So, I’ve been trying to think of a decent use for my Raspberry Pi that nobody else has thought of yet. And then, my dishwasher sprang a leak all over the kitchen floor.
The status lights had been doing some weird stuff for a while, but normally just putting the thing on again got it going. What I didn’t know was that all those flashing lights meant that water was leaking out all over the kitchen floor, not doing the laminate flooring any good whatsoever.
So, what if the flood sensor (basically a switch connected to a lump of polystyrene) were connected to my RasPi which in turn was connected to my WiFi network? Any triggering of the sensor would initiate an email with a useful message telling me exactly what was wrong. Sounds good so far, but why stop there? How about notifications when the salt was running low, or the rinse aid needed filling up?
I’m now thinking a web interface would be good for the current status (much like the sort of thing you get on a networked printer) showing salt level, rinse aid level, current status and estimated time before complete.
Configurable alerts would be quite easy to set up for all of the above, including a mail when the cycle finishes. I have to take my trusty old SMEG apart again next week to replace a couple of o-rings and hopefully stop the leak. I’ll take a quick look at the circuitry while I’m inside and see what my conclusion is.
Watch this space!
