Day 4 - Refinements

    Today we received most of the things we ordered from Amazon and all of our things from The Home Depot, including the wood, water pump, and hundreds of pounds of garden soil.
Most of our day was spent devising a way to measure the amount of water in the rain barrel, as we will not be using water from the tap. The water sensor (in the tank) will be connected to the Arduino computer in the FarmBot and give us readings on the computer. We tested using a water glass as the bot was still inside. After some trial and error, we eventually came up with a sequence that would take a sensor reading every five minutes. If the water level is less than a certain number (in this case, below 200), it sends a warning notification to the FarmBot app and email. This way we will know when to fill the rain barrel if it doesn't rain. 

    After figuring that out, we programmed two of the three custom buttons on the FarmBot, one to return to its home position, and another one to shut down the bot's computer. Tweaking with the settings and adding our own custom functions resulted in several mishaps, and hopefully, we will fix our problems in the days ahead. Towards the end of the day, though still inside, we attempted to construct the first tier of the bed and mount the FarmBot on top of it. Hopefully, we will be able to see how the robot works on the bed tomorrow, which will be so exciting! 


Autumn connecting the water sensor to the garden bot's computer.


Alexander and Mr. Beradino setting the garden bot on the garden bed



Alexander's soldering connections onto the water sensor (red rectangle in the center)











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