Introducing PowerArdy!

My second PCB Ever has been sent of for fabrication! I’ve been lazy and haven’t posted my first Circuit Board Ever yet. This will replace my Current Cost Envi unit which has been beavering away for a few years now with 2 current Sensors. Since adding Solar to the house 2 isn’t enough. I have one Sensor on the total house power circuit (Mains) and the other around the Heating Circuit which services the Hot water Cylinder and the Heatpump. I pull 3 totals out of this by subtracting the Heat circuit off the total power circuit to give me the leftover which is powerpoints and Lights. There has been some anomalies with this which to be honest I haven’t looked into my code to see if its a bug there or something else. The new PowerArdy has 4 Current sensors on it! They will monitor:

  • Lights and Power
  • Heater Circuit
  • Solar Production
  • Total Power

This will hopefully fix the anomaly with my data. The other problem I have with the old setup is when I have a surplus of power from the solar and it starts exporting to the grid it appears as power consumption on my graphs! No good at all. I’ve also gone pro by adding a 9V AC-AC Powersupply that will monitor the line voltage to calculate power factor. This in turn lets you calculate real power value properly. Also in the mix, as this unit will be by the Front door, I’ve added a PIR sensor for motion detection, a TMP36 temperature sensor, a light sensor and a button. The button is for a coming Doorbell button. Which as it happens is how I started playing with Arduino stuff in the first place! I just wanted a doorbell! I have a lot of trouble hearing anybody at the door which I plan on fixing with a very loud old school Siren I have around here somewhere. Awesome sauce…… once its setup 🙂 Also included is a Xbee to shoot all the data through to motherhub.

Here is the PCB layout of the new board

Capture

 

I hope its all correct! Will be a 4-8 weeks before I see the boards yet so I have some time to wait. In the meantime I’ve ordered all the other parts I don’t have here. Version 2 of this will probably have a arduino included in the design instead of being an Arduino shield as it is now.

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