Smart Chicken Coop Light

When we first got chickens, we were trying all kinds of things we read online to get the most out of our laying hens. This project was one of those silly ideas to provide more “daylight” for the chickens throughout the year so they would lay eggs year-round.

I threw this together over a weekend with these basic features in mind:

• On/off schedule
• Dimmable
• Log temperature and humidity
• Battery-powered

I used the following parts to make it happen (mostly because I already had them available):

• Harbor Freight Ultra Bright LED Portable Worklight/Flashlight
• SparkFun Blynk Board - ESP826
• Temperature Sensor - TMP36
• N-Channel MOSFET 60V 30A
• JST Jumper 2 Wire Assembly
• LG SBPL0103001, 3.7 V, 4.8 Wh Li-ion battery pack
• 1” 6-32 Machine Screw x 2
• 6-32 nuts x 2

I’m not going to go into a detailed step-by-step process for how I put this together, but hopefully, between the pictures and description, you can get the idea.

I followed these general steps to assemble the hardware:

1. Lay out the placement of parts in the lights
2. Modify light fixture
   • Cut out battery holder
   • Join the two lights together
   • Drill out holes for the charge port and mounting points
3. Wire components and fit into lights
   • Solder the JST Jumper wire to the battery so it can be plugged straight into the Blynk board
   • Wire the MOSFET Source -> GND, LED Cathode -> MOSFET Drain, LED Anode -> Vin, MOSFET Gate -> Pin 5. (Circuit Demo)
   • Wire temperature sensor to the ADC pin
4. Test, rinse, repeat
5. Semi-permanently mount board and battery
6. Close it all up and test

Arduino sketch and Blynk app source: https://github.com/RubenFixit/smart_light_sf_blynk