Tonight the first business-application of RiderNet goes into action. One of our beloved horses (Chilli) is sick. Yesterday we would be staying vigil all night outside his stall, taking turns sleeping and checking on him. From now on, we simply attach one of the MBF Mobile Cams to the stall door and we can watch over them 24/7!
Much of this work is thanks to Adafruit products, support and tutorials – so Adafruit Industries definitely had a hand in helping to save Chilli – and every horse that gets sick from now on.
RiderNet is an all-weather arduino-managed 802.11g WiFi network made from 6 exterior and 3 interior Netgear WNDR3300 WiFi routers and Arduino Mega 2560s in a mineral oil tank. The mineral oil provides temperature stabilizaiton in freezing cold and very hot conditions, an aquarium pump and heater provide circulation and heating in the winter. These will be installed around Misty Brae Farm on trees, barns and other spots to provide complete WiFi coverage of our Pony Club Center in Virginia. The electronics were inspired by Adafruit Industires, which provided all the tutorials and great parts I got the project.
After completion I took these screenshots, and dressed one of them up with a breakdown of the RiderNet components. This unit is the “Showcase Model”, as I mounted a VFD LCD and one of the new Adafruit temp/humidity sensors outside the router for exterior measurements. This one will go in the main barn, so it wont be directly exposed to rain/snow – so I figured it would be nice to have the temp/humidity of the barn displayed on the VFD. The VFD LCD working with the “showcase” router looks very nice – especially at night.
Amazing project.
Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7:30pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat and our Discord!
