Dexter Industries TIR Sensor

I've just finished playing around with the new Dexter Industries Thermal Infrared Sensor (TIR).
While Xander did a very nice experiment with RobotC, I was keen to see how well it went with the NXT-G datalogging blocks.

I got some good results, and although it would be nicer if it sampled a little faster than 5Hz and reacted to changes in temperature a little quicker, it was easy to implement and I can see lots of great experiments I could run in class with it.

Full writeup here on my blog - http://www.damienkee.com/home/2011/11/7/dexter-industries-thermal-infrared-temperature-sensor.html

Dexter Industries - Thermal Infrared Sensor

Dexter Industries have just released their latest sensor for the NXT, the Thermal Infrared Sensor.

From their webpage -

The Dexter Industries Thermal Infrared Sensor reads surface temperatures of objects. It is a non-contact thermometer based on the MLX90614. Detecting the infrared radiation from an object, the sensor can read object temperatures between -90°F and 700°F (-70°C and +380°C). The sensor has a high accuracy of 0.5°C and a resolution of 0.02°C. 
The Thermal Infrared Sensor reads both the ambient temperature (the temperature of the air around the sensor) and the surface temperature of the object that the sensor is pointed towards. 
The sensor can detect a flame at a range of 2 meters.

Xander has already done some cool things with his sensor, and I've just received mine, so stay tuned for a post about how I've tested it out.

How would you use this sensor?  Feel free to add your thoughts in the comments.

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Damien Kee
www.damienkee.com

Thermal Imaging with a thermal IR Sensor

Xander has once again come up with a fantastic post on his Blog about his use of the Dexter Industries Thermal IR sensor.

http://mightor.wordpress.com/2011/06/12/bring-on-the-heat-thermal-imaging-with-the-nxt/

Having spent most of yesterday hacking and optimizing the firmware for the new Dexter Industries Thermal IR Sensor, I thought I would go ahead and make something fun with it today.
I built a pan and tilt rig for the sensor with a great deal of gearing down to allow me to take a lot of measurements as the rig moved around. Initially I had it set for about 40×40 measurements but those didn’t look that great and I wanted a bit more. I reprogrammed it and made it spit out data at a resolution of about 90×80.

He gets some great looking images of both a cold bottle and a hot flame.

From what I hear, he's working on increasing the resolution and range that the sensor can output.

--
Damien Kee
www.damienkee.com