Upgrading of Beehive Monitoring System

March 16, 2021 Sophia Physics Bee Wise 0

(All image credits: Vincent Casey)

The major monitoring system components. A ‘gate’ system bee counter – counts bees going in and out. The hive heart which monitors temperature, humidity and sound in the brood box. The GSM unit connects via bluetooth with all the sensors and relays the data over the mobile network to the monitor servers. The scales is hidden underneath the ‘weather shroud’.

The GSM unit is the key to data collection and logging. On the left is an improvised charger system which was used to provide the initial 3.7 V battery charge. Hopefully the sun will do the charging onwards from here.

An aluminium shim was folded and screwed to the wooden scales runners holding the load cells in order to stabilise their configuration under the hive (a). The scales electronics module was placed on the aluminium shim (b) and the cables were taped to the shim to reduce play in the light cables (c). A heavy bathroom floor tile completed the scales ‘sandwich’, (d).

Celine places hive heart on queen excluder before closing hive. The Sophia hive with bee counter, hive heart and sitting on the scales sandwich with gold underfloor felt shrouding the sandwich from the weather. The solar powered GSM sits on top of the hive. The bees are fast learners – they quickly adjusted to entering and leaving the hive via the gates. Now they can get on with the pollen gathering – notice the yellow sacks being drawn in to the hive.


And now the data flows from the hive – Sophia hive 3!

Web link to hive data: https://main.beehivemonitoring.com/e23614415b374d82b2c93a9ed7b191b8