Salty Sensor Contest

Contributors: Hendrik Hagala (Primary Research), Last Updated: March 17, 2021

Salty Sensor (formerly AquaBuoy: Smart Buoy Project)

From: r3doubt <r3doubt@r3doubt.io>
Date: Thu, Apr 1, 2021 at 9:51 PM
Subject: Salty Sensor Contest
To: <contests@defcon.org>, Grant Romundt <grant@oceanbuilders.com>

 

Are you applying to host a 'Contest', or an 'Event'?

Contest

Is this a new, or returning contest?

New as a DEF CON event, but we "floated" the idea at DEF CON 28 to attendees of Hack The Sea Village

Official name of your C&E (used for Art, Marketing, Announcements, et al.)?

Salty Sensors

Please provide a full description of your C&E (used for Marketing, program, webpage, et al.):

Oceans cover 75% of the blue marble we call home. Monitoring environmental conditions in the ocean's ecosystems is vital but difficult task. Until now, deploying sensors was an expensive proposition, limiting research to projects run by universities and a handful of well funded NGO's.  We challenge hackers and makers to use your skills and creativity to help design new, cheaper, open-source hardware and software floating or diving sensor buoys to democratize marine environmental research.  We will kick-off with tech talks by experienced sensor builders and oceanographers.  Teams with winning designs will have the opportunity to visit the OceanBuilders Blue Frontier incubator off the coast of Panama and see their design deployed to monitor the coastal ecosystem.

Why DEF CON?
Note: This is your opportunity to directly address the contest team why you think your contest is good for our hacker con.

This contest presents a technically demanding challenge for creating new open-source hardware and software design concepts and draws on a broad variety of skills from across the hacker community, and supports a worthy cause.  A new career and lifestyle on the "blue frontier", where a hacker approach to solving problems is a must, may be the life adventure some DEF CON attendees didn't know they were looking for.

How will you or your contest &/or event, contribute a new perspective to the content at DEF CON?

It gives participants exposure to the opportunities that exist for both activism and entrepenuerialism in the "blue economy".

Images, If any images or logos accompany your contest or event, please include it with your application.

We have images and logos on the way.

 

Please have them in highest resolution possible (at least 300dpi raster, or vector format), source file is preferred.
Acceptable raster (pixel) formats: .tiff, .jpg, .png, .psd.
Acceptable vector formats: .ai, .eps, .SVG
Image should be clearly named for your event, example: "contestname.ai". Please don't send "DefconLogo-v.1".

Please provide the official web address/URL/twitter account for your C&E if available:
https://sensors.hackthesea.org
https://oceanbuilders.com/incubator/

Which days and times will your C&E operate?:

The hackathon will kick-off the first day of DEF CON, and there will be opportunities and space at Hack The Sea Village during normal conference hours for teaming, collaboration, and discussion with experienced seasteaders and sensor designers from projects like UCSD's Argo and DARPA's Ocean of Things each day.

Please provide the primary POC's Name:

Grant Romundt

Please provide the primary POC's email address:

grant@OceanBuilders.com

Please provide the secondary POC's Name:
R3doubt (aka Brian Satira)

Please provide the secondary POC's email address:

r3doubt@r3doubt.io

NEW! If your contest or event is accepted, do you consent to inviting the primary & secondary contacts to the official DEF CON planning project on "Basecamp"? We will use the email addresses you included on your application (unless stated otherwise). DEF CON staff, and other contest and event coordinators would be able to see your email address once you accepted the invitation. Yes/No

Yes

Please provide any additional information/requests:

Any comments or notes for us? Questions?:

Thank you for your application, someone with DEF CON Contests will respond to your application that it's been received within 3 business days. If you don't hear from us something went wrong, please send us another message, check your spam filters, reach out, etc. Final decision on who is granted contest space won't happen until a few days after the close of the deadline on April 1st, if not sooner.

Problem: The world's coral reefs are dying. The ocean's ecosystems are in decline. We need to understand the problem and have it backed up with real data so that we can find solutions.

 

Solution: We would like to build an inexpensive, multi-purpose, remote monitoring buoy which can be reproduced globally so we can get real data to understand the problem and work towards real solutions. The buoy should consist of multiple sensors which can continuously collect scientific research data and transmit it to a central station for analysis. Here is a similar project built by some students (https://www.instructables.com/id/Smart-Buoy/). A typical line of sight radio transmission is 3 miles (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line-of-sight_propagation) unless there is a raised antenna.

 

Potential Collaborators or Similar Work or Youtube videos and other references:

DARPA https://vimeo.com/389269188, https://oceanofthings.darpa.mil/index#Floats

Timeframe: (???)

Size Constraints: (maybe in pounds???)

Target Build Cost: Under $500

Prize: Get credited as a Project Contributor for the Ocean Builders Project, <insert text>

Repository: https://github.com/oceanbuilders

License Requirement:

Open Source: Can be used for private or commercial projects

Software: GNU General Public License (GNU GPL V3) here

Non-Software: Creative Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0) here

Project Areas

• 3D Renderings
• CAD Design
• IoT Development (sensors, arduino’s and raspberry pi’s)
• Software Development (python)

 

Stages

1

2

3

 

 

Points	Required	Feature
100	Yes	Does it float?
300		Does it float in waves over 1m?
200	Yes	Is the body more than 80% 3D printed, laser cut, or made from repurposed recycled object(s) that are easy and cheap to acquire?
150	Yes	Is it waterproof?
100/week		How long will the power run for? Ideally it can run continuously on solar power (maximum 700 points)
150	Yes	Can it collect GPS location data?
100		Can it detect wave height data?
100		Can it detect wave direction?
100		Can it detect wave period (the time in between maximum wave heights?
50		Can it detect turbidity?
300		Can it transmit data to an external/remote station periodically or continuously?
1/GB		Data Storage
50		Can it detect water temperature?
50		Can it collect motion data?
50		Can it detect wind speed?
50		Can it detect wind direction?
200		Is it solar powered?
50		Can it collect salinity data?
100		Can it detect pH?
200		Can it capture 360 degree images on camera 0.5 to 1m above the water?
500		Can it detect sensor data at various depths below the water?

 

Resources:

Low Res: https://www.dropbox.com/s/e5b6xdn56r4bhhx/Aqua%20Buoy_low.jpg?dl=0

Med Res: https://www.dropbox.com/s/qm6oefplz7339pi/AquaBuoy.jpg?dl=0

Draft Outline: https://www.dropbox.com/s/g2tc4ahy8gmc9kt/AquaBuoy.docx?dl=0

 

This project is being developed as an open-source project with the following licensing: