HeadGear -
(x15) TEC's- $15.00 each> $225.00 http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10080 -In the proposal we anticipated TECs could not be powered through the micro-controller alone, they will possibly need their own power supply or as Dr. Mellodge suggested, one larger power supply could be used for both the TEC and the micro-controller...
-Also, is a TEC sized for 6+ watt output suitable for 1~5 watt applications? This is worth testing...
(x8)Micro-controller-$20.00 each>$160.00 http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9725
(x30)Temp Sensors- $2.00 each> $60.00 http://www.sparkfun.com/products/250 Lets order a set of these and see how effective they are at measuring skin surface temp, will their irregular shape have significant temperature variation when applied to a relatively flat portion of the skin? Comfort is erroneous so long as the sensor can take accurate temp without air temperature conflict... issues with adhering to a site because of their shape? Arguable...
(x8)Batters-$15.00 each> $120.00 http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8786 What are the compare contrast between these and the 9v batteries. These come off as boutique priced batteries... However their aesthetic is nice.
(x1)Spool of Thread- $20/150yds> $20.00 http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8544 Won't this waste a lot of power as heat with a resistance of 82 ohms per foot? - I doubt we will be using more than a foot of wire in any area of the project so when scaled down the resistance is minimal and the heat should not be a problem, if it was I don't think they would sell it. TOTAL: $585.00 Good price range, but we're not addressing the real issues of power supply and respective components.... To those interested, pursue the topic and post on it before Friday.
Here is a list of products that are all designed to be compatible with eachother. These are not top of the line products but they are cheap, easy to get and easy to work with. The website where all of these parts were gathered from come from a supplier geared toward hobbiests and enthusiests, meaning that they are fairly common and provide adequate documentation with them to help us as we use them.
Personally, I along with a few other classmates feel that the idea of building an entire working headgear model is a bit of a reach. There is nothing wrong with that, however, we are undergraduate students with little or no eperience in the field and are on a small scale budget. As far as the general principle idea of designing and building a product that is compact and versatile in relation to todays methods is a good start. The product in specific deals with thermoelectric coolers and microcontrollers. Again majority of us have little to no experience with these. As a base I feel that it would be best to start with building a general device that grasps the principle of what is being put together.
We know that we want to design a device that cools down and works relatively similar to an ice pack. In todays methods of therapy, for certain cases, a person is wrapped in tubes filled with water and are hooked up to giant machines that regulate temperature and flow. With our design we can accomplish the same process, just more compact. Now to say that by the end of the semester we have come up with a working, marketable substitute for this device is a bit outlandish, but not necessarily out of reach.
Our device should be a represesntation of how we would go about accomplishing such a task. Our end device should be a working model of what we feel the basics are, a device that cools. Of course there are more details involved such as, self regulation, emergency shut off, temperature distribution and collective data about device use.
Basically an outline for this device would include a thermoelectric cooler (TEC) - as the main temperarute source, a thermistor - to sense the temperature that the device is outputing, a microcontroller - to gather data readouts of the thermistor and adjust voltage to the thermoelectric cooler accordingly, a user interface - some buttons for control and a small screen to display the temperature output, and a battery source - to supply the proper power needed to run the device. That takes care of the core of the project. The next step is to implement this configuration into a piece of cloth of sorts that can easily be applied to various parts of the body. A simple band with adjustable straps or velcro would suffice. Another aspect to think about is a plate that would distribute the temperature evenly across a larger surface area, seeing as the TEC is roughly 4cm wide.
After we accompish this and understand how this works and understand the devices and learn how to deal with them we can then implement this design into a multiple TEC device that instead of covering, lets say, the back of a hand we can now cover the front and back of a persons neck or move on to a persons shoulder. Perhaps further down the line we can implement multiple devices that interact with eachother, an eample would be cooling down an extremety like a leg, if one TEC is applied to the upper leg it would slow blood flow that is again cooled by another TEC applied to the lower leg. The devices would then check the with eachother to not freeze the persons entire leg and potentially harm them. These end branches are all great additions to the basic principle idea, they are feasable they are reasonable and should not be entirely dismissed. These extras and applications of the device should be documented and presented with the basic device. We must crawl before we can run, we need a foundation under the house. I'm simply proposing another way of going about this project in simpler terms so that we can grow off this great idea.
Jerred Jordan: Question, do we know if the proposed budget went through ?
James Hall: Yes Brents proposed budget went through. Apparently he presented his idea last Friday after class. As far as I know we were granted $1000, which gives us plenty of elbow room.
Brent : We were granted half, that's $1,100. And I didn't just present my idea, I presented our project, our budget proposal and it was done on time. A significant part of the reason this amount was granted was because we are all working on one project as a class. Further success will be a factor of our ability to work together as a team and meet our deadlines with quality output.
Suggested Objectives for Friday:
-Refine budget and resubmit....
-Break into groups and focus on our respective tasks i.e....
-Begin Programming by collecting Ardunio code relevant to sensor inputs and variable power control
-Begin Research- math equations like modified Newtonian cooling formulas that will keep us away from critical skin exposure times at or close to maximum watt ouput
-Begin Power- properly calculate and document the anticipated
-Shopping list so we can get the parts in by next class, what exact components are we making the first device out of....
-Anything else you can think of between now and Friday?
-
-
-
(x15) TEC's- $15.00 each> $225.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10080
-In the proposal we anticipated TECs could not be powered through the micro-controller alone, they will possibly need their own power supply or as Dr. Mellodge suggested, one larger power supply could be used for both the TEC and the micro-controller...
-Also, is a TEC sized for 6+ watt output suitable for 1~5 watt applications? This is worth testing...
