Ben Heck’s Luggage Detective Episode -- Episode 232

One of the neatest, simplest, devices I ever saw was an invention that would detect if frozen food ever warmed up to above freezing.

It was simply 'frozen men' that were produced much like ice cubes and one was to be inserted in each packet of frozen food.

My friend sold the patent, for what was a very large sum of money, at the time, and the purchaser, a large food company, promptly buried the idea as it would be too expensive to keep food below the optimum temperature!

Ben wanted to add more, but due to battery life concerns, he kept the design and function simple. Always great to hear ideas from the community, though!

~Karen

That was SO funny !

I agree.  I thought an RTC would have been a good choice as well.  Regular OTS batteries are required to (instead of Lithium types).  They are not permitted in luggage due to fire concerns.

The Luggage Detective would be improved greatly by added GPS and altimeter, so you can prove where the damage occurred (in flight, in airport baggage handling, or before you got to the airport).

Consider if this device would cause TSA inspectors to be concerned.

Hey there.  Yes.  I recently created a data logger for my wife.  She's a High School Guidance Counselor Administrator.  She wanted to track how many phone calls and walk-ins she received each day.  She once told be 287 (calls and people).  I thought it would be cool to see office traffic over time though.  Using and Arduino Uno, SD Card Shield, Real Time Clock, project box, power adapter, and few LEDs, a Liquid Crystal Display (school colors), and couple buttons it was done.  The file written to the SD card is a .txt file.  I should have simply made a .csv file though... after seeing your video. I will fix that in software update 2, but that's an easy fix when the SD card is retrieved. Nevertheless, the project is working and recording data.  It has been in use for about a month so far.  At the end of the schrewal-year I will retrieve the card and see what it tells us.  For more info check out this URL: http://leckemby.net/aj0ml/blog.html#arduino ...scroll to the bottom of the entry and start there.

Great episode TBHS team!

Jeffrey Leckemby

Hampton, VA

Great idea.

I sometimes wonder what my poor luggage goes through on its way to and from the airplane.

DAB