Wireless Sensor Network Application in Monitoring of Machining Operations

Abstract

The scope of this paper is the research of the possibilities of application of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) for monitoring of machining operations. Due to the limited battery lifetime, WSNs are energy constrained networks and energy efficiency of the network is a very important issue. Since communication requires significantly more energy then processing, instead of sending raw data through the network, data processing and decision making should be performed in the node. Consequently, as a basis for WSN design we consider IEEE 802.15.4 Wireless Networking Standard, created for low data rates and very low power consumption which makes it suitable for remote monitoring and control. In this paper, a prototype of the node, designed for acceleration monitoring, has been developed. The node has been created at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering in Belgrade and it is based on low power Atmel Atmega16 microcontroller and IEEE 802.15.4 compatible transceiver.