Water meter data logging

Interesting idea. Could be as simple as a mic and a microcontroller, hardware wise anyway. You might be able to use the noise of the water flow in the pipe to get an indication when the water switches off and on, but that doesn't help with the actual flow rate. The clicks could be quite fiddly in practice I suspect. Also, I wonder what the water meter dude will do when he comes around to check the meter and sees this gadget hanging off?

Dave.

This is what you want

well that is if price is no object ;-)

Or see this

and read the bit about the pulses and see their section on data logging

You may get some ideas. Everyone else just reads their own meters before and after ;-)

Cheers TT

I work with flow meters but nothing that would be suitable in a domestic installation. I take it you are not disputing the accuracy of the meter but just want to know the flow rate at any given time? If so I would say using a piezo transducer, utilising hardware and software filtering with a microcontroller sounds very plausible (provided your meter "ticks") and would be very easy to calibrate to your existing meter. Not only that but there is nothing to stop you doing it, whereas installing an additional flowmeter would cause all sorts of head scratching and accusations from the uninformed water authority representitive, since there would be no tampering with the meter.

James

I've done a similar thing, but in my case I ordered a water meter with a pulse output - it has a magnet attached to the fastest spinning dial (one rev every 10 litres) and a reed switch mounted above it. In my case, a PIC tied to an LCD display shows both instantaneous and cumulative usage.

The water meter was relatively cheap, and that was for a 2" unit - I imagine a domestic unit would be even cheaper.