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NXT Temperature Sensor

Also while at the LEGO Engineering Conference, they spoke about the upcoming NXT Temperature Sensor. They had a basic CAD picture of it, and they are sending me a more detailed picture in a few weeks. It has a range of -20 to +110 degrees Celsius, and quite a long sensing area. Those of you familiar with the original RCX temperature probe will remember that the sensing head, the part you were 'allowed' to immerse in liquids was only a few millimeters long. This new sensor has a probe that looks around 80mm long, perfect measuring hot cups of chocolate and icy cool drinks.

It is only being released by LEGO Education, not LEGO Retail so unfortunately it won't be available at "Shop@Home".

I'll be posting a pic of it as soon as I get a copy.

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Damien Kee
www.domabotics.com

Comments

Andy said…
Sounds interesting. Looking forward to hear more about it ;)
And with a 80mm long "cap" it will sure be a blast for doing scientifical projects with the NXT :P I mostly want it for sensing heat and cold in the air cause robots watching for example the tea water isn't the most interesting, and it can be a little bit risky for the NXT :P
Hope this will be cheaper than the RCX temperature sensor at 32 bucks from LEGO Education..

-Andy
Mar 27, 2008, 12:50:00 AM
Brian Davis said…
It would be nice if it had switchable resolution (just like the sounds sensor has switchable frequency integration). That way you could have the sensor read over the entire range, or read over a smaller central range (0 to 30 C?) at higher resolution. It will be interesting to see how this turns out.

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Brian Davis
Mar 27, 2008, 1:16:00 AM
Andy said…
Hmm, interesting Brian. Maybe you could make your own sensor block that does that if it isn't avilable in the original block :P

-Andy
Mar 27, 2008, 6:05:00 AM
Brian Davis said…
Nope. The problem is that the thermometer is an analog sensor - the internal AtoD converter within the NXT is really just reporting the voltage the sensor is producing, and it can only produce a certain resolution. To get higher resolution out of the sensor, you would have to amplify the voltage difference (you need HW, not just an after-the-fact SW conversion).

Think of it this way - on a digital camera there is usually both the optical zoom, and the "digital zoom", where each pixel is blown up to four pixels, then 9, 16, etc... but it just makes the image look bigger (and blockier), it doesn't actually add any resolution. I want the equivalent of "optical zoom" on the sensor, having two switched modes.

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Brian Davis
Mar 27, 2008, 6:14:00 AM
Anonymous said…
Sure, come out w/ a new temp probe now that I've purchased two of the RCX temperature probes. I suppose it's like anything else, you can't always wait for the next newer model to buy....

LEGOmom
Mar 27, 2008, 6:22:00 AM
Brian Davis said…
Hey, don't complain to me about it - I can actually blame *you* since you were the one who got me interested in them as well ;-). anyway, they've been very handy and interesting.

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Brian Davis
Mar 27, 2008, 7:57:00 AM
Andy said…
Your right Brian, didn't think of this. *Note to my self, think more before you post! And talk sometimes too :P*

-Andy

PS. Aren't there any 3rd party (Mindsensors? HiTechnic??)devolopers making a temperature probe for the NXT that is digital so we can do what Brian suggested?
Mar 27, 2008, 11:51:00 PM
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