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IEMI Labs
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SensingDesign rev A, 27 Oct 2026: CAD, fit checks and assembled 3D model done; not built

FarmMast

One solar mast at the field corner: frost, the stock trough, crop raiders and the pest trap

One solar mast where an orchard block meets the paddock does the jobs of FrostMast, TroughTally, RaidPost and TrapTop: bud frost and sprinkler start, the stock trough's level and inflow, a light-and-sound deterrent for animals at the gap with a bell in the house, and moth counts in the grower's own delta trap.

Who buys it
Mixed farms and smallholders with fruit trees and stock side by side; farmer groups and extension programmes that subsidise crop-raid and frost kits.
Why it pays
$499 + $39/yr instead of $722 + about $65/yr for our four products separately, and one pole, panel and battery to look after instead of four devices (est.).
Target price
$499 per mast + $39/year; farm LoRa gateway $249 once or your own (target)
First-minute wow
One morning card: 'Buds reached -1.1 °C at 03:40, sprinklers ran 2 h. Two boar at the gap at 02:10, left after the strobe. Trough 82%, filling. 4 codling moths this week.'
See the CAD designConcept page
FarmMast concept: the idea and where each part goes
The concept. The CAD design is below, under Printable CAD.

What the research found

And how this design answers it

  • Four devices on four poles with four batteries and four apps → one mast, one ESP32-P4 brain, one LoRa radio, one 6 W panel and one app
  • RaidPost and TrapTop each needed their own camera and brain → the ESP32-P4 runs both cameras: the night camera on MIPI, the trap camera on DVP
  • FrostMast and TroughTally ran on AA cells because they had no panel → they now share RaidPost's solar pack, and the P4's low-power core reads them every minute while the main cores sleep
  • TrapTop's head sat on the trap in the canopy → the trap hangs under the mast's arm at 1.6 m at the block edge; the snout and liner view are the same
  • TroughTally's chip and radio at the trough → a chipless pod on the rim wired 15 m back along the fence; a trough further away still needs a TroughTally

Use case

A cold spring night on a mixed farm

GrowerFamily at the houseStock hand

  1. 01Trigger: clear sky at 23:00, buds at pink stage, air 3 °C and falling
  2. 02Detection: bud IR reads 1.5 °C under the air; at 01:40 the buds reach -1.1 °C and the wet bulb says start the sprinklers
  3. 03Alert: the FrostBell rings; at 02:10 the PIRs wake the night camera, it names two boar and the strobe fires; the RaidBell rings twice
  4. 04Action: sprinklers on, boar gone; in the morning the app also shows the trough filling normally and 4 new moths in the trap

Outcome: Buds and the maize edge protected in one night, from one mast (est.)

How it works

Architecture

  1. 01

    Sense: bud, sky, air and dew sensors; trough level, temperature and meter; 3 PIRs, a night camera and a trap camera

  2. 02

    Decide: ESP32-P4 runs the frost rules, the trough state machine, the animal classifier and the moth counter on the mast

  3. 03

    Send: one RAK3172 LoRa radio to the farm gateway, FrostBell and RaidBell

  4. 04

    Tell: push, SMS and a morning card in the FarmMast app

Hardware

Real parts, buyable today

Bill of materials: about $376 per mast at qty 10 (est.), including the $76 meter and the RaidBell.

BlockPartWhy this part
BrainESP32-P4NRW32X on our head boardTwo camera ports (MIPI + DVP) and a low-power core for the sleep loop
RadioRAK3272S (RAK3172)The radio all four sources already used
RaidOV5647 NoIR camera, 2 x SFH 4715AS, 3 x EKMC1603111RaidPost's night detection, now on the shared brain
TrapOV5640 with 120 deg lensTrapTop's liner view, 15 px a moth at the corners
FrostMLX90614 DCI + BAA, SHT45FrostMast's bud, sky and dew point
TroughA02YYUW, DS18B20, DAE AS200U-75PTroughTally's level, temperature and inflow
Power6 W panel, 2 x LiFePO4 32700, CN3058EAbout 0.45 Wh a day without the siren season (est.)

Mechanical

Printable CAD

8 parts, generated from code and checked as closed solids. Pick a part to inspect it, or download the STL files to print.

Loading the CAD…

Real CAD · drag to rotate · scroll to zoomReal CAD · swipe sideways

Open risks we are working on

  • Place: the trough must be within about 15 m of the orchard corner; many farms have it further away
  • Two cameras on one ESP32-P4 and the trap camera on a 200 mm DVP ribbon are unproven (bench test first)
  • UART and 1-Wire over 15 m of cable next to an electric fence are unproven
  • A trap at the block edge on a pole may catch differently from one in the canopy (edge effect, est.)
  • Monitor and alert only: frost and trough alerts never replace the fan's auto-start or a daily stock check; siren rules and noise vary by country

Design stage only: nothing on this page is for sale. Specifications and prices are targets.