Brilliant Stu! Glad Daffy is gaining use of her leg👍
Just found this channel this morning and I have spent the day binge watching. Love the work and I have lived the ups and downs of boat projects. I have only seen one thing that I can suggest a tip on and that is put a drop of none acid silcone under your heat shrink. Water proofs it a bit better and gives the bare wires a bit of support. Wires snapped at a terminal is always a problem on yatchs.
As an ex-IT guy myself, I found that bloody interesting. Nice one Stu.
Thanks mate.
Good technical information, updating old systems with more reliable gauges. Enjoyed the simple practical experiment. Thanks for another professional tutorial.
Hey Stu that was rather interesting and I can see where it could be very useful.
Diesel is lighter than water, I trying to remember numbers I haven't used in 30 odd years... water is .48 psi per foot of head. Diesel is .45 psi per foot of head I think it is, this should help you work out the range you need for your sender or transducer for your fuel level computer.
Hmmm, not sure what you are getting at , I haven't watched entire video yet......the computer board at the beginning made me start looking at the comments ..... but one foot of water head is .433psi in a manometer tube. You numbers give the difference between water and diesel I think?
( we used to use a 'manometer pressure' to check fuel tanks for leaks before installing in the boats) Cheers Warren
Just ordered an Arduino style kit on Amazon, want to give this a shot now. Around U$18 for the starter kit with electronic sensors, components and other bits and bobs. Thank you, Stu. Love your channel.
The starter kits are a great way to go. They give you everything you need to do a few sample project straight away. Have fun! :)
Refurbishing a soldering iron tip: File the tip back to clean copper and re-tin. When using a soldering iron, dip the hot tip into flux paste or Bakers Fluid or clean with a soldering station pad to ensue a clean uncontaminated tip. Cleanliness is the secret to trouble free soldering.
I hope this helps
Thanks Chris!
@@DangarMarine do not file, you will ruin this tip for good. Soldering iron tips are made of copper clad in iron. If you file away the iron coating, the bare copper will corrode very fast. Immerse hot tip in pipe soldering flux, which is mildly acidic and clean with steel wool, repeat until your tip is fixed.
@@akhtarkh I agree, good advice. Stu may need to purchase a replacement tip. Cheers
I’ve mentioned it before, but now is a excellent time to do a colab with EEV blog. That would make for one epic Aussie video!! 👍👍😬
Those Arduinos are amazing little devices. I built a home/yard security system that detected intrusion and plotted motion on a diagram of the house on my laptop using a kit made by them about a year ago. Works great. The sensors that showed a door or window opening was straight forward. The motion sensors were accurate +/-6 feet and had to be majorly tweeked by adjusting values in the code for it to show accuracy of +/-2 feet on the laptop diagram. I think you may have to do same to get an accurate reading on your fuel gauge. What I loved was all the code was availible on their website and the whole thing was sold as a kit online that cost about $150 (U.S.). Hope it works for you. Once you work out the tweeks, it should. Awesome video. Definately different and not boring. See you in the next one.
Yes, my plan is to use the Arduino for the boat's security system too. Have GPRS / GPS shield for it so it can be tracked and send SMSs to me if any alarms go off.
Alot of that went over my head.... But as an Irish man I felt compelled to watch!... GO Ireland 🍀🇮🇪
Hi Stu, You talked about building up the thickness of antifoul . With my experience over 15 years with a displacement cruiser. Less is more. Only apply enough to work between your regular out of water maintenance period. As it is design to release and wear away. I have found that build up of old antifoul to thick and painted over will eventually loose adhesion and flake off taking your new coating with it. I found that it was better to sand old antifoul well back .Good idea to each time you put a new coat of antifoul is to use a different color so you can sand back to the last old color. Love watching your projects.
I do like the idea of using different colours, but being a steel boat I also like the idea of being protected from the odd scratch not going down to metal.
Wow Stu, you are really good with that stuff!
That was great Stu, a completely different part of the whole project that is totally nesescary.
The way you explained it made no sense first time around, but I can go over it till I get it in my head!
THANKYOU!
Not your usual output as you say, but interesting none the less. I enjoyed it! Running a boat requires lots of different skills, and this is a great example of that.... boating is not just spanners, welding spatter, paint fumes and oily rags!!
Great work Stu ... was not expecting this one but makes sense. Can then expand later for weather, water speed by power created from a turbine put relative to kn etc.
For sure, the sky is the limit when it comes to Arduinos.
Two things I worked with today, Differential pressure switches and Trane controllers. Nice!
Definitely have not given up! This project is awesome. I was so excited you got to take the first sea trial. The dottie(sp?) updates really round out the video also.
another sensor you can try is " Laser Distance measurement with 6pin VL53L0X "
or the ultasonic distance sensor , mounted in top of tank , bounces signal off liquid level .
