Yale beehives

#1 By: Glen, February 28th, 2014 21:02

Hi all,

I recently started a group at Yale University called Yale Bee Space, and we are working to design and create intelligent beehives. Naturally, I came across this group when I began doing some background research on intelligent hive design.

We are working on separate hive designs based off the Langstroth and Warre design. I am planning on incorporating various sensors to measure temperature, humidity, weight, etc. and have them all connected to a central web server using an Arduino Yun. I just started a Git repo here, which I will be updating as time goes on.

I, and the team, have considerable experience doing design, fabrication, electronics, and everything else needed for these projects, and we are looking forward to continuing design, participating in the community here, and of course would love to answer any questions anyone has about what is going on here.

I am very excited to join the conversation!

Cheers,
Glen

#2 By: Colten Jackson, March 1st, 2014 20:48

Sent you an email, really looking forward to collaborating!

The hive on your site is kind of adorable, maybe it's less intimidating for beginners? Could also be done with smaller CNC machines, or just hand saws, huh?

#3 By: Glen, March 3rd, 2014 11:12

The Warre hive that is on our website was made completely with hand tools (saws, plane, chisel, etc), and shows that you can certainly do this without complicated CNC machining. Obviously, having access to a CNC router makes the process considerable easier...

The specific sensors I am planning to use are the SparkFun Relative Humity and Temperature sensor, and SparkFun electret microphone, and I am also planning on using a bathroom scale connected to an Arduino to read the weight of the hive.

Many people have talked about needing a device to lift the hive off the scale to zero it before measurements...I am not sure if this is necessary. If you are using a digital interface, I imagine (though I have not tried so I cannot be sure) you can send a signal to the scale that will turn it on, zero it, and allow data to be read.