Tracking devices at a festival

Projects General Guidance
1

Hi all, I am trying to figure out a relatively inexpensive way of tracking some small toaster-size art works at a festival in the desert. Right now I just want to know when they leave a certain area and when they come back. Will be using an Arduino to automate some other functions - lights, sounds etc.

I was thinking BLE and using the "Scan" function to detect if the toaster is in range? Would something like the Seeed Studios board here work? Or even the ESP32 version?

Any other thoughts? I did think of LoRa, but it seems a bit expensive and overkill right now.

Phil

2

What is the max $ cost per device?
What are the size constraints?
How many hours does the battery need to last?
How often in seconds between location updates?
Are you under a metal roof, or something transparent to GPS signals?

3

I'd like the cost to be $10-$15 per device
Size - could be UNO sized but smaller would be great
battery last ~8 hours - plenty of room for a big battery
maybe update once a minute
No metal roof - tent canvas...

Phil

4

Whats the area the 'festival' will cover, or what the maximum distance the 'art works' will be away from base ?

5

Right now the goal is to detect that they have been removed from the home base - there is an entrance that they need to come through that's like the size of double french doors.

6

I bought a couple of the Seed Studio esp32 with BLE and will see if I can use the scan function to detect presence...

7

mmm, the original post and requirements appears to have changed.

8

How so?