SUNFLOWER

During the process, we have learned a lot to bring with us to the 3-week course. The tool Prototype Planner was especially a huge factor and repeatedly used. Our alpha prototype, Solar panel movement, taught us to be able to move an object in several axes, in this case two. This was necessary for the product to become relevant on the already existing market of this category. If the solar panel are to move all the time to look for the most amount of lumen, as our current prototype does, the solar panel will in fact not be sustainable due to loss of power when constantly moving. This is something for us to investigate in our next beta prototype of Solar panel movement.

When assembling and making the alpha prototype Water pump, several questions determined the outcome. Where is the most efficient place to put the hygrometer? In the bottom or the top? For now, the plant potholder is designed to water from the bottom, since this is the best way to water according to theories on a plant’s health. This could influence where the hygrometer should be placed to read the levels most correctly. Our most qualified opinion and the current solution is placing the hygrometer manually in the top. Could the plant be watered another way to make the hygrometer placement automatic?

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We will furthermore have to iterate on the placement of the hygrometer together with the placement of the water pump regarding overwatering. If they are far away from each other, could the pump then overwater the plants? And if they are placed close to each other, the consequence could be too little water for the plants. Is it good for the plant to have a big amount of water rarely or small drops of water more often? Many issues must be considered, and we will have to iterate on our current prototypes to come up with the best possible solution all in one.

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We would also like to individualize the boundaries for the moisture level, e.g., a basil needs a more watered soil than rosemary. However, we are also critical of this aspect - Will it be possible to individualize this and what will the effect be?

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The LED screen alpha prototype has led us to understand that an interactive message will be possible to display a status of the plant with an emotion emoji. However, the message will be of the sun status for all the plants and not the water status. We have learned to create the animations and show them on the screens.

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In general, one of our main issues will be the calculations in terms of how much power the different hardware’s use. If the solar panel will move and search for the sun on a cloudy day, will we then have enough power to turn on the growth LEDs? We have learned that this could be solved by a charging element to the battery, so you are sure to have enough power anytime.

Alpha prototype NodeRED App also gave us an insight and further developed on what other components we would need - Components that we on beforehand had not thought of. We concluded, based on the prototyping of the app, that we will need a sensor to measure the water levels in the water tank, so that this information is available to the user as well. The user should see how much sun the plants have had during the day and possible be able to manually turn on the growth LED’s if there has not been enough. The growth LED will also run automatically and turn on/off based on a set sun level required in the code.

In general, we have learned to master new components that we had not used before. Beforehand we were limited to the components in the Arduino kit but we have now expanded our horizon. We are looking forward to continuing this journey to make the best possible product! We will do this by iterating on the current systems and products and come up with a final product Sunflower which will take the world by storm!