Problem

Water intrusion into a buoy can cause serious damage to the components inside. To prevent as much damage as possible, Axys uses a water level sensor that detects several different levels of water height. This data is used to determine whether there is water in the buoy, how high it is, and how fast it is rising. With this information, they will know how much time they have to save a leaking buoy.

For the sensor currently in use, the water levels are detected via the conducting water making contact across the sensor terminals. The existing sensor measures voltage difference when the water conducts and when it does not. The problem with this is the inaccuracies due to different water conductivities which depends mainly on dissolved inorganic salts and water temperature. These inaccuracies could cause serious damage to go unnoticed. That is why we were tasked with developing a new sensor. Our design specifications were to make a small, accurate water level sensor that used a low amount of power and was cheap to build.

Full specifications can be found here.