Title : Wild Fire Monitoring System

Presented by : Mahlalela John S.

ID No : 133745

Supervisor : Prof P.C Egau

Abstract

System Overview System Operations

System Modules

Challenges

Conclusion and Recommendations

Questions and Answers

This presentation will outline the overall design and implementation of WFMS prototype.

Challenges faced during the system development

The finished prototype detects fire, monitor battery conditions of the sensing modules and send warning signals to the host PC. The design of WFMS is based on the following objectives.

Project Objectives

To use the knowledge of electronics to solve a real life problem

To design a PC based Monitoring Windows Application (GUI).

To design an outdoor fire detecting system.

To transmit warning signals from field to the Monitoring PC.

WFMS is designed to use wireless sensors to detect and transmit information to the host computer.

Display current status of remote sensors on the forest map.

WFMS have four operation modes as follows.

The four basic operating conditions depend on the received signal.

1. Normal operation mode

2. Fire Detected mode

3. Power Saving Mode

4. Low Battery mode.

MAX232 ICMCU

RF ModuleRx

Sen

sor

1

Sen

sor

3

Sen

sor

2

Host PC

Siren

1. Monitoring Interface GUI developed using VB.

Application features include:

Creating Log files

Sensor location display

Editing and saving log reports.

Clearing of existing alarms

Display of current room temperature.

Indicating received signal strength

Screen Shot of Application

Serial communication Module

This is the interface between RF module (Receiver ) and the host computer. It includes

1. Microcontroller (PIC18f2550)

2. MAX232 to interface PIC and PC

3. RF receiver module

4. Relay to switch on/off Siren

SCREEN SHOTS

The response time of the entire system depends mostly

on the sensor response.

Temperature Sensor response time is one minute

Smoke sensor - as soon as the concentration of smoke increases above 1 V. Output of the sensor depends on air cleanliness nominal value was 0.62 V clean air.

Battery monitor – as soon as power supply voltage falls below 2.7 V.

WORKING SENSOR

Sensor calibration

Temperature of steam , Vo = 3.78V

Melting Ice Vo = 1.2V

Change in temp = 0.0258V/ 0C

The average change in sensor output in a normal day was noted to be 0.05 V corresponds to 2 0C per minute. Observed on a period of approximately 4 883 minutes = 81 hrs.

1.9

1.95

2

2.05

2.1

2.15

2.2

2.25

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Se

nso

r O

utp

ut

(Vo

lts)

Time (Minutes)

Temperature Sensor output Vs Time

Temperature

WFMS detects the presence of fire using two concepts:

Smoke

Rate of temperature change ?Gas Sensor (TGS 2600)

The circuit uses a transistor as a switch to detect if Vcc goes below 2.7 V and reports to the microcontroller which generate a battery low signal and send it to the transmitter.

Immediately when Vcc goes below 2.7 V the transistor starts conducting thus output voltage Vo = Vcc

Designing the outdoor fire detection system was not easy

1. Number of sensing module

2. Power consumption was not easy to minimize since each sensor had own power dissipation which must be satisfied.

Scarcity of RF Modules.

Software on the PIC microcontrollers both on Sensor and receiver side was developed on C using PIC18 C compiler.

The monitoring application software was developed using Visual basic.

Most Challenging work

1. Establishing proper communication between PIC and PC

2. Sensor design and noise elimination at receiver end.

Although WFMS is a monitoring system designed for commercial forest monitoring, This system can be used for residential fire monitoring , instead of connecting to a computer ,it can be connected to a fire suppressing system .

Overall the objectives set at the beginning were fulfilled and the design of the system seems possible to implement even on large scale forest fire management.

More work is recommended on the sensor design to improve its efficiency.

PIC to PC interface can be converted to USB since most computers now have USB ports rather than Serial port.

See more recommended work on project report.

Questions

THE END