The parts have arrived for the ditch project.

The first tranche of hardware came (in a small box) today:

There are parts here for four sensor packages and a base station. The sensor nodes have an Arduino, a 2mW XBee radio, and a digital temperature sensor. The base station has an XBee and a wired ethernet for connecting up to the internet. There are also some prototyping shields to simplify integration, a wall wart power supply for the base station, and some other goodies to support some other development.

The initial design for a sensor mote puts three temperature sensors together with an Arduino and short-range radio module. The following is the parts list for a single sensor mote:

• Arduino Uno — £18.50
• Arduino XBee shield — £12.10
• Arduino Series 2 2mW XBee radio module — £17.50
• Arduino prototype shield — £10.40
• Mini-breadboard — £2.00
• 3 x DS18B20 one-wire digital temperature sensor — £11.70
• Battery holder — £1.20
• Enclosure (waterproof, resealable food box) — £3.50

A total of £76.90 (+ VAT) per sensor, not including assorted wires and resistors. [UPDATED 11Jul2013: added cost of enclosure]