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Showing posts from April, 2024

Improving and calibrating the capacitive water sensor

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In a previous article, I explained a type of water level sensor that works capactitively and therefore passes no direct current through the water. When I wrote that article, I had already made two of these sensors and installed one in each of the two sump pump wells in my basement. These sensors have been working quite well for a long time, but they have a few issues. In this article, I will describe the improvements I have made to the sensor design and how I calibrated the sensors to allow me to determine the water flow rate and the volume of water the sump pump pumps each time it comes on. Introduction The two water level sensors I installed in the sump pump wells were equipped with nRF24L01 wireless modules. They transmitted measurements every 30 seconds to a Raspberry Pi, which recorded them to a database. This allowed me to visualize the water level in the sump-pumps in real time and see roughly how often the sump pumps came on. However, the water level followed this interest