Adafruit debuts the Feather 32U4 Adalogger

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The Feather 32U4 Adalogger is Adafruit’s take on an all-in-one datalogger.

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Remember when we brought you a first-ever look at Adafruit’s new lineup of Feather boards back at World Maker Faire? Well, as Ladyada herself promised, the new dev boards are thin, light and ready to let your imagination fly! Following the recent debut of the Feather 32U4 Basic Proto, the team has unveiled the latest addition to its family: the Feather 32U4 Adalogger. 

The Adalogger is Adafruit’s take on an all-in-one datalogger (or data-reader) with USB, battery charging and a microSD card holder. As it name would suggest, the board is based on an ATmega32U4 clocked at 8MHz and at 3.3V logic, with 32K of Flash and 2K of RAM. And since it features native USB support, not only does it boast built-in USB-to-Serial programming and debugging capabilities, it can also act like a mouse, keyboard and MIDI device.

As Adafruit notes, they’ve gone ahed and added a connector for a 3.7V LiPo along with an integrated 100mA battery charger. However, the Adalogger can run just fine via microUSB.

“But, if you do have a battery, you can take it on the go, then plug in the USB to recharge,” the team writes. “The Feather will automatically switch over to USB power when its available. We also tied the battery through a divider to an analog pin, so you can measure and monitor the battery voltage to detect when you need a recharge.”

Measuring only 2.0″ x 0.9″ x 0.28” without headers soldered, the Feather weighs roughly five grams. The board has plenty of pins (20 GPIO), with eight PWM and 10 analog inputs, four mounting holes, a power/enable pin and a reset button. Capitalizing on the little space that was left over, the Adalogger packs microSD slot and a green LED.

The 32U4 Adalogger comes fully assembled and tested, with a USB bootloader that lets you quickly use it with the Arduino IDE. Sound like the $21 board for you? Head over to its official page. Meanwhile, stay tuned as Adafruit continues to reveal the newest members of the Feather family here.

Syncing sensor data with video to create an onscreen display

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Build a ‘black box’ data logger for adding onscreen display gauges to your highlight videos. 

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If you enjoy motorsports, mountain biking or “extreme tricycling” (aka riding a drift trike), you may take videos of your rides. This kind of presentation can be interesting by itself, but how much cooler would it be if you could display stats like speed, altitude, or even the temperature outside?

Well now you can, using an Arduino Mega (ATmega2560) equipped with several sensors, including a GPS and accelerometer. Instructions for making your own can be found on Fluxaxiom’s Instructables post on this ‘black box.’ The parts list is fairly involved, and although it doesn’t look like a ridiculously-hard build, you’ll definitely spend some time soldering components.

Once everything is soldered together, it’s attached to an anti-vibration mount reminiscent of something that would be used on a quadcopter. The assembly is then inserted into what is physically a clear box. Since it’s important (or at least less confusing later) for the box to be kept in a known orientation, the box is labeled with X, Y and Z direction labels.

After the data is obtained, it can be combined with your video using software called “Race Render 3.” There are other possible solutions to put this kind of data onscreen, but Fluxaxiom has gotten good results with it — as seen in the drift trike video below.

ATmega32u4 powers this open-source temperature datalogger

The Pax Instruments T400 — which recently made its Kickstarter debut — is a simple, inexpensive and open-source temperature datalogger. Designed by Charles Edward Pax, the ATmega32u4 powered T400 is a first in a new class of affordable lab instruments.

According to the Pax, he first came up with the idea of the T400 after finding himself seeking a device that could reliably log several temperatures at the same time without needing to keep a close eye on it. Instead of spending upwards of a thousand dollars on a proprietary instrument, in true Maker form, he decided to create a specialized system using an Atmel based Arduino Leonardo.

“With the help from a few friends, I set out to solve this problem by creating an easy-to-use ‘plug and play’ device that’s more than accurate enough for most purposes, yet still has the flexibility of an open system,” Pax described. After several months of developing, the T400 Temperature Datalogger was successfully completed.

Ready for use right out of the box, the T400 is equipped with everything one would need to track and record the temperature of a solid, liquid or gas. After plugging in one of the provided thermocouples and turning it on, a user can simply read the temperature measurements directly on the T400’s LCD screen.

The trusty T400 can be utilized for a various actions within the household or laboratory. Anything from taking the temperature while cooking meats to monitoring liquid levels during the home brewing of beer can be accomplished. Thanks to its ATmega32u4 based platform, the device can be modified and expanded to fulfill almost any need.

According to Pax, the device can stream live data onto your computer via USB. “But don’t worry about connecting the T400 to another device: all of the data is logged directly to a MicroSD card,” the Maker writes. “It works independently of other devices. The long battery life on the T400 means that you can set it up, walk away, and come back when that work is done, all of your recorded data will stay safe and sound on the SD card.”

For those interested in a detailed look under the hood, you can access the T400 source files on Github. Some of the key features include:

• ATmega32U4 MCU
• 132×64 pixel LCD display with blacklight
• Internal BL-5C LiPo battery with USB charging
• MicroUSB for streaming data to a computer
• MicroSD card included for recording data to .csv (FAT16 only)
• Compatible with industry standard mini-TC connectors
• MCP9800 junction temperature sensor
• MCP3424 ADC for measuring thermocouple voltages
• DS3231 RTC with backup battery to trigger readings while processor is in sleep mode
• Molded enclosure

With several weeks still go to in its campaign, the datalogger is just shy of its $6,250 goal. Interested in backing this project? Head over to Pax Instruments’ official page here.