Smallest Arduino with GPS and Mobile App?

Projects General Guidance
1

Hello forum! I'm an Engineering student working on a new project and I would really like your help and advice since I am new to Arduino in every aspect.

I would like to know the smallest possible way there is to make a GPS unit using an Arduino board.

The reason for this is that I want to make my dog a collar with an integrated GPS and be able to access his location remotely from a phone app in case he ever goes missing.

I need some guidance as to what the smallest possible components for this would be. I would like to also know if the best option I have is the Arduino Micro or Nano, what other components I need and if I could program the board for an Android app to access my pet's location.

Anyways, that's the general idea of the project, I would like to know if anyone has anything similar where I could go and look.

Anways, thank you for your time.

2

How do you intend to handle the data transmission to the collar?

Wifi?

Bluetooth??

GPRS (mobile)?

3

rogerClark:
How do you intend to handle the data transmission to the collar?

Wifi?

Bluetooth??

GPRS (mobile)?

Hello! Thank you for replying!

I want to use GPRS for the transmission of data!

Thanks!

4

By the time you have a battery, an Arduino Pro Mini, and GPS module and a GPRS board, all stuck together in a box, the size of the device is going to be larger than a small android phone and likely to cost more and have less functionality

So unless you intend on building a custom PCB with all the above components, its not going to be practical due to physical size

There are GPS tracker devices that you can buy, but I'm not sure if any one them use GPRS, I know you can get ones that send text messages, as I have one of them to locate my quadcopter in case it escapes.

5

rogerClark:
By the time you have a battery, an Arduino Pro Mini, and GPS module and a GPRS board, all stuck together in a box, the size of the device is going to be larger than a small android phone and likely to cost more and have less functionality

So unless you intend on building a custom PCB with all the above components, its not going to be practical due to physical size

There are GPS tracker devices that you can buy, but I'm not sure if any one them use GPRS, I know you can get ones that send text messages, as I have one of them to locate my quadcopter in case it escapes.

I'm planning on placing small solar panels around the collar to charge a smaller battery, also the distribution of the components would go around the collar, so as long as the components aren't too thick, they can be placed around the neck of the dog with no problem (it doesn't need to be a block, it can be curved), specially considering it's a Border Collie, it can handle the wheight without problem.

What do you think?

6

Solar power is not likely to be enough to run GPRS all the time.

GPS module would need to be at the top, so you are not likely to get much power from solar at all.

splitting the batteries all around the collar will help, but I'm not sure where you will find some Lipo batteries that shape.

But a good source of nicad cells is inside the cheap 9V rechargable batteries from eBay
These batteries are a con, as they claim to be 300mAH, but are in fact full of small rechargable 60mAH button cells. So the battery is 9V but only 60mHA.

But bizarrely, the cost of the cells is much more than the fake battery !

So I have several of these that I have taken apart for the batteries !

GPS tends to take a lot of power as well.

You will need to only run the GPS and the GPRS when necessary, not all the time, otherwise the battery life will most likely be limited to only a few hours at the most

i.e if you turn on you mobile phone and turn on the GPS and then surf the net for an hour, the chances are that your phone will be flat.
Albeit it as a screen that takes power, so assume 50% of the power is taken by the screen

It would still only give 2 or 3 hours of network and gps activity

7

rogerClark:
Solar power is not likely to be enough to run GPRS all the time.

GPS module would need to be at the top, so you are not likely to get much power from solar at all.

splitting the batteries all around the collar will help, but I'm not sure where you will find some Lipo batteries that shape.

But a good source of nicad cells is inside the cheap 9V rechargable batteries from eBay
These batteries are a con, as they claim to be 300mAH, but are in fact full of small rechargable 60mAH button cells. So the battery is 9V but only 60mHA.

But bizarrely, the cost of the cells is much more than the fake battery !

So I have several of these that I have taken apart for the batteries !

GPS tends to take a lot of power as well.

You will need to only run the GPS and the GPRS when necessary, not all the time, otherwise the battery life will most likely be limited to only a few hours at the most

i.e if you turn on you mobile phone and turn on the GPS and then surf the net for an hour, the chances are that your phone will be flat.
Albeit it as a screen that takes power, so assume 50% of the power is taken by the screen

It would still only give 2 or 3 hours of network and gps activity

Exactly what I thought, that is why I want to remotely trigger the GPS/GPRS tracking on the device, because I don't expect to know where my dog is all the time, only when he is lost.

Radiation is also a factor in this case, which is another reason as to why I don't want it to be on all the time.