Russell Dearlove yup, in rural areas here in the UK where a lot of people use heating oil in tanks, this is a common way of monitoring oil level 👍🏻
In a boat it likely will rock the fuel so its kinda messy
@@mrizkic Software can handle that. Arduinos are great for cleaning up messy readings.
Fun to see tech being applied to a practical situation.
Loved it! Great example of how inexpensive electronics can be adapted for specific applications. Cal curve for the win!
I love this project - I’m a massive tech-head/geek.
Loved this one Stu. Fairly new here and now binge watching all the old episodes! Subscribed and thanks for sharing your work.
Thanks mate. Glad you enoyed it.
I am impressed. Way over my head, but pretty cool. You obviously have some knowledge of programming language. A whole new dimension of Stu. Very cool
Thanks mate. Yes, worked as a programmer for many years.
I love this stuff. As tinkerer and computer science student, just seeing simple code produce a practical result is great :D
Thanks Stu, that was very interesting even for a guy 50+years of age. Keep up the great work.
I really enjoyed this video and you demonstrating how it will work.
Awesome video!!! I’ve been watching you for 6 months and this is definitely one of my favorite. Keep up the good work.
Could not be more excited about using the Arduino to measure system pressures and temperatures. Just had an undetected cooling failure that has cost me $15k US on an older IO drive resulting in a fire. Imagine if I had the Arduino checking the exhaust water pressure and temp then sounding/flashing an alarm if it's out of spec. Totally appropriate subject for your channel. Many Thanks.
For sure, there is so much you can do with the Arduino, and as your situation shows, you really can't have enough monitoring of temperatures, pressures, volumes and voltages to keep things safe and running well.
Thats awesome! I've fiddled around with arduino myself but to see you use it for a legitimate purpose is pretty cool
They are fun to experiment with just to learn as a hobby, but it's always good when you have a practical use.
I'm a computer nerd and programmer by trade (game dev, mobile lately) so seeing you peck around in code was actually enjoyably entertaining.
Analogue, lol
Thanks Stu!
I've been thinking about dipping a toe into the Ardwater.
Coming to the end of a major project at the moment, maybe now is the time. They seem to be pretty unlimited in what they can do.
Hi, enjoyed the technical video. Shocked to see the amount of barnacles on the prop, of course it will disturb the balance of the prop. Great video 👌🇬🇧
Wow can't believe the growth on that prop that is insane
Thanks so much for explaining this, I’m going to make one for my beer kegs so I can assess the volume, this is just brilliant!
The perfect application. ;)
I like it a lot. I’m actually building my throttle and gear change with an arduino. I also have to flatten out the input of the joystick. You can do that by comparing the previous value with the new one and only apply a change if the difference in value exceeds a certain number. This number is a variable where you can play with to fine tune!
For sure, it's amazing the amount of problems like that you can solve in software.
This was a great video Stu! I took an automotive electrical class and it covered much of the electrical content you've encountered on the boat and some content of this fuel guage project.
That pipe over that Mac book, hurts.
Excellent proyect!
Good man Stu, loving the Jersey. ☘
Oh I like. You've got me thinking about an Electronic flow meter now.
If you find any good flow meters that could be interfaced with an Arduino let me know!
@@DangarMarine most of them appear to have a flow rating that is way to high. From another youtube channel I found a bloke that used a Bio-Tech FCH-M-PP-LC Aggressive Chemical Low Flow Flowmeter. Might be worth exploring.
Link added www.conrad.com/p/bio-tech-ek-fch-m-pom-lc-g-18-flow-meter-fch-m-pom-lc-001-35-lmin-150391
This was a great episode. I’m definitely not a tech person but it was really nice to learn few things here! Cheers!
A-4 Skyhawk electrician. Grew up on a Simpson 260, and an "O"-scope. Good piece !
My fuel gauge was the antique analog method using a 5 foot long organic sounding rod which closely resembled a broom stick. This was calibrated whilst filling the tanks from dry at 50 litre intervals with a notch inscribed into said rod. This proved to be infallible, unlike electronic contraptions that seems find the fine sea air disagreeable. Even if the swab of a deck hand did loose one over the side whilst beating a marauding shark around the snout, we then substituted the handle of the deck brush, the draw back was every time he scrubbed the decks he stank of diesel.
Yes, I'll be using both.
Another method of measuring tank level is with a capacitive sensor. Several nice videos on how to build a sensor to do this. One nice thing about this is it likely could detect the presence of a significant amount of water in the tank because the dielectric constant for water is so much higher than for diesel.
Peter from Sweden already mentioned using a second pressure sensor to get an atmospheric pressure as reference. You actually can get inexpensive differential pressure senders/sensors from camping supply stores or get them from Alibaba for a fraction of the price here in Oz.
