[dba-Tech] Has anyone kickstarted?

Fri Mar 13 13:41:28 CDT 2015

Hi John:

It does sound like a fun project for sure. Doing electronics is not my strong suit but if it works it will sure be useful. (I still have a soil testing kit...I wonder if this new product could replace it?)

Aside: Maker labs are all the rage out here...There one at the local college which is shared by the university, two private ones that anyone can become a member of and I have a friend that has virtually every piece of equipment (he even has a full lath that can cut hierarchical gears (used in his home made electric car), a 3D computerized boring machine and a medium size 3D printer that came in a kit) and has rented out his facilities for various projects. My friend built a new battery for my lawn mower and it has been running for 5 or 6 years...(he estimates it will recharge up to 15 years and maybe more). My lawn mower is one of the articles in his next monthly news letter.  

Please keep me posted on your progress.

Jim

----- Original Message -----
From: "John W. Colby" <jwcolby at gmail.com>
To: "Discussion of Hardware and Software issues" <dba-tech at databaseadvisors.com>, jwcolby at gmail.com
Sent: Friday, March 13, 2015 4:29:08 AM
Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] Has anyone kickstarted?

The spectrum analyzer is on the way. I will likely be joining one of 
those "maker space" things, though there are none local so it will be a 
drive to get there.  That will give me access to 3D printers and such.  
I need to do a good prototype and do some extensive testing.  There is a 
lot of absorption spectrometry going on now that this inexpensive widget 
is available.

It "feels" like this should work.  It is something that I personally 
want and would just pay for if it already existed.

I have in fact found a company doing something similar, though they only 
test for hardness and Ammonia, not PH, Nitrate or Nitrite. They do cover 
water temp. logging etc.  Slickly packaged and a slick web page. Lots of 
add-ons and consumables to drive the price up. They also do what appears 
to be a submersible camera probe (extra cost add-on) to do light 
analysis at the bottom of the aquarium.

All of which gives me hope that the idea does in fact have legs.  I have 
the programming chops to do computer analysis and automation.

One way or the other it will be a fun project.

John W. Colby

On 3/13/2015 3:07 AM, Jim Lawrence wrote:
> Hi John:
>
> This looks like a Kickstarter project that has legs. It is hardly as smooth a sales video as many of the most popular supported products but it would seem that a good video production individual could put a real professional presentation together.
>
> Jim
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "John W. Colby" <jwcolby at gmail.com>
> To: "Discussion of Hardware and Software issues" <dba-tech at databaseadvisors.com>, jwcolby at gmail.com
> Sent: Thursday, March 12, 2015 12:08:43 PM
> Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] Has anyone kickstarted?
>
> Visible spectrum analysis of lights (LEDs, florescent etc) is widely
> talked about (and done) in the aquarium community. Basically shine a
> light of interest on a spectrum analyzer and measure the strength of the
> light at various frequencies.  A kickstarter project built an
> inexpensive analyzer using a diffraction grid plastic, a shaped (dark)
> box and a cell phone camera.  Use the cell phone to run software to
> display (and graph) the resulting spectrum.
>
> http://publiclaboratory.org/wiki/spectrometer
>
> Measuring various properties of aquarium water (inexpensively) uses
> measured vials of water (5ml), adding various "number of drops" of one
> or more titrating liquids. You then compare the resulting liquid color
> to a color card to determine the amount of the substance being
> measured.  You can buy kits which measure PH (High and low), Amonia,
> Nitrite and Nitrate.  The process involves taking 4 water samples. then
> dropping the correct number of drops of various things into each sample,
> comparing the resulting colors to an included card.
>
> For anyone who has actually done this... it is an inexact science to say
> the least.  The color cards contain shades which are difficult
> (impossible) to really accurately gauge when holding the tube against
> the card.  As an example, the Amonia test is really yellow turning to
> green, but it is basically impossible to tell which of three shades your
> tube matches.  In this example, any three adjacent shades are close
> enough together (to the eye) that "who knows".  And yet for example, one
> is 1 PPM (borderline bad), the next is 2 PPM (bad) the next is 4 PPM (do
> a water change NOW, do not stop for dinner).
>
> So all you really get is a range.  Unfortunately one end of that range
> is non-toxic, the other is toxic as hell.
>
> So...
>
> Take the tubes of water, beam light through them and measure the
> resulting color intensity with a spectrum analyzer using a camera and
> software.  If the light intensity is known and stable (a white LED), the
> sample is placed in a dark chamber so only light from the LED can pass
> through the sample (and not leak around the sample), the distance from
> the sample to the diffraction box is stable, and the distance from the
> diffraction grid to the camera is stable (and doesn't leak light) then
> you should be able to accurately and reliably measure intensity and
> color of light through the sample.
>
> Reliable analysis.
>
> If you can automate the process, you get automated reliable analysis.
> Twice a day (week, month) measurement of all measurable parameters.
> Throw in water temp.  Throw in logging.  Throw in Wifi and a browser
> interface.  Heck, throw in automated dosing of chemicals to correct the
> issue.
>
> The first part (measuring the color) is relatively simple. Automation is
> not.
>
> I am ordering the USB Desktop analyzer and will then build a little box
> to hold the sample vials such that light is forced through the vials
> (not around) and a powerful white LED as a light source.  I will then
> test the measuring concept with this widget.  If it works then I can
> reliably measure my own aquarium water.
>
> If it works, that is where kickstarter would come in, commercializing
> this.  There is a pretty large community out there of folks doing
> aquariums, even high end aquariums.  Lots of people, lots of money.
>   From what I can tell, and I have done a lot of reading, everyone just
> uses the liquid tests.  So selling into a high end market where people
> already use and are comfortable with these tests, but providing really
> accurate measuring, logging etc seems like a viable business.
>
> John W. Colby
>
> On 3/12/2015 12:28 PM, Jim Lawrence wrote:
>> Hi John:
>>
>> Sounds exciting...so maybe you can give us a hint of what type of project you are thinking of?
>>
>> Sorry, no experience other than contributing occasionally.
>>
>> Jim
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "John W. Colby" <jwcolby at gmail.com>
>> To: "DBA Tech" <dba-tech at databaseadvisors.com>
>> Sent: Thursday, March 12, 2015 7:41:23 AM
>> Subject: [dba-Tech] Has anyone kickstarted?
>>
>> Has anyone ever done a kickstarter project?  If so email me off line. Or
>> discuss general details here of how it works.
>>
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