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Universal miniaturized data logger for usage in RC-modeling
Hermann Leopold Schellenhuber
Supervision: Univ.-Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Dr. Bernhard Zagar
Today RC modeling belongs to some of the most favored hobbies of young and old. RC stands for remote controlled models. The spectrum ranges from model boats to aerial models, where the lastly mentioned brings the most fascination to the hobby. A term that has gained a lot of recognition on the modeling scene is "data logging". It's understood that it logs particular information from various parameters of a model during its drive or flight in order to study the values that were stored during the activity. The use of a data logger can purely be for curiosity in order to measure the maximum speed, max height, etc, or to be used to figure out problem areas, i.e., fine-tuning, optimizing or monitoring of vital components specifically used in electric powered RC models.
Figure 1: a) data logger b) temperature sensor c) revolution sensor d) amperage/voltage sensor e) bluetooth module f) stroboscopic lamp g) gps module
During this student project a universal miniaturized data logger with an add-on module was developed in order to track voltage, amperage, temperature and revolutions per minute. Now it is possible to track and evaluate all of the above relevant data from an electronic powered model during actual flight and is now able to be recorded and viewed graphically on a PC. As storage medium a "transflash storage card" with a maximum of 2GB storage can be utilized. The device can be configured and viewed via the color LCD screen of a Nokia mobile phone. The logger's functions can be changed or advanced by swapping the add-on module. Figure 1 displays the development of the components during the project.
September 03, 2009
