I
recently read the first book in a series titled, "Mad Tinker
Chronicles." A quote from the novel got my attention. It read...
of course I can't find the page right now. My interpretation was that
it said something about how scientists are lazy because they don't
apply their knowledge. So, as someone who aspires to think of herself
as a scientist, but does not wish to be lazy, I am trying my hand at
applying the science behind solar panels and solar charging stations.
As a bonus, my wonderfully engineer-minded boyfriend set up a project
for me. He ordered the parts to build a solar-powered charging
station. It is my job to read the tutorials on the open-source
websites SparkFun
Electronics and Arduino and
figure out how to put everything together and code it.
Act
1, Scene 1.
Unfortunately,
as soon as I began, I opened the box to discover that the glue
holding the wires in place at the back of the solar cell had not been
allowed to set properly. Here was the result:
Now,
I think I could fix this myself by getting some kind of putty and
just overlaying it on that little misaligned square box... but for
that I would have to know where to buy putty. So, I asked my
boyfriend to save me and now SparkFun Electronics will send me a new
solar cell. (They will likely be more vigilant in the future as
well.) Because the solar cell seems fine on its own and SparkFun
Electronics has a pretty cool set-up with its whole open-source
business model, I will mail the misaligned panel back to them once I
receive the new one.
Act
2, Scene 1.
While
I wait for the replacement solar cell to arrive, I can take advantage
of the lull in my schedule (recent graduate here) to learn a bit and
try to figure out the other parts of my project.
First,
let's go over the parts list. I'll list them and then in this or the
next entry discuss the important new things that I am learning...
I
have:
- 1 USB Type A Female Breakout (BOB-12700)
- 1 Arduino Uno - R3 (DEV-11021)
- 1 Hook-up Wire - White (22 AWG) (PRT-08026)
- 1 Polymer Lithium Ion Battery - 2000 mAh (PRT-08483)
- 1 Solar Cell Huge - 5.2W (PRT-09241)
- 1 LiPower - Boost Converter (PRT-10255)
- 1 Sunny Buddy - MPPT Solar Charger (PRT-12084)
- 2 Servo - Generic (Sub-Micro Size) (ROB-09065)
- 1
Pan/Tilt Bracket (ROB-10335)
My
boyfriend helped me sketch out a design but that was about a month
ago. My goal is to have it stationed in a sunny spot outside my house
with a wire relaying it inside, maybe to my room, to be used for
charging my dumb phone and my iPod Touch. In my head, it will
go something like this:
A.
The Solar Cell takes in solar energy. It uses a Pan/Tilt
Bracket and Servos that are programmed to scan the sky for the
position of the sun and instruct the Solar Cell to move to the angle
that will collect the most sunlight. This will use require some
energy to run the Servos but it should be outweighed by the benefit
of continually collecting an optimal amount of sunlight.
B.
Energy collected from the Solar Cell goes to the Servos for running
the pan and tilt bracket and the rest is relayed to the Polymer
Lithium Ion Battery. Something needs to happen with the other gadgets
that I have. The Arduino will be used to program the Pan/Tilt Bracket
Servos thing and the Sunny Buddy Solar Charger is important for
regulating voltage (or is it amps? I should have taken a class for
this. Fortunately, SparkFun has tutorials to teach me about these
things).
C.
Somehow I will connect the USB Type A Female Bracket to the charging
station, probably using the Hook-up Wire (which can be any color, but
you probably don't actually want to use black, red, or white, because
those have other common significance in the world of electronic
tinkering).
D.
Once the battery is charged, I will be able to charge my phone using
solar power! Neat! It may take me some time to get to that point. I
am going to post this, let my boyfriend read it, and have him tell my
where my brain is confused.
To be
continued...