You could also mount (glue) ultrasonic sensors on the outside of the tank and use the change in signal for the digital I/Os. If you space them according to tank volume, you avoid calibration issues. There are some of these things available for caravan tanks and don't cost an arm and a leg. (or direct import from Alibaba).
ok, do that many viewers really hate anything electronic so much that a warning had to be used?? C'mon folks, all of these videos are educational and great content! Thanks for the updates Stu, another great installation in the life of a trawler owner.....
From the stats, about 50% don't watch anything electrical. Believe it or not, some people even threaten me with violence.
@@DangarMarine well I learn something from every video....and even if I don't need it now, I may need it some day while on the water, so I appreciate everything you take the time to make. Please keep it up.
The sound of daffy walking at the end was like a pegleg pirate walking across deck. You should put an eye patch on her and video her on the boat, just for fun, haha. I love your yard too. It reminds me of my grandfather's doorless barn in the 60s. Nothing metal was thrown away, and chickens free ranging outside, but nesting boxes tucked in the nooks inside.
I love the boat building, and even the electronics. I actually work with computers but if I had followed my passions in my youth, I might of been a shipwright of old tall ships.
You could try using an automotive MAP sensor. They come in 1, 2 and 3 bar varieties and are cheap. They won’t like diesel though so will need an air column. This is how your washing machine senses the water level, a tube to the bottom of the tank with a pressure sensor at the top and air in between.
Mate your genius! I’ve been struggling with a float switch on my pressure washer buffer tank for months, because it’s all mounted on a trailer it doesn’t last 5mins, pressure sender has no moving parts so should withstand bumpy roads and dodgy driving alot more. All I have to do is program it to send a kill signal to engine once a set minimum value is reached.
Yep, that should work fine. I too aren't a big fan of anything with moving parts in a rough environment.
my head exploded !! the stupid runs deep in my family , but I have no doubt someone understood and will be able to help you more than I ever could great vid ….I think :)
Truly a jack of all trades.
The Arduino is digitizing the analog signal. So, when you switched to internal 1.1V reference, the detectable voltage difference becomes smaller, as you stated by a factor of 5V/1.1V = ~4.54. So, the electrical noise in and around Arduino's electrically un-shielded circuitry is now being seen and digitized along with your signal. You are dealing with signal + noise which is why the values are bouncing around. I would consider enclosing the assembly in a grounded (battery neg terminal is fine if powering from the battery) box. You can, of course, do averaging but that will slow the update to the display (you must collect n readings, then compute avg = (sum of readings)/n). If your analog pin read conversion rate is, say 1 per second, and you want to average 10 readings, your display will not update for 10 seconds UNLESS you write a running average algorithm , Not sure how the Arduino will handle that if you are using large n window. Then you can still get a 1 per second display update rate but NOT UNTIL the first n readings have been taken. Finally, the noise reduction goes as 1/square-root(n) so you can get a lot of that noise removed by large number averaging BUT that is a band-aide at best. First, isolate/eliminate the electrical noise sources and you may not need to average to get a more stable reading but if you still do, it will take far less averaging once you have minimized the electrical noise sources. Cheers and have fun! Good stuff!
It's a fuel tank, it isn't changing rapidly...
@@אסףנוב shielded cable will help solve this in the uk its called belden cable its multicore cables wrapped in foil and i believe there is a bare cable which you can use to ground with, that will help with the noise problem
You probably need averaging to negate sloshing
Most automotive applications use a slosh module to flatten their float driven analog systems, in this application the fuel usage is gallons per hour so I think your idea here is really good if their was more range to the sensor. A proximity sensor (like is used for monitoring industrial bins) might give that sensitivity but still there will be the slosh to deal with so a reading update every 3 minutes that only recognized usage... maybe you would have to reset at the fuel dock? I do not know code (as yet) Cheers
Yes, shielding is going to be important. I'd be happy with a 60 second update interval to cover a handful of rolls of the hull using this library playground.arduino.cc/Main/RunningAverage/
Very cool!! Pls do more videos like this!!
Fun stuff Stu, I really enjoyed that. Makes me want to try something like that myself. I agree that you need a sensor with a tighter range. Most of the range is wasted with the one you have.
Way to go Stew.... enjoyed the information, and will probably be using it soon.
Pretty nifty way to read the fuel level.
Glad that her leg is getting so much better :)
And you program too!! You are a jack of all trades!!!
My first thought was to have a smoothing function to average inputs. Then I see guys far smarter than me have already offered the same. Love me some subscriber help!
Very interesting Stu. Arduino's are very useful devices. It's amazing how many applications they can be used for!
For sure, it's almost limitless.
