Help with parts for first project

Community Projects
1

Hi,

I sent the below message to the support email on SparkFun’s site. I received a reply that I should post it here.

Hoping the experienced can help a noob with his first project.

Thanks!

I’m wanting to build my first Raspberry Pi/Arduino project and have decided to build a weather station with internal ambient sensors in addition to the atmospheric weather data.

I’ve decided to use your SEN-15901 Weather Meter Kit for some of the atmospheric data I want to log. That is what led me to your sight.

My problem (at least in regards to this project! :slight_smile: ) is lack of experience with RBP and Arduino and the various boards and sensors I am going to need.

Here is a brief breakdown of what I want to monitor:

Atmospheric Data:

  • Wind

    Rain

    Temp

    Humidity

    Pressure

    • Interior Data:

  • Temp

    Humidity


    • With regard to the interior data, I want to have a sensor package in my basement, on the first floor, an one on the second floor.

    I want all 4 sensor packages (Arduino based) to communicate to the base station (RBP based) via a wireless connection. I want to do this as economically as possible. There seems to be a plethora of expansion boards, sensors, etc. so I’m a bit overwhelmed with what I need to buy.

    Once I have all the parts, I don’t fell setting this up and programming it will be a huge issue. It’s kind of what I do for a living, just not with these parts and pieces.

    Can you give me some guidance on what I would need to build this out?

    Just to note, the Raspberry Pi I get will be WiFi capable in order to connect to my home network (I don’t want to have to run a cable to it). So if WiFi parts are available and not overly expensive that might work. Otherwise some sort of RF type wireless adapter would work.

    If you need any more information to help answer this question please let me know.

    Thanks,

    Mike

    2

    Hi Mike.

    I can’t give you a complete parts list or guide but this might be enough to get you started. :slight_smile:

    The easiest way to do the interior sensors would be to use a temperature sensor and humidity sensor along with a WiFi enabled microcontroller. You might have a look at the parts below for your indoor sensors:

  • - [[SparkFun ESP8266 Thing - Dev Board](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13711)
  • - [[SparkFun Humidity Sensor Breakout - SHTC3 (Qwiic)](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/16467) OR [[SparkFun Humidity and Temperature Sensor Breakout - Si7021](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13763)
  • - [[SparkFun Digital Temperature Sensor Breakout - TMP102](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13314)
    • [/list]

    For the outdoor portion, it gets a bit more complicated. For that, you might consider the following:

  • - [[SparkFun Weather Shield](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13956)
  • - [[Arduino Uno - R3](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/11021)
  • - [[Weather Meter Kit](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/15901)
    • [/list]

    Now the Weather Shield doesn’t have any sort of way to make it wireless, but you could add a Pi or another Thing Dev to it and let those handle WiFi for you. This will involve writing a bit of software to transmit the data however. Also I recommend you check out the guide for the Weather Shield, there are a few other bits and pieces you need to connect everything together and those are mentioned in the guide.](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/15901)](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/11021)](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13956)](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13314)](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13763)](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/16467)](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13711)

    3

    One quick word of caution (that I found out the hard way) is to make sure your sensors (especially temperature sensors) are at least a few inches from the computer boards (especially the RPi). The boards can generate some heat, which will throw the readings off. (I once made the mistake of having an Arduino Uno and temperature sensor in side the same case – I should have known better!)

    One other “noob” mistake I’ve seen is putting things that are supposed to be “wirelessly connected” into metal boxes – the radio signals don’t get through the metal boxes. (You can put an antenna outside the metal box, but for “homebrew” stuff, using a plastic case is easier.)