AI, Artificial intelligence for a dumb watermeter

[Metropolitian]

In this era, many technology has evolved in a high slope.

Years and years ago when garage door openers became an option for additional 'luxurious' households and not much later for everyone.

Remote controlling the lights was for theaters (wired DMX) and then you had DIY hobbyists, making transmitters that operated on a wide bandwidth and a few channels .. Which only works fine when without disturbing RF inference from their surrounding.

I remember done a thing like that, it was too strong and in the analog tv era with the main channel transmitting on the same frequency.. I've well seen the neighbors tapping on their TV as the signal was distorted.

Another thing I did was boosting the IR lights from the TV remote control, so I was able to change channel by aiming on the wall or ceiling instead pointing to the TV. And again seen the neighbor men across the street hitting their TV's.. our houses had big windows.

 

Then came the digital era, many channels were possible in a smaller bandwidth on the 'free' frequency spectrum. And there came the remotes for the lights, and newer versions of garage openers that only opens yours and not in the whole street (lol) .

 

Of course time didn't stood still with the advent of the WiFi which brought us much much more possibilities.

Controlling the coffee machine from your bed in the morning and checking the arrival of the daily morning paper from the ipcam in the front.

This is where I stopped, nothing better then making your own coffee in the morning, with the 'newspaper' in your hand, digital that is. ????

 

But.. The house I grant a full entry into the digital world. A portion of the lights, climate sensors, radars (1090Mhz) processing, electricity, movement, and so on..

 

Now: only the water system is still 'analog' ????

 

What I would like to see the house intelligence center is collecting the flow and usage of the water.

For that there is a 'crude' water flow sensor for around 100B.

Crude as it measures between 1-30L/min. So the little flow it wouldn't notice.

 

Our water meter is Thai styled in the front and the pipes are buried in concrete.

Like this:

 

Putting that flow sensor in series with the main meter isn't a easy job.

From the meter to the house, the area is concrete -and- tiled..

 

SO... Now I was thinking about something else, using the actual water meter without tampering with it.. in a way that the top stays visible and the lid can be opened/closed.

I tried looking online for the datasheets / internal pictures. But nothing.

I would like sticking an hall meter on it, near one of the dials.

 

Has anyone knowledge about this meter and especially it internals?

 

nb. While I was searching for the water meter online I stumble across this one, with built in WiFi, something like that would be nice to hook up in series with the official meter.

Check this: Wifi Water Meter

[Metropolitian]

Hall Sensor:  This type of sensor need a magnetic field , with the small water flow sensor there is an free-spinning disc/fan inside with a small piece magnet. The hall sensor sense each pass of that tiny magnet.  This also works, at high sensitivity setting, with iron/copper fins.

Youtube video . Arduino Tutorial.

 

Ultrasonic Sensor: This type measures the time of the signal that travels from one to another sensor. The time changes with the waterflow.

Youtube video . Arduino Tutorial.

[tjo o tjim]

Most water meters I have dealt with can be read with the hall-effect sensor.  It isn’t perfect, but it will get you rough data. If you want to go wild and crazy, add a camera with image recognition to periodically re-calibrate the numbers, as low flow will not always be reliable with the sensor.

[Metropolitian]

Great comment and have thought of that, and even met those solutions in my search.

 

In the west many water meters has plastic tops, the sense of any moving parts inside would be easy.

The water meters here are die cast , wholly iron/copper, so I have to test that.

 

Currently the watermeter is hidden behind a big pot with plants, so I will come back on this in a while.

 

Some links I saved, which has great info on this subject.

 

https://www.instructables.com/id/Monitoring-residential-water-usage-by-reading-muni/
https://spectrum.ieee.org/geek-life/hands-on/build-a-wireless-water-meter-for-your-home
http://seductiveequations.com/2015/11/09/water-meter.html
https://community.openhab.org/t/water-meter-selfmade/79270
https://forum.mysensors.org/topic/1594/automatic-water-meter-reading-with-a-webcam
https://www.mysensors.org/build/pulse_water