KofKaN Embedded Sensor Node
Compact custom sensor platform for field and plant data
Overview
Not every measurement justifies an industrial gateway. The Embedded Sensor Node is our compact platform for the rest: a custom board with a microcontroller, a sensor interface and one radio, sized to run for a long time on a small battery or a modest solar panel. It exists so that a client who needs twenty measurement points does not have to pay for twenty industrial controllers, and so our own larger systems have a consistent building block.
System capabilities
Sensor interfaces
I²C, SPI, analogue and digital inputs so the same board serves several measurement types.
Low-power operation
Deep-sleep duty cycling designed around the reporting interval the application actually needs.
Radio options
Wi-Fi, BLE, LoRa or cellular fitted per deployment rather than forced by the platform.
Store and forward
Samples are retained through connectivity gaps and transmitted in order on reconnect.
Field updates
Over-the-air firmware updates so a deployed fleet can be improved without site visits.
Enclosure and mounting
Board designed alongside its housing for real placement — outdoors, in a panel or on a machine.
How it works
- 01Sensors sample on a configured interval
- 02Microcontroller filters, timestamps and stores readings
- 03Radio wakes and publishes the queued batch
- 04Broker routes data into dashboards or client systems
- 05Node returns to deep sleep until the next cycle
Applications
- Environmental monitoring
- Industrial facilities
- Agriculture
- Research and teaching labs
Gallery
Image credits
- Computer Board — Lenharth Systems (CC0 1.0)
- NTRC 3D printing 2014 Knoxville — usdoe (CC0 1.0)
- New cellphone prototype — dam (BY 2.0)