Learn how to make your own inexpensive pagoda (a.k.a. Stevenson screen or instrument shelter) for deploying a water, weather, or any other Industrial IoT sensor in the field.

Valarm compatible sensors are available at Shop.Valarm.net.

Here’s a video of the final, fun step with the rest of the instructions below

 

 

DIY pagoda for Valarm deployment with Yocto-Meteo weather sensor.

DIY pagoda for an Industrial IoT sensor monitoring deployment with Yocto-Meteo weather sensor.

For this project we recommend having:

  • All Thread Rods (12″ or less depending on how tall you want your pagoda)
  • Bolts and wing nuts for your allthread
  • Plates or pot trays or saucers (e.g., Home Depot)
  • Weather sensor (e.g., Yoctopuce Yocto-Meteo) or anything you want to protect with your pagoda
  • Hot glue and hot glue gun
  • Dremel
  • Drill
  • Plastic or vinyl tubing sized to fit snug on your allthread

If you are building a pagoda for air quality monitoring, you may want to select your materials more carefully. Many plastics and paints will gas-off a variety of VOCs for days or weeks when new! Our pagoda in this example is monitoring only basic weather factors.

First, drill three holes in your plates to form a triangle where your allthread goes. We left these plates green so we could discretely mount the pagoda where it would be fully shaded in a small tree. This was our specific research target for this pagoda (see below for a picture of the final deployment environment) so adapt your color and other characteristics to fit your scenario! For example, a pagoda that will be exposed to sun can easily be painted white on the outside and perhaps black on the undersides of the intermediary plates.

After you’ve got the three holes use a dremel (or a different, less exciting tool) to cut out the middle of the plates (except for the two plates that will form the top and the one for the bottom of the stack) and notch all of the edges for water drainage. For this pagoda we left a couple of solid plates on the top and one solid on the bottom. You can adjust this to how you see fit for your environment as well. Note that in a fully exposed, white pagoda, the very bottom plate should not be painted black underneath because you want the pagoda unit to reflect heat from the ground. White or silver would certainly be better.

Use a Dremel to cut out the middle of the plant pot trays.

Use a Dremel to cut out the middle of the plant pot trays.

 

You can also use a Dremel to cut notches in the edges of the plates to make sure water can drain.

You can use a Dremel to cut notches in the edges of the plates to make sure water can drain.

Now you can put your wing nuts on the bottoms of the all thread rods and stack your saucers on top of each other. Cut pieces of plastic or vinyl tubing to your desired height to create spacers between each level of plates (approximately 1″ plastic tube pieces used here).

Valarm Pagoda Stack Plates

Stack levels of your pagoda with plastic tubing in-between each saucer.

 

Valarm Pagoda Sensor Taped To Top

Use double-sided tape, spit, velcro, or anything else you like to stick your sensor (e.g., CO2, VOC, weather, air quality sensor) to the roof of your new pagoda.

 

Valarm Pagoda Final

Good to go! Get all of your plates stacked then tighten down all of your screws and wing nuts. Hot glue the bolts on top to seal any holes.

 

You’ve made it to your last step: dremel off the ends as seen in the video at the top of this post.

Now plug it in to your sensor hubs for M2M and Industrial IoT sensor monitoring.

We understand your organization’s Industrial IoT and sensor monitoring needs. Take a gander at our Smart Water Monitoring Systems.

Have a look at our Customer Stories page for more on how businesses, government agencies, and other organizations save time, money, and lives by monitoring with Tools.Valarm.net.

And see our Web Dashboards for real-time Industrial IoT sensor monitoring on any device with a web browser, like your phone or tablet.

Please don’t hesitate to Contact Us at Info@Valarm.net if you’ve got any questions.

 

Valarm Pagoda LA Natural History Museum Edible Garden1

Final Industrial IoT sensor monitoring pagoda deployed in a fig tree next to a bee hotel in order to gather real-time temperature, humidity, and barometric pressure data. These monitoring systems are part of a collaborative research project with the Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits, the Entomology Department at the Los Angeles Natural History Museum, and the BioSCAN biodiversity project. The goal is to assess local leafcutter bee biodiversity and nest cell construction.