On Sunday, I published an article showing how I’d built an Arduino-powered ethernet gas meter, to publish real-time gas meter readings to Pachube. Thanks to James Taylor (http://twitter.com/jtonline) who re-tweeted my initial tweet highlighting it as potentially of interest to the #homecamp folks, within a few hours some 200 people had read the article, and I’ve received some great feedback and inclusion on several sites on the web. Not bad for my first article of this kind, I thought!
I’ve been thinking that I should really extend this little venture into a project that adds support for:
- Tracking electricity, gas and water meter values (all from the same Arduino), using cheap sensors
- Add support for pulse meters, as well as what I’ve dubbed ‘reflective’ meters (not sure of the proper name, but these are the meters with the little reflective discs of metal on one of the dials).
I’ve created a project on Google Code for anyone who’s interested in following (there’s not a lot there just yet, though). I’ve got a busy few weeks ahead, but will do what I can in the interim. It’s look like June will be the first real chance I have to sit down and extend the code. If anyone’s interested in getting involved, or helping out in any way, please get in touch. I’m still fairly new to the world of Arduino and physical computing, so I’m still learning too – all feedback is appreciated!
Richard Parker 