Is there a way to remotely turn it on and off? As for the solar panels, each can feed the integrated battery with around 3.7V.

The idea is to place the collar on the dog and not ever worry about batteries.

8

You can already by devices for tracking your dog or cat etc.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/2015-GENUINE-TKSTAR-WATERPROOF-PET-DOG-CAT-GPS-TRACKING-TRACKER-COLLAR-/351270661322?pt=AU_Electronics_GPS&hash=item51c95cecca

So, Unless you are doing this as a project to learn electronics etc, the best thing to do is to buy an existing GPS tracker device, or buy something close to what you want to use and modify it.

e.g like this generic tracker.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Mini-Car-Vehicle-Realtime-GPS-GSM-GPRS-S-MS-Tracker-System-Device-Locator-TK102B-/350877962961?pt=AU_Electronics_GPS&hash=item51b1f4d2d1

Then take it out of its box and build it into the collar.

However you are unlikely to be able to have enough power via solar to keep anything with a phone receiver in it, powered all the time.

unless your dog spends a substantial amount of time in very bright sunlight, which seems unlikely, and also the hair on the dog's coat can't get in front of the solar panels at all, otherwise it completely stops their operation. i.e solar panels do not work with any part of it covered at all.

You could look at inductive charging, where you put a coil of wire in your dog's basket, so that when it sleeps it will change inductively. But if you are worried about mobile signals,I suspect you won't want to subject your dog to large magnetic fields either

9

rogerClark:
You can already by devices for tracking your dog or cat etc.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/2015-GENUINE-TKSTAR-WATERPROOF-PET-DOG-CAT-GPS-TRACKING-TRACKER-COLLAR-/351270661322?pt=AU_Electronics_GPS&hash=item51c95cecca

So, Unless you are doing this as a project to learn electronics etc, the best thing to do is to buy an existing GPS tracker device, or buy something close to what you want to use and modify it.

e.g like this generic tracker.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Mini-Car-Vehicle-Realtime-GPS-GSM-GPRS-S-MS-Tracker-System-Device-Locator-TK102B-/350877962961?pt=AU_Electronics_GPS&hash=item51b1f4d2d1

Then take it out of its box and build it into the collar.

However you are unlikely to be able to have enough power via solar to keep anything with a phone receiver in it, powered all the time.

unless your dog spends a substantial amount of time in very bright sunlight, which seems unlikely, and also the hair on the dog's coat can't get in front of the solar panels at all, otherwise it completely stops their operation. i.e solar panels do not work with any part of it covered at all.

You could look at inductive charging, where you put a coil of wire in your dog's basket, so that when it sleeps it will change inductively. But if you are worried about mobile signals,I suspect you won't want to subject your dog to large magnetic fields either

I'm doing it as a project. The concept is the following:

A dog that is lost usually spends its time in sunlight. This would charge the device enough so that I would locate it.

As for the solar panels, they wouldn't be feeding the energy to the arduino chip directly, rather focusing on recharging the battery whenever it gets slightly depleted. The battery section is prety much covered with the solar panels (we've studied this quite far, actually, it is the part we are most advanced at with this project).

What we need most help with is the type of Arduino we need to use and the components needed for the specific objectives we set, which is using GPRS, GPS and being able to program a mobile app (preferably for Android) where I could access my dog's location on-the-go.

10

As for the solar panels, they wouldn't be feeding the energy to the arduino chip directly, rather focusing on recharging the battery whenever it gets slightly depleted.

Have you modeled the size of panel required to power an ATMega328P as used on the Arduino vs the size of panel required for even full sunlight let alone the indoor or moderate lighting conditions

If this is a college or university project as part of a qualification, I'm afraid I can't help you, as I gained all my qualifications by doing all my own work, and in the long term you will not be helping yourself by just getting people on the web to do your project for you

11

rogerClark:
Have you modeled the size of panel required to power an ATMega328P as used on the Arduino vs the size of panel required for even full sunlight let alone the indoor or moderate lighting conditions

If this is a college or university project as part of a qualification, I'm afraid I can't help you, as I gained all my qualifications by doing all my own work, and in the long term you will not be helping yourself by just getting people on the web to do your project for you

No, the project isn't for part of a qualification or any evaluated process (I will be on this forum for over a year developing this thing if I have to). It's for a project I have with two other friends of mine, all of us dog owners.

This is why, at the beggining of the thread, I asked if all this was possible, because we have to buy the components through Amazon and, due to Venezuela's current foreign currency exchange laws, we need to buy the components right the first time (we have access to very limited amount of dollars, so every purchase counts).

