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I live in the country and I have deer constantly eating this and that in my garden. I was not so mad until they killed two pear trees and two cherry trees. I am thinking about making an automatic water gun with sensors and camera detecting big moving objects and shoot out water stream when the object is too close. I figured that should scare the deer away without harming them. Not that I am anti-hunting by any means. It is environmental friendly without chemicals and my lawn will be happy with extra water. I will probably get some close-up pictures as a plus. Yes, yes, yes… I know I can put up a fence. But it will not be nearly as fun as making an automatic watergun!
The first stage will be making it web enabled. The watergun receives requests from a website, sends commands to the micro controller. The microcontroller controls two stepper motors to rotate and tilt the watergun and shoot. The parts I am using for these two projects are pretty much the same. This does not require any high quality camera for motion detection/image analysis.
Budget:
1. Buzz Bee Toys Tarantula B/O Water Blaster: $49.99
Motorized watergun blasts up to 35 feet of water. This includes rechargeable battery pack and charger. I could not bring myself to spend 50 bucks for this water gun. Finally I found one from our local hardware store for only $15. Great buy!
2. XBee Pro 50mW Series 2.5 RPSMA sku: WRL-08768 : $43.95 x 2
This is the new 2.4GHz XBee XBP24-BSIT-004 module from Digi (formally Maxstream). Series 2.5 improves on the power output and data protocol. The Pro series have the same pinout and command set of the basic series with an increase output power of 50mW! These modules take the 802.15.4 stack (the basis for Zigbee) and wrap it into a simple to use serial command set. These modules allow a very reliable and simple communication between microcontrollers, computers, systems, really anything with a serial port! Point to point and multi-point networks are supported.
3. 2.4GHz Duck Antenna RP-SMA – Large sku: WRL-00558 : $9.95 x 2
2.4GHz Large Duck Antenna 5dBi with Reverse Polarized – SMA RF connector. Perfect for prototyping with our RF ICs. 50 ohm impedance. This antenna mates nicely with the Reverse Polarized SMA Connector.
4. Breakout Board for XBee Module sku: BOB-08276: $2.95 x 2
This is a simple breakout board for the popular XBee product from Maxstream. This board breaks out all 20 pins of the XBee to a 0.1″ standard spacing dual row header. The spacing between 0.1″ headers is 0.5″ making it breadboard DIP friendly. We highly recommend using the female sockets to avoid having to solder the XBee permanently to the breakout board.
5. 2mm 10pin XBee Socket sku: PRT-08272: $1.25 x 4
This is a 10-pin socket with 2mm pitch that mates with the popular XBee radio from Maxstream.
6. Wirless Camera. I have two options.
Mini 2.4GHz Wireless Color Spy Camera: $59.99
Mini Wireless Low-Light Color Spy Camera: $58.99
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