June 12th 2015 - Davis Weather Station up and running!

The weather station that has been on the roof is finally working! I called Davis Technical Support and they stepped me through the process of setting up the weather station properly. On the console, as you hold down DONE, press the down arrow with the minus sign. The console should read "Receiving Data" and then you can press DONE. Then using the right arrow, scroll through the station numbers 1-7. The first should say "ISS" and then 2-7 should say OFF. If one of the other stations reads ON, turn them off by using the down arrow. The station should properly read the data on the console.

Weather Station

Just to document, we purchased the RFM transceiver from https://www.sparkfun.com/products/12031.  Just to note, it is currently backordered but the following link seems to have a similar chip that will perform the same tasks and maybe even more: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/12030.

Weather Station: Day 19- June 13

Today we cleaned up the raspberry pi that we were using and renamed all of the programs. We then saved them on a flash drive for later use.

Then we made a simpler circuit so that the ardiuino and RFM could fit in a small enclosure. We had to solder the RFM down onto a protoshield with many resistors and wires connecting everything. This is what our final circuit looks like:

We tested this and it works!!! Good way to finish research! Thank you to everyone who has helped and made this a fun experience!

21 cm Detector: Day 19 -June 13

Today is the last day of research! We have mixed emotions! It has been a lot of fun and a great experience to work on our projects and learn with each other! Today we were pleasantly surprised and were able to test our 21 cm detector thanks to Dr. Hassel! He found a new way to connect it to the tv dongle so we were able to get a reading of the microwaves as shown below in our pictures.

 

We were still not able to find out how to load our webcam pictures or video to a public website. So, as of right now you can only view them if you are on Siena Air.

 

We had a great time working with everyone on the Viper Project! Thanks to all the professors for your help!

 

 

 

Weather Station: Day 18- June 12

We finally did it! The weather station data can be read on one graph in plotly. The following code is what worked:

#!/usr/bin/python

import plotly.plotly as py
import time
import datetime
import serial
#from plotly.graph_objs import Figure, Data,Scatter, Layout

from plotly.graph_objs import *

#reads the data from the sensors and splits the line into the correct variables
def getpoint(ser):
        data = ser.readline().split()
        temp_C = float(data[0])
        humidity = float(data[1])
        rain = float(data[2])
        windDc = float(data[3])
        windDir = float(data[4])
        gustDc = float(data[5])


        # convert celsius to fahrenheit
        temperature = ( temp_C * 9.0 / 5.0 ) + 32

        #convert wind deci meters to meters
        wind = windDc/10
        gust = gustDc/10

        date_stamp = datetime.datetime.now()

        return date_stamp,temperature,humidity,rain,wind,windDir,gust


ser = serial.Serial('/dev/ttyACM0',9600)
py.sign_in('physuser','aldyw0r26q')

x1=[]
x2=[]
x3=[]
y1=[]
y2=[]
y3=[]
x4=[]
x5=[]
x6=[]
y4=[]
y5=[]
y6=[]

my_data1 = Scatter(x=x1,y=y1, stream=dict(token='tvfuqv0s6g'), name ='Temp(F)')

my_data2 = Scatter(x=x2,y=y2,
stream=dict(token='bjo44dghec'),xaxis='x2',yaxis='y2', name =
'Humidity')
#data=Data([my_data1,my_data2])

my_data3 = Scatter(x=x3,y=y3,
stream=dict(token='4tv7be960v'),xaxis='x3',yaxis='y3', name = 'Rain')
#data=Data([my_data1,my_data2,my_data3])

my_data4 = Scatter(x=x4,y=y4,
stream=dict(token='onmmq775to'),xaxis='x4',yaxis='y4', name = 'Wind
Speed')
#data=Data([my_data1,my_data2,my_data3])

my_data5 = Scatter(x=x5,y=y5,
stream=dict(token='g97c3g3475'),xaxis='x5',yaxis='y5', name = 'Wind
direction')
#data=Data([my_data1,my_data2,my_data3])

my_data6 = Scatter(x=x6,y=y6,
stream=dict(token='6l3o4sttj6'),xaxis='x6',yaxis='y6', name = 'Gust')
data=Data([my_data1,my_data2,my_data3,my_data4,my_data5,my_data6])

layout=Layout(title='Siena
Weather',xaxis1=XAxis(anchor='y1',title='time',showline=True),yaxis=YAxis(domain=[0,.12],title='Temperature(Degrees
F)',showline=True),xaxis2=XAxis(anchor='y2',title='time',showline=True),yaxis2=YAxis(domain=[0.18,0.30],title='Relative
Humidity(%)',showline=True),xaxis3=XAxis(anchor='y3',title='time',showline=True),yaxis3=YAxis(domain=[0.36,0.48],title='Rain',showline=True),
xaxis4=XAxis(anchor='y4',title='yaxis4=YAxis(domain=[0.53,0.65],title='Wind
Speed(m/s)',showline=True),xaxis5=XAxis(anchor='y5',title='time',showline=True),yaxis5=YAxis(domain=[0.71,0.83],title='Wind
Direction(Degrees)',showline=True),xaxis6=XAxis(anchor='y6',title='time',showline=True),yaxis6=YAxis(domain=[0.89,1],title='Gust(m/s)',showline=True),
width=900, height = 1200, autosize=False)


my_fig1=Figure(data=data,layout=layout)
py.plot(my_fig1, auto_open = False)

s1 = py.Stream('tvfuqv0s6g')
s2 = py.Stream('bjo44dghec')
s3 = py.Stream('4tv7be960v')
s4 = py.Stream('onmmq775to')
s5 = py.Stream('g97c3g3475')
s6 = py.Stream('6l3o4sttj6')

s1.open()
s2.open()
s3.open()
s4.open()
s5.open()
s6.open()

while True: #while loop for temperature
        pt = getpoint(ser)
        s1.write(dict(x=pt[0], y=pt[1] ))
        s2.write(dict(x=pt[0], y=pt[2]))
        s3.write(dict(x=pt[0], y=pt[3]))
        s4.write(dict(x=pt[0], y=pt[4] ))
        s5.write(dict(x=pt[0], y=pt[5]))
        s6.write(dict(x=pt[0], y=pt[6]))

        time.sleep(5)

s1.close()
s2.close()
s3.close()
s4.close()
s5.close()
s6.close()


This is what this looks like in plotly:

Now we need to just clean up the RFM and arduino set up. We need to solder the RFM chip to little pins that stick directly into a breadboard. This makes the circuit neater and so that nothing will move around when we put it an enclosure on the roof.

21 cm Detector: Day 18 -June 12

This is a picture that our camera took at night. This means that as long as there is some light on the telescope, you will be able to see what is occurring on the telescope.


Today we figured out how to start and stop motion at a certain time each day. We also were able to delete files that were more than a day old. The code we used is shown below.

 

 

Tomorrow is the last day. :-( Unfortunately, we will not be able to test the 21 cm detector again this week because a pin broke that connects it to the TV dongle. We hope to find more information on how to upload pictures to a public website and to write out instructions on how we got our webcam working.

21 cm Detector: Day 17 -June 11

Even in the rain we managed to place our 21 cm detector in the telescope at Union.

Unfortunately, our test was not successful. We got closer and closer each time we went to Union so we are hoping the next time it is tested it works!