Also, as I said, I am just beggining to get into Arduino, all I want to know is what the smallest components available are that fit a GPS and GPRS module and if an Arduino Nano or Micro can get these things done.

I've done some research and it seems the "Adafruit Ultimate GPS Breakout - 66 channel w/10 Hz updates - Version 3" would fit nicely.

The other problem we have is making the GPRS conection (we initially thought of making it with GSM but it seems like GPRS is more convenient, hoever, any help and info suggesting otherwise is welcome!)

Anyways, thanks again for the fast replies!

12

Still have no idea of what's the smallest GPRS I can use with this, any help appreciated!

13

Well as no one else has replied...

Some other things to consider. Surely GPRS is going to cost you quite a lot, or perhaps mobile connections are cheap were you are. I think the cheapest I can get is $40 per year and I'm not sure that includes any data.

You may be better off considering the use of a 433Mhz transmitter, and receiver pair, then do something like transmit a brief signal every 2 minutes e.g. which would take less than a second, and then send the unit back to sleep.

But also have a receiver, and listen for perhaps 1 second after you transmit to see if the position of the dog is required.

i.e Transmitter sends a pulse every minute. Then listens for 1 second.

If you loose the dog, you use another device that has a 433Mhz receiver and transmitter, and you turn that unit on, it listens and if it receives the signal from the dog, it sends back a command to tell the module on the dog that the position of the dog is required.

The module on the dog then responds with a message saying "OK turning on GPS", then it turns on the GPS, waits for a fix, and then sends the position back to you.

I agree if the dog has run miles away this doesn't resolve the problem, as your system needs to be in range of the dog,so it would depend if the dog was in a built up area or roaming in open countryside. But if your dog is in a dense urban area, you'd need to leave the GPS on a lot to get a good fix hence you'd have battery issues

As advise initially, that size is not the problem. Power is you issue. and getting it to work at all is the issue.

Just buy some inexpensive parts and work with them, and once its all working fine consider how you can make the solution smaller.

BTW. One other option is wifi, e.g. the ESP8266 module, it can be configured to be a wifi base station (access point) or a normal wifi device (Wifi Station), they are very small and also contain a micrprocessor, so can be directly interfaced to a GPS device.

14

rogerClark:
Well as no one else has replied...

Some other things to consider. Surely GPRS is going to cost you quite a lot, or perhaps mobile connections are cheap were you are. I think the cheapest I can get is $40 per year and I'm not sure that includes any data.

You may be better off considering the use of a 433Mhz transmitter, and receiver pair, then do something like transmit a brief signal every 2 minutes e.g. which would take less than a second, and then send the unit back to sleep.

But also have a receiver, and listen for perhaps 1 second after you transmit to see if the position of the dog is required.

i.e Transmitter sends a pulse every minute. Then listens for 1 second.

If you loose the dog, you use another device that has a 433Mhz receiver and transmitter, and you turn that unit on, it listens and if it receives the signal from the dog, it sends back a command to tell the module on the dog that the position of the dog is required.

The module on the dog then responds with a message saying "OK turning on GPS", then it turns on the GPS, waits for a fix, and then sends the position back to you.

I agree if the dog has run miles away this doesn't resolve the problem, as your system needs to be in range of the dog,so it would depend if the dog was in a built up area or roaming in open countryside. But if your dog is in a dense urban area, you'd need to leave the GPS on a lot to get a good fix hence you'd have battery issues

As advise initially, that size is not the problem. Power is you issue. and getting it to work at all is the issue.

Just buy some inexpensive parts and work with them, and once its all working fine consider how you can make the solution smaller.

BTW. One other option is wifi, e.g. the ESP8266 module, it can be configured to be a wifi base station (access point) or a normal wifi device (Wifi Station), they are very small and also contain a micrprocessor, so can be directly interfaced to a GPS device.

Hello, thanks for the reply!

I was thinking about using an Xbee (from what I've read online it's a pretty good RFID) so that, when it gets out of range from the area set by the RFID, it would turn the GPRS/GPS systems on. The RFID would be powered by the solar panels since the RF needs so little power. Since the same battery would power the GPS, GPRS and RF, while the dog is in its safe-zone, it would ONLY be feeding energy to the RF, as you said. What do you think? Other options are these two (for the RF transmitter/receiver).

http://www.amazon.com/433Mhz-transmitter-receiver-your-Experiment/dp/B00AMB3NCY/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1422687365&sr=8-5&keywords=433mhz

http://www.amazon.com/nRF24L01-Wireless-Transceiver-Arduino-Compatible/dp/B00E594ZX0/ref=pd_sbs_misc_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=0ZZ1ZCZX270M6TZ78Z0T

As for the data transfers: I want to be able to display my dog's location in Google Maps on my phone (unless there's another map option out there that you would recommend me using, I was thinking Google maps because it has pretty good naming of my streets here in Venezuela). Wouldn't I specifically need a GPRS to transmit the data of my dog's GPS location so that it can be done? I'm asking from what you said here

The module on the dog then responds with a message saying "OK turning on GPS", then it turns on the GPS, waits for a fix, and then sends the position back to you.

