Smart Jacket for Caving based on Seeed Studio XIAO ESP32C3 and Seeed Studio Wio Terminal

SAJAC is an innovative smart jacket designed specifically for caving expeditions. This jacket incorporates advanced technology that allows explorers to monitor environmental conditions and request help when needed using Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and Long Range (LoRa) communication protocols. With its built-in sensors, the SAJAC jacket can track and report a variety of environmental parameters, such as temperature, humidity, and air quality, providing valuable insights to explorers on the conditions of their surroundings. Additionally, the jacket’s BLE and LoRa communication capabilities allow for real-time communication with rescue teams or other explorers, enabling quick and efficient response in case of an emergency. Overall, the SAJAC jacket represents a significant advancement in caving safety technology, providing explorers with a powerful tool to help ensure their safety and success on their expeditions.

Seeed Hardware: Seeed Studio XIAO ESP32C3、Seeed Studio Wio Terminal

Software: Arduino IDE、MIT App Inventor、PlatformIO IDE

Industry: Industrial Site

Solution Deployment: Indonesia

Background

Caves, which are quiet places and rarely passed by humans, often have extraordinary beauty. The beauty that is in it is very different from other natural landscapes. Caves often still keep a very pure natural beauty because of the lack of human activity in them. Caving is one of the exploration options to see this natural beauty.

Caving has become a hobby that has become increasingly popular in recent decades. Caving is sometimes done just for the pleasure of doing the activity or for physical exercise, still the beginning of exploration, or physics and biology also play an essential role. Caving has become even safer because of modern clothing and equipment.

The Challenge

There are several challenges that may be encountered when working on the smart jacket project. Firstly, designing the jacket to withstand the extreme environmental conditions of caving can be challenging. The jacket must be able to protect explorers from extreme temperatures, wet and humid air, low air pressure, and , while also being comfortable and practical for extended periods of use. Additionally, the jacket must be durable and able to withstand the wear and tear of caving expeditions.

Another challenge is integrating the BLE and LoRa communication capabilities into the jacket. This may require specialized knowledge and expertise in and , as well as careful testing and validation of the communication system to ensure reliability and accuracy.

Furthermore, ensuring the accuracy and reliability of the sensors used in the jacket can be challenging, as the sensors must be able to accurately measure such as temperature, humidity, and air quality in real-time. This may require careful calibration and testing of the sensors, as well as careful consideration of the of the sensors and their impact on the battery life of the jacket.

Finally, ensuring the usability and accessibility of the jacket for explorers is also a challenge. The jacket must be easy to use and understand, even in stressful or , and must be designed to fit a wide range of body types and sizes. Additionally, the jacket’s user interface and must be intuitive and easy to operate, even for those with limited technical knowledge or experience.

Overall, while there may be several challenges involved in developing the SAJAC smart jacket, the potential benefits of improved safety and communication for caving explorers make it a worthwhile endeavor.

The Solution

Related to this problem, I will develop the Sajac Project to help people who have a hobby of caving. Sajac Project is a smart monitoring system aims to observe environmental conditions in the caves. This system will provide information about how the environment around the users. This machine is equipped with machine learning to determine whether the environmental conditions and user friendly. At each checkpoint inside the cave, a transmitter will be connected directly to the guards outside. If the user gets a danger notification from his jacket, user can immediately ask for help at the nearest checkpoint using the transmitter, and the guards can immediately provide help as soon as possible.

The Results

After all, by using SAJAC, the users can find out how the condition around himself is. If it is not good enough, the users could somehow cancel or postpore his exploration. Even if he could not get out of the cave by himself, he can ask for help through SAJAC to then can be rescued by the guards.

The developers hope that Sajac can be an option to help cavers reduce the risk of hazards that can arise at any time. In the future, the developer hopes that Sajac will develop with more enhanced features and a better system. There are many things that can be explored to make users safer, for example, to detect user activity (running, walking, not moving) which will help Guards to monitor the user’s condition directly.

Of course, the Sajac Project is far from perfect, and many shortcomings need to be corrected before it is ready to be explored further. Therefore, the developer hopes for a lot of suggestions and support from other developers to improve this project.

We are free to explore whatever we want, whether food, music, or hobbies, but we still need to pay attention to our safety. For all people who have a hobby of cave exploration, please use equipment that complies with existing standards because “Safety is number one”.

More Info

• Learn more about products used: Seeed Studio XIAO ESP32C3、Seeed Studio Wio Termina
• Discover Seeed Studio XIAO Series
• View and Download: System-on-Modules (SoM) User Manual

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