(x8)Micro-controller-$20.00 each>$160.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9725
(x30)Temp Sensors- $2.00 each> $60.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/250
Lets order a set of these and see how effective they are at measuring skin surface temp, will their irregular shape have significant temperature variation when applied to a relatively flat portion of the skin? Comfort is erroneous so long as the sensor can take accurate temp without air temperature conflict... issues with adhering to a site because of their shape? Arguable...
(x8)Batters-$15.00 each> $120.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8786
What are the compare contrast between these and the 9v batteries. These come off as boutique priced batteries... However their aesthetic is nice.
(x1)Spool of Thread- $20/150yds> $20.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8544
Won't this waste a lot of power as heat with a resistance of 82 ohms per foot?
- I doubt we will be using more than a foot of wire in any area of the project so when scaled down the resistance is minimal and the heat should not be a problem, if it was I don't think they would sell it.
TOTAL: $585.00
Good price range, but we're not addressing the real issues of power supply and respective components.... To those interested, pursue the topic and post on it before Friday.
Basic Idea -
TEC - $15.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10080
Micro-controller - $20.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9725
(x2)Temp Sensors - $2.00 each > $4.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/250
Battery Source - $15.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8786
Spool of Thread - $20/150yds > $20.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8544
(x3)Button Pad - $2.00 > $6.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8776
This brings up a good point, do we need to toggle the device on and off or give it a reset button in the case the temperatures/power output reaches undesired levels or in the case of unintended operation?
- We found that the threading kit on the Shopping List page comes with LEDs and Buttons to cover this issue
(x3)7 Segment Led Display - $1.00 > $3.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8546
Total: $83.00
Here is a list of products that are all designed to be compatible with eachother. These are not top of the line products but they are cheap, easy to get and easy to work with. The website where all of these parts were gathered from come from a supplier geared toward hobbiests and enthusiests, meaning that they are fairly common and provide adequate documentation with them to help us as we use them.
Personally, I along with a few other classmates feel that the idea of building an entire working headgear model is a bit of a reach. There is nothing wrong with that, however, we are undergraduate students with little or no eperience in the field and are on a small scale budget. As far as the general principle idea of designing and building a product that is compact and versatile in relation to todays methods is a good start. The product in specific deals with thermoelectric coolers and microcontrollers. Again majority of us have little to no experience with these. As a base I feel that it would be best to start with building a general device that grasps the principle of what is being put together.
We know that we want to design a device that cools down and works relatively similar to an ice pack. In todays methods of therapy, for certain cases, a person is wrapped in tubes filled with water and are hooked up to giant machines that regulate temperature and flow. With our design we can accomplish the same process, just more compact. Now to say that by the end of the semester we have come up with a working, marketable substitute for this device is a bit outlandish, but not necessarily out of reach.
Our device should be a represesntation of how we would go about accomplishing such a task. Our end device should be a working model of what we feel the basics are, a device that cools. Of course there are more details involved such as, self regulation, emergency shut off, temperature distribution and collective data about device use.
Basically an outline for this device would include a thermoelectric cooler (TEC) - as the main temperarute source, a thermistor - to sense the temperature that the device is outputing, a microcontroller - to gather data readouts of the thermistor and adjust voltage to the thermoelectric cooler accordingly, a user interface - some buttons for control and a small screen to display the temperature output, and a battery source - to supply the proper power needed to run the device. That takes care of the core of the project. The next step is to implement this configuration into a piece of cloth of sorts that can easily be applied to various parts of the body. A simple band with adjustable straps or velcro would suffice. Another aspect to think about is a plate that would distribute the temperature evenly across a larger surface area, seeing as the TEC is roughly 4cm wide.
After we accompish this and understand how this works and understand the devices and learn how to deal with them we can then implement this design into a multiple TEC device that instead of covering, lets say, the back of a hand we can now cover the front and back of a persons neck or move on to a persons shoulder. Perhaps further down the line we can implement multiple devices that interact with eachother, an eample would be cooling down an extremety like a leg, if one TEC is applied to the upper leg it would slow blood flow that is again cooled by another TEC applied to the lower leg. The devices would then check the with eachother to not freeze the persons entire leg and potentially harm them. These end branches are all great additions to the basic principle idea, they are feasable they are reasonable and should not be entirely dismissed. These extras and applications of the device should be documented and presented with the basic device. We must crawl before we can run, we need a foundation under the house. I'm simply proposing another way of going about this project in simpler terms so that we can grow off this great idea.
TEC - $15.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10080
Micro-controller - $20.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9725
(x2)Temp Sensors - $2.00 each > $4.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/250
Battery Source - $15.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8786
Spool of Thread - $20/150yds> $20.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8544
(x3)Button Pad - $2.00> $6.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8776
(x3)7 Segment Led Display - $1.00> $3.00
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8546
Basic Idea -
Total: $83.00
Jerred Jordan: Question, do we know if the proposed budget went through ?
James Hall: Yes Brents proposed budget went through. Apparently he presented his idea last Friday after class. As far as I know we were granted $1000, which gives us plenty of elbow room.
Brent : We were granted half, that's $1,100. And I didn't just present my idea, I presented our project, our budget proposal and it was done on time. A significant part of the reason this amount was granted was because we are all working on one project as a class. Further success will be a factor of our ability to work together as a team and meet our deadlines with quality output.
Suggested Objectives for Friday:
-Refine budget and resubmit....
-Break into groups and focus on our respective tasks i.e....
-Begin Programming by collecting Ardunio code relevant to sensor inputs and variable power control
-Begin Research- math equations like modified Newtonian cooling formulas that will keep us away from critical skin exposure times at or close to maximum watt ouput
-Begin Power- properly calculate and document the anticipated
-Shopping list so we can get the parts in by next class, what exact components are we making the first device out of....
-Anything else you can think of between now and Friday?
-
-
-