Need Help Teaching Hippies!

[YLEKIOT]

Hello to everybody on the blog!

I love Dave's stuff!  His BS blog on "Solar Roadways" really sold me.  I knew it had to be BS just from the standpoint of durability!  Have you seen the condition of most roads?  There is a reason they make them out of cement!

So now that the pot called the kettle black, (my pet project is setting up automated gardens on Mars for the first explorers,) let me tell you of an effort I am making.

I work with an odd group of people on various other blogs about various subjects.  They all tie into gardening though.  Not just your everyday gardening, but usually "sustainable" gardening.  You can read that as "Hippie" gardening if you like!  It's actually got some good points, but is short on tech and long on labor.  I have been trying for years now to automate sustainable gardening so that it can be tended to by more machinery and less people. 

To that end, some of the Hippies are interested in my efforts and want me to teach some of my methods.  Computers I get, electromechanical I have worked with, I even understand some basic coding, but my knowledge of electronics is limited to the board level.  By board level I mean, "Hmmmmm, this board is bad.  Take it out and put in a new one!" 

Efforts have progressed to the point that I need to get educated, so I can educate.  So here's what I am looking for.

Go back, way back to day one when you took your Mom's blender apart or shocked yourself trying to get flaming crumbs out of the toaster.  Remember those days when you had enthusiasm but no knowledge?  Ok, that's where the Hippies are and they want to learn about electronics.  What would you recommend for them?

I want to put together a kit for them, cheap as possible.  Any free or low cost books you can recommend would be greatly appreciated! 

Kit needs a multimeter.  Now they won't be measuring anything high voltage, so it can be a Chinese knockoff model.  I will make sure and tell them to keep it out of the wall sockets!  Auto ranger would be great, so they don't constantly blow fuses, misread numbers or blow up the meter.

I already have a list of simple components we will be covering in the class below.  Can you guys take a look and see what's BS, what's good and what might need to be changed?  I am guiding the series online through YouTube videos, so I will be there to explain the basics to these people.

1.  An Arduino R3 Starter Kit.  (Or an equivalent.)  Comes with a breadboard, breadboard wires with terminated ends and a project holder for the breadboard and Arduino.
2.  A 100 Ohm resistor.  A 220 Ohm resistor.  A 3,300 Ohm resistor.  A 1 Mega Ohm resistor.  (Rough value equivalents are fine.)  One potentiometer.
3.  Two red LEDs.  Two green LEDs.  A blue LED.
4.  A 100 uF electrolytic capacitor.  A small plastic film capacitor.
5.  A set of alligator lead clips.
6.  A multimeter.  (Still working on the best model.)
7.  A solid sate relay and a electromechanical relay. (Mechanicals are used in drip systems, etc.)

Again, this is a super simple, super cheap, "get your feet wet" attempt to introduce complete novices to electronics.  As such, I want people to invest $100 US or less in the class- and walk away with stuff they can still use.   

We are using the Arduino as a simple source of different voltages and later for sensing temp, humidity, moisture, etc and then doing something about it by actually opening a valve, starting a fan, etc.  I could just jump to sticking sensors in the Arduino, but I want people to at least know what a resistor is, what a capacitor is, etc.  The combination are needed in my opinion. 

The eventual goal is to have automated gardens on Mars waiting for the astronaut explorers to harvest fresh vegetables! 

But today's goal is a working knowledge of electricity.

Thanks for your help!

Jeff

[ez24]

http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/

http://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/forums/electronics-resources.15/

and this book hosted here

http://www.eevblog.com/files/seekPDF.pdf

[ignator]

Hippies and garden on mars, sounds like a kit to make an automated grow room operation for MaryJane.

[ez24]

Great opportunities in Wash and Colorado for ETs, just hope they can remember the lessons    but at least it is low voltage (expect for the high power lights)

[Richard Crowley]

There are already dozens, scores, maybe hundreds of Arduino experimenters kits on Ebay and Amazon and the Chinese equivalents.
There are already also dozens/scores/hundreds of videos on YouTube covering all the basic things you can do with Arduino.

I see your task as identifying the suitable kits and videos, etc. for your audience.
You could recommend a particular kit from one of the popular online vendors.
And then assign a YouTube video on a particular topic (or make one yourself) as the "classroom lecture"
then you could conduct on on-line discussion/Q&A/"laboratory" session for each topic or lesson.
Sounds like great fun!

Forget about growing weed. That's kid-stuff.
I want to start growing really good TOMATOES in my basement.
You can buy recreational drugs practically on any street corner.
But have you found a really good tomato at the supermarket recently?

[dr.diesel]

Forget about growing weed. That's kid-stuff.
I want to start growing really good TOMATOES in my basement.
You can buy recreational drugs practically on any street corner.
But have you found a really good tomato at the supermarket recently?

You Sir, are one of the great ones.

[Seekonk]

I still don't know what you want, but I would rather teach people who know nothing than those who pretend they do. Done a lot of solar with arduino, water heating, pumping with linear current booster (no battery).  Even growing plants with ultrasonics (pay attention you in CO, I can make you money).  I believe in simplistic linear code where each line stands on its own, nothing but IF's for the beginner.

[YLEKIOT]

LOL!  I actually did not think of that.  But since the stuff is going legal everywhere you look these days, the astronauts will likely bring it with them as a "medical necessity."

Far as I know, none of them are weed eaters, but you never know.

Great opportunities in Wash and Colorado for ETs, just hope they can remember the lessons    but at least it is low voltage (expect for the high power lights)

[Rerouter]

most basic ones are AC / DC, ohms law, and how it ties in with power, e.g. why there 10W solar panel cannot run there 8W mains pump via joining the wires,

IT comes down to, you can still keep things at a board level, if they need to know about the other passive types, the links in the first reply are the best place to look,

take the arduino, you want its output to operate mains, well great, how? (5V relays), they want to read soil moisture and temperature on 40 plants, ok how? (possibly 1 wire temperature chip daisy chained, and a few analog muxes to the 6 analog pins, )

i'm not saying play dumb, but you could contain them to mainly programming and sheilds for what i could imagine the complexity of there setups would be, with some veroboard and some analog and digital theory to fill in the gaps,

[YLEKIOT]

Forget about growing weed. That's kid-stuff.
I want to start growing really good TOMATOES in my basement.
You can buy recreational drugs practically on any street corner.
But have you found a really good tomato at the supermarket recently?

I hear you!  Even the supposedly "hot house" tomatoes lack flavor and seem like they were designed to be mechanically picked, rather than taste good.

The near goal in to produce a group of people with enough electrical knowledge to be able to reproduce some of the prototypes I have come up with.  I garden in the deserts of Arizona, using a variety of methods.  One of them is a self contained "mini-greenhouse" that waters, breathes and adjusts it's own temperature.  It occurred to me that on Mars, an astronaut would kill for a carrot or a tomato.  If these self contained, self monitoring gardens can be stored away flat for travel to Mars, the astronauts could have fresh food waiting for them when they arrive.  (God knows, eating out of a toothpaste tube will get old real fast!)

Thank you as well for you advice on where to find materials!

Jeff