Blog #10 - The Final Push

Wow, where did all the time go.  It seemed to evaporate.  I tried to stay disciplined with my time management but sometimes life gets in the way.

I woke up on Saturday morning with the realization that a whole lot of work still needed to be done.

After my coffee I crouched over my kitchen table to solder the remaining components on the carrier board.

The first module installed on the carrier was the PROFET 2+ Shield.

Then I installed the DPS368 Pressure2Go module.  He's a cute little guy... smaller than a stick of gum.

And finally, on top of the stack, we have the XMC4700 Relax Kit board.

Wow, I was so impressed with how everything looked together.

So although I was very pleased with the electronic integration there was some disappointment ahead.

I was completely defeated by the plumbing. LOL.

This is one area that I totally underestimated.  I had a lot of difficulty sourcing the appropriate adapters and plumbing fixtures so I used rubber tubing to attach the solenoid valve.

Unfortunately the smallest amount of pressure would cause the rubber tubing to fail, in turn sending the solenoid into the puddle that was quickly forming in my garden.

Things weren't looking too safe so I had to abandon this goal.  For the sake of posterity I've included an image capturing this failed attempt.

Please do not try at home:

I had greater success with the data logging function.  On Sunday night, I 'left the Relax Kit to its own devices'.

After 3 hours or so I checked to see what data was logged.  The results are shown below:

So, yeah, its kind of cool that it can run autonomously, record data and make decisions based on that data.

And once I befriend a qualified plumber I have no doubt that it will be able to control a water valve.

For the time being my project sits on my TV stand.  He runs autonomously collecting data.

And he's in good company too, being watched over by two of the best friends I ever had.

I want to thank Newark Element14 and Infineon for putting together this design challenge.  It provided a good introduction to technologies I wasn't too familiar with like ARM Cortex M4, the XMC series of microcontrollers and the DAVE IDE.  More importantly though, it provided that rare opportunity in life, where you are challenged and given an opportunity to solve problems in creative ways.  For this I am truly grateful.