MicroHybrid Gas Sensor
The MicroHybrid Gas Sensor Project was a project conducted at the Fordham University Physics and Engineering Lab. This project utilized the gas sensor from the company MicroHybrid. (Find out more here.) We were conducting initial testing for this project and after further development, began to monitoring surrounding neighborhoods to measure Methane levels.
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Image to the left: The set up for the project. Metal gas chamfer with inlet and outlet for gas, along with an infrared emitter and thermopile detector.
In order to set up the experiment, we needed a gas chamber to pump in/pump out gas along with measure the values via infrared emitter and detectors. To do this, we used a band saw to cut down a large aluminum rod, placed it on the lathe to smooth edges and cut down on diameter, used a drill press to make a hole of the appropriate diameter (to fit the emitter and detector), and finally tapped and threaded holes to screw in the gas nozzles.
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The emitter and detector was connected to the circuit board provided by the MicroHybrid company. This system came with a software that allowed for voltage tracking. (Image below). The two sinusoidal plots were the two output channels and the third plot was the amplitude of these channels. As inputs of gas varied, these amplitudes would increase or decreased and were indicative of surrounding methane levels.
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