For a sender, try taking a look at stuff for HVAC monitoring or Barometric pressure measurement. If you put a hose Barb at the bottom of the tank and run a small hose up above the tanks, you can monitor air pressure instead of fuel pressure. There are barometric sensors (BMP180, to name one) that will give you insane resolution in measurement of small air pressure changes.
Last time I did this, I epoxied some wires and the baro sensor inside of capped PVC with a barb. Worked awesome for water level sensing.
Interesting, I'll look into that. I actually have a barometric pressure sender in that Arduino kit.
Thanks! You got me inspired to order the things I need for my project.
Arduino based remote control for my autopilot. It's a Raymarine talking Seatalk :) I'll be using the same display shield you use to display what is happening and the buttons to control the autopilot + I'm adding a wireless remote also.
You aren't only a good boat mechanic you are a professor at technology also. I always measured diesel fuel tanks in gallons you got me lost on this percentage stuff.
I'm going to have the buttons swap between percentage and litres remaining, and maybe even an estimated time till empty. :)
If it's any help, I definitely enjoyed this episode. electronics, arduino, etc all good fun.
That stuff is nice for a reference, but I'm old school and would want sight glasses. Have a great day.
Personally node red on a pi for any iot deployment. Can use it for so many other function. Can be configured for total boat management and control. Has some great ui tools and dashboards.
You continue to impress me with your range of knowledge and communication skill. :-)
Also u could add 4 float switches to outside of ur tube for 3/4 1/2 1/4 and reserve. Just use couple of leds in the unit u mount display in. Plenty of io on the board and wouldnt need to change ur display as indicators are the leds. Easy to add to your sketch.
Interesting, you learn something everyday, thanks Stu.
This is a great coverage and info for Arduino projects in general! Great stuff!
A rail to rail op-amp would allow you to use full the 5V resolution in the Arduino ADC with the lower voltage range from the sensor. Basically it would allow you to electronically tune the signal to match the ADC rather than mechanically tuning the tube and sensor.
Thanks mate, I'll look into that.
Geoffrey Cox, that is exactly what I thought and what I use on my boat, much less likely to be affected by the breath of the sea getting into old Edwino, won't take days to set up and fit, that might work well on a ship but on a small boat leaping around when the tanks are half full I'm not so sure. Spot on with needing a register on the shaft couplings and those barnacles on the prop will be terrible, nice to see the D squad doing well though
Darned good idea. You might find you need to damp/smooth read display to get decent readings when the boat is moving/sloshing the fuel around. Should be able to do this in the Arduino code. E.g. measure every 5 seconds and show the average of the last 20 readings.
The other thing worth thinking about from my point of view is moisture/corrosion. Arduinos are not intended for wet salty environments.
Good introduction to Arduino. Always wondered how they were set up. Looks to be a reasonably easy bit of coding. Of course if you had a raspberry pie you could do the same thing with multiple sensors and a colour touch screen interface. But the Arduino seems like a good simple solution. Thanks
Great project to work on and working like you want. Enjoy your videos and content.
Very interesting and a straightforward explanation of the code. I was going to comment but others have said it all.
Something like BSP (British Standard Plumbing), straight thread or NPT (National? Pipe Taper, same size but tapered) which use the internal pipe diameter as the bit to be measured. Pipes were originally iron. So there.
Awesome episode Stu! I didn't know you were so knowledgeable about so many different things. I have had an interest in arduino but the programming is kicking my butt! I'm sure with a little fine tuning you will have an awesome functional guage! Cheers!
Thanks mate. I think with a more sensitive sensor and some averaging code it will work quite well.
Brilliant Channel!
Thanks mate. :)
If you use a pipe from the top with the sensor at the top it works well we use that system in water tanks on floor scrubbers if you google a Tennant t16 waste water tank you should find a good pick of the set up
Awesome job Stu. Thanks for the fun 🍻
You're welcome. :)
Very impressed with your broad range of capabilities. Is there anything you can’t do!! Loved the video and keep up the great work.
Thanks mate. Can't dance. ;)
Nice change! Something I want to add to my system is sensors. I've been learning from Paul McWhorter tutorials. Paul did a portioning level on LED light that will work for fuel level as well I believe. I 'm just learning to use a project kit he recommends. It looks like you went about the same thing as Paul but, he is an engineer who went about it differently. Same results though. Enjoy your video's.
I enjoyed the content, it shows how many skill are needed for a modern build!
I am so impressed, as always, but a whole new field and good results anyway. Thanks for making the video
Cool video, nice change of pace. Keep up the good work!
You can recover your soldering iron tip with some fine sand paper or emery cloth. Then dip it in some flux if you have it then tin the tip the first time you heat it up. Then use a wet sponge to clean it after use to clean the tip between use.
Great information ,we all need to get digital savvy. That prop was nasty , hope it solves the wobble.
Been really interested in ways to use this tech on my boat. Keep them comming