I had an idea... Once I get my solar panels in place, I'd like to wirelessly log the temperature, voltage, and position of each panel through each day of the year. I'd like to send this data to a PC for graphing purposes.

Is there anything out there that already does this cheaply? If not, do you guys think this is something that people would want? If so, how much do you think people might pay for something like this? $20, $50...?

Another project of mine is getting into the the business of selling various electronics kits for hobbyists to build on their own. So, I'm trying to test the level of interest in an idea like this one.

 

I would be interested, especially wireless temperature. I am planning on using a National Instruments 6008 with the student version of Labview to log wind speed, voltage, current, RPM, and temp of my wind generator. Temp almost has to be wireless. I saw something with built-in Zigbee wireless the other day in a magazine that I thought might work, I'll try to find it. I think it was around $100-$150, so something cheaper would be nice.

 

Selling kits seems like a pretty saturated area but good luck. There are ALOT of people on this board who sell kits, some better than others. One of the top is blueroom's kits. I won't offer who I think are the worst.

 

Gosh thanks gabeNC

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Bill
Smart Kits build Smart People
http://www.blueroomelectronics.com/

 

Thanks for the headsup. I think/hope the key will be doing a little preliminary research and finding a need that hasn't yet been filled by others.

 

BlueRoom, any words of wisdom you'd like to share with a newbie?

Sales volumes would be terrific, but if you can at least summarize as much as saying it was or wasn't worth your time, that would be useful information to me.

 

He aint gonna help you mate he's here to make a quid for himself.
Nothing wrong with that.

Ive been setting up an Arduino Arduino - HomePagewith wires atm to monitor freezer temps . It seems I need two Arduino boards (one each end) with some form of radio rx/tx chips (one on each) to get it to work.

Programs (IDE) to put your program on the chips is free. Plenty of assistance to do so is forthcomming. Cost however is not cheap for any of these syatems whatever you use .

2 Arduinos = $ 70 min ( you need a miroprocessor chip of some kind)
2 radio chips = $ 25 min (something like xbee = 35 each)
Time = lots.

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My Property and my Family are not for Govenments to control.That is not the purpose of Governments.
To stop corruption in Government officials give them three times the penalty. They should, and do, know better. Let them commit to that when first employed

 

If you are still around and keen, I got a Freezer/Fridge monitoring system up and running with radio transfer of data,

It is at forums.adafruit.com on the arduino board . Ill post the link later.
Cost about $40 for two arduino boards if you use a bare bones one and about $5 for a transmitter and $8 for a receiver . So you could probably put it together for under $50 in any quantity. Lots of uses and I hav'nt seen any around commercially

http://www.forums.adafruit.com/viewt...p?f=25&t=13122

__________________
My Property and my Family are not for Govenments to control.That is not the purpose of Governments.
To stop corruption in Government officials give them three times the penalty. They should, and do, know better. Let them commit to that when first employed