Kickstarter

Hey Kickstarter Community!

We wanted to share our recent coverage on Slashdot.org, and send out a Huge Thanks to Tim Lord for the interview, Robin Miller for the video, and everybody else down at Slashdot as well. Thanks Guys!

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/10/11/2334239/prefab-greenhouse--ardunio-controls--automated-agriculture-video

Also, we're looking forward to hosting a Horto domi Electronics Box Workshop this weekend in San Marcos. This will give those who are interested in the area an opportunity to get some hands on experience with electronics and wiring. We are really looking forward to helping a number of people get past those initial soldering inhibitions. Of course, we intend to film the event, and post the highlights as an update.

Like everyone else, we can't wait to have all the open documentation published online. We apologize for the delay. The Instructional DVD is well into the production phase, as well as the CAD documentation and Construction Card. All of which have far exceeded our expectations, and we hope this will ameliorate any discontent in their delayed release and distribution.

Hope you enjoy the Slashdot coverage, and we'll keep you up to date on any further developments or events. Thanks again,

Outer Babylon
Sam Bagot
Will Bratton

Hey Kickstarter Community!

We’ve been wrangling on a number of fronts, and apologize for our delays in updating. All the pieces are fitting together nicely, just not in the order we’d assumed and hoped. Our Hardware production is moving much faster than out Media production (as media is neither of our specialties), so our Hardware pledges that were set to go out in November will actually be read
y to go out by September. However, our Media pledges, Construction Cards & DVDs, that were set for distribution in September actually won’t be available until November. Of course we apologize whole-heartedly for this. We have completed the entire filming process and are well into the production phase of the DVD. Thad Getterman, of Broken Sidewalk Farm, will be producing the DVD. Here is a link to a recent trailer and update video he produced for both the Kickstarter Community, as well as for an interview we had with Le Monda, France’s Newspaper of Record. We were honored by the coverage, and hope you find interest in it as well. Again, we apologize for the switch in pledge delivery months, and hope everyone understands, because like we said, all the pieces are coming together very nicely, and we are certain you will be pleased, even with the wait.

Thanks Again for All Your Support!!!

Outer Babylon
Sam Bagot
Will Bratton

Hey all, this is Sam from OuterBabylon. The Horto Domi smart garden project is coming along well. This video is an update video that I made after creating the version three of the electronics box for our smart garden project. This version is much cleaner than the first two revisions of the electronics unit and will be the version that we publish in our video DVD and open documentation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yoAKBKukuI

Horto domi received some exceptional foreign media coverage recently in France!  Here's a link to the pdf of the LeMonde Article on the Horto Domi smart garden project. Enjoy.

http://www.hortodomi.com/store/Le_Monde_Article.pdf

And here is a link to the LeMonde Science and Technology publication:

http://www.lemonde.fr/sciences/article/2012/08/16/texte-infographie_1746873_1650684.html

Also:

This is a Google translation of an article published on Horto domi in Le Monde's Sceince and Technology section on August 18th, 2012.

"

Technological fashion "do it yourself" has a new avatar: gardening. Two young Texans Will Bratton and Samuel Bagot, propose simplifying gardener's life (and organic) with a greenhouse automated and remotely controllable. "Many people have space for gardening but they do not have time, "laments Will Bratton that each dream "productions emancipated centralized "and has a healthy diet. "People will just have to focus on most: planting, harvesting and eating. "Their project Horto Domi, has received more than $ 11 000 with the platform Kickstarter fund raising, which hosts many DIY projects home. This money will be used to disseminate plans and how employment of the third version of the greenhouse, so that everyone can create his own dome. Philosophy is that open source, that is to say maximum transparency for a broadcast the widest possible improvements by the user community. New sensors for better control parameters the garden are already in development. The inventors even imagine several interconnected greenhouses for these productions and more massive diversified. Once built the greenhouse, the gardener amateur just has to feed tray earthworms with scraps or manure (which provides best results). "The idea is original. But Presumably, this project was developed by specialists in electronics than in agriculture. I wonder about the control inputs of fertilizers, which may depend on crops for example, "says Philippe Caillard, director of the National Center Horticultural Promotion (Maine-et-Loire). It will also ensure the thickness of earth power plant carrots or roof height for tomatoes.

1. Main tray

The land is isolated from the environment in order to install the system anywhere. The circular surface is about three square meters. The tray can be made of wood or metal.

2. Bin worms

This wooden enclosure called vermicompost, has two floors. It contains soil, waste organic household and worms earth. These join the garden by traps. The liquid compost, called "tea", is recovered for use as fertilizer. 300 to 800 per cubic meter to guarantee 300 to 500% more production.

3. Greenhouse

The greenhouse is a polyhedral framework Assemblies of metal tubes hand, covered with canvas plastic. The set has the form an igloo.

4. Roof

Two fans guarantee automatic ventilation. Two lamps are used for illumination or to increase the heat. In the center, a shower used for watering the garden.

5. Sensors

Moisture two tanks, temperature, acidity may even land be controlled, allowing the action back watering, fans ...

6. Sprinkler systems

Pipe feeds the central tank. Another, possibly enriched the natural fertilizer recovered centrally fed to the roof watering from above.

7 & 8. Electronic Enclosures

A micro-controller (sort of microprocessor model) integrates the sensor measurements and user commands for decide to water, ventilate, heat ... The mixture of water and fertilizer is also automatic. A network connection allows by remote control a telephone or website.

"

*The figure on necessary earthworms per cubic area sounds a bit outrageous to me in meters, 300-800 per cubic meter. In cubic feet one only needs 10-25 earthworms to realize 300-500% increased production. So by my calculations that's more like 270-675 per cubic meter, but in either case, that is basically the volume of the entire growing bed, so I guess it isn't that outrageous.