Pluvi.On Tracks Rain Intensity with the ESP8266

Thanks to its small size, Wi-Fi data transmission capabilities, and low cost, the ESP8266 module is ideal for environmental tracking. The Pluvi.On is no different, tracing rainfall in a nicely laser-cut enclosure that can be visualized via the system’s API or through ThingSpeak.

What is interesting about this project — which was developed during a Red Bull Basement hacker residency in São Paolo, Brazil — is the way it tracks rainfall. A split bucket acts as a sort of seesaw, shifting one way or another to empty itself when one side becomes full. The other side repeats the process, and shifts are detected by the NodeMCU ESP8266 dev kit which translates this data into rain intensity.

The system is envisioned as being able to detect potential localized flooding, and this type of seesaw setup, which has been known for many years, is a great concept to keep in the back of your mind as a potential solution to tricky measurement problems.

Build instructions can be found here, though you’ll need to translate the Portuguese it’s written in unless you speak the language.