As for the data costs here, yeah they are pretty cheap, specially since only one of the mobile providers has LTE (horrible service they offer, too). So in general it's very cheap.

You mentioned WiFi, if I understood correctly, you mean to use WiFi as a sort of RF transmitter and reciever, so when my dog, for exmaple, leaves my own WiFi hotspot it would turn the other modules in his collar on?

Anyways, if GPRS is needed (which I think it is, unless I misunderstood you lol), what is the smallest possible GPRS I could use?

So far I have chosen these components (all subject to change under any advice from you or anyone here);

Adafruit Ultimate GPS Breakout - 66 channel w/10 Hz updates - Version 3

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00GLW4016/ref=ox_sc_act_title_4?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A19MRELPGC5OXX

Atmega32u4 Breakout Board

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KGEMIBO/ref=ox_sc_act_title_3?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=AYY3UP8OL9FV8

Adafruit FONA - Mini Cellular GSM Breakout uFL Version

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00N429XBI/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=AZHZ102UTKBMA

Slim Sticker-type GSM/Cellular Quad-Band Antenna - 3dBi uFL

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00N4YMMTG/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A19MRELPGC5OXX

Is the GSM module I selected any good? Is it all compatible?

I haven't chosen the battery or the solar panels yet. I have some solar panels to do tests here when I get the components but I need to see what the total amount of input to run all of the components is needed before I buy or choose the battery and panels.

Again, thank you very much for your time and help rogerClark

15

I can't comment on any of your components, as I don't use any of those.

I'd save money and get them from eBay or AliEpress and buy and Arduino Pro Mini for about $5 and something like a Ublox NEO-6M GPS for around $15. I have no experience of GPRS as its too expensive for me to use.

Be aware that the 32U4 board is basically a Leonardo and there are driver issues on some machines, you can probably get a pro micro cheaper.

Re: RFID

Rang on RFID is very very very short, so unless you just want to detect that your dog is not laying in its basket, use something else, eg. Bluetooth low energy.

But really, you have not thought about power usage - which is the major issue with this project

By all means spend loads of money on lots of flashy components, but you may be disappointed when the whole project isnt useful because your battery life is only 6 hours even with solar panels

16

rogerClark:
I can't comment on any of your components, as I don't use any of those.

I'd save money and get them from eBay or AliEpress and buy and Arduino Pro Mini for about $5 and something like a Ublox NEO-6M GPS for around $15. I have no experience of GPRS as its too expensive for me to use.

Be aware that the 32U4 board is basically a Leonardo and there are driver issues on some machines, you can probably get a pro micro cheaper.

Re: RFID

Rang on RFID is very very very short, so unless you just want to detect that your dog is not laying in its basket, use something else, eg. Bluetooth low energy.

But really, you have not thought about power usage - which is the major issue with this project

By all means spend loads of money on lots of flashy components, but you may be disappointed when the whole project isnt useful because your battery life is only 6 hours even with solar panels

Ok! So:

And:

http://www.amazon.com/Generic-NEO-6M-Module-NEO-6M-0-001-U-BLOX/dp/B00NJOTGKY/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie

As for the RF, check out this video:

Seems like it can get pretty far. The Xbee (normal series) goes out to 300ft before losing connection and the pro series upwards of a mile. That means the solar panels and battery would only be feeding the RF, until it goes out of range.

Worst case scenario, if it doesn't work, we can just replace the rechargable battery fed by the solar panels with one rechargable through cable. It isn't the idea we want but I guess it's a valid option. We really do want to use solar panels though, I guess we can later implement them to turn on LEDs remotely incase the dog gets lost at night.

17

There is a GPS module from Adafruit that is self powered and does logging every few seconds. You could have your communication module read the data from that when needed. One of the modules can be put on a dog collar and used as a pet logger.

18

Or get the same thing (MTK3339) for cheaper on Amazon

19

Rogerclark is a bully pessimist