Multi-Use Roof Eliminates Roof

September 11, 2025 by Bryan Cockfield 49 Comments

One of the biggest downsides of installing solar panels on a rooftop is that maintenance of the actual roof structure becomes much more difficult with solar panels in the way. But for many people who don’t have huge tracts of land, a roof is wasted space where something useful could otherwise go. [Mihai] had the idea of simply eliminating traditional roofing materials altogether and made half of this roof out of solar panels directly, with the other half being put to use as a garden.

Normally solar panels are installed on top of a roof, whether it’s metal or asphalt shingles or some other material, allowing the roof to perform its normal job of keeping weather out of the house while the solar panels can focus on energy generation. In this roof [Mihai] skips this step, having the solar panels pull double duty as roof material and energy generation. In a way this simplifies things; there’s less to maintain and presumably any problems with the roof can be solved by swapping out panels. But we would also presume that waterproofing it might be marginally more difficult.

On the antisolar side of the roof, however, [Mihai] foregoes the solar panels in favor of a system that can hold soil for small garden plants. Putting solar panels on this side of the roof wouldn’t generate as much energy but the area can still be useful as a garden. Of course we’d advise caution when working on a garden at height, but at least for the solar panels you can save some trips up a ladder for maintenance by using something like this robotic solar panel scrubber.

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Rainwater From The Road To The Garden

December 15, 2024 by Bryan Cockfield 65 Comments

Most small-scale, residential rainwater harvesting systems we’ve seen rely on using an existing roof and downspout to collect water that would otherwise be diverted out into the environment. These are accessible for most homeowners since almost all of the infrastructure needed for it is already in place. [SuburbanBiology] already built one of these systems to take care of his potable water, though, and despite its 30,000 gallon capacity it’s not even close to big enough to also water his garden. But with some clever grading around his yard and a special rainwater system that harvests rain from the street instead of his roof, he’s capable of maintaining a lush food forest despite living through a drought in Texas.

For this build there are actually two systems demonstrated, one which is gravity-fed from the road and relies on one’s entire property sloping away from the street, and a slightly more complex one that’s more independent of elevation. Both start with cutting through a section of sidewalk to pass a 4″ PVC pipe through to the street where the stormwater runoff can be collected. The gravity-fed system simply diverts this into a series of trenches around the property while the second system uses a custom sump pump to deliver the water to the landscaping.

For a system like this a holding tank is not necessary; [SuburbanBiology] is relying on the soil on his property itself to hold onto the rainwater. Healthy, living soil can hold a tremendous amount of water for a very long time, slowly releasing it to plants when they need it. And, at least where he lives, a system like this is actually helpful for the surrounding environment as a whole since otherwise all of the stormwater runoff has to be diverted out of the city or cause a flood, and it doesn’t end up back in an aquifer. If you’re more curious about a potable water system instead, take a look at [SuburbanBiology]’s previous system.

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A circular concrete pond in a garden. A small round fountain jets water out in the center and a solar panel and control box are visible attached to the end of the pond opposite the camera. On the top left is the text, "3D printed, Solar powered, and Arduino controlled" in yellow

Solar Fountain Aerates Garden Pond

August 2, 2024 by Navarre Bartz 8 Comments

Sometimes off-the-shelf solutions to a problem don’t meet your expectations. That’s what led [TomGoff] to build his own solar pond fountain.

This build features a lot of creative reuse of materials [TomGoff] already had on hand, like the end of a cable reel for the platform and a wheelbarrow inner tube for flotation. A 3D printed nozzle in the center of this apparatus is attached to a 12 V water pump and the whole thing is controlled by an Arduino running 30 seconds on and 3 minutes off to conserve battery power.

A hand-built perfboard contains a light dependent resistor (LDR) to tell the Arduino not to run at night, the relay for the pump, and a battery charge monitor. Be sure to check out the full write-up to see the video of the Tinkercad electronics simulation as well as the code. A 20 W solar panel keeps the whole thing charged so you don’t have to run mains power out to your pond.

If you need more solar projects for your garden, how about this Charmander lamp or a solar powered irrigation system?

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Mobile phone reading an NFC tag with information on a garden plant

NFC Puts A Stake In The Ground

August 15, 2023 by Michael Shaub 21 Comments

Sometimes we have a new part or piece of tech that we want to use, and it feels like a solution looking for a problem. Upon first encountering NFC Tags, [nalanj] was looking for an application and thought they might make a great update to old-fashioned plant markers in a garden. Those are usually small and, being outside 24/7, the elements tend to wear away at what little information they hold.

[nalanj] used a freeform data structuring service called Cardinal to set up text information fields for each plant and even photos. Once a template has been created, every entry gets a unique URL that’s perfect for writing to an NFC tag. See the blog post on Cardinal’s site for the whole process, the thought behind the physical design of the NFC tag holder, and a great application of a pause in the 3D print to encapsulate the tags.

NFC tags are super hackable, though, so you don’t have to limit yourself to lookups in a plant database. Heck, you could throw away your door keys.

No Need To Buy A Woodchipper – Build One!

August 8, 2023 by Dave Rowntree 32 Comments

Polish YouTuber WorkshopFromScratch finally got fed up with tripping over piles of garden detritus and decided to have a go at building a woodchipper (Video, embedded below). Since they had a ‘small’ 1.5kW gearmotor just lying idle (as you do) it was an obvious fit for a machine that needs torque rather than supersonic speed. The video is a fabulous 20-minute journey through the workshop showing just about every conceivable metalworking tool being used at some point.

Checkout out the thickness of my blades!

One interesting point is the bottom roller, which sits between a pair of removable guides, which should help the thing self-feed without jamming. Whether that was necessary is not for us to judge, but it can’t hurt. The frame looks like it was constructed from at least 1/4″ thick steel, which is expensive if you don’t happen to have a supply to hand. There’s lots to see, everything from thin sheet metalworking, which was plasma cut, constructing the feed and exhaust guides, to box sections being skilfully welded at some interesting angles to make a cart to move the thing. They tell us the blades were constructed from some seriously thick slabs of C45 grade steel, but currently are not hardened. This is planned for the future, but we suspect not something that is easily achieved in the home workshop!

If this channel is familiar, then you might remember the earlier stump grinder they built. If you are drowning in sawdust, but have a log burner, then you’ll appreciate this sawdust briquette machine.

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Grass Gauge Tells You When The Lawnmower’s Catcher Is Full

January 18, 2023 by Lewin Day 20 Comments

If you’re not mowing your lawn regularly, you’re probably familiar with the hassle of overfilling your catcher. Grass clippings end up scattered everywhere, and you end up with a messy yard after all your hard work. [Dominic Bender] designed a mower fill gauge to eliminate this problem which shows you when your catcher is getting full.

The concept behind the gauge’s operation is simple. Catcher-based mowers rely on airflow from the spinning blades to carry grass into the catcher. That airflow is, in this case, also used to push up a flap mounted in the top of the catcher. As the catcher fills with grass, that airflow no longer reaches the flap, which sinks down, indicating the catcher is getting full. The basic design is a simple 3D printed flap and housing that uses a short piece of filament as a hinge. There’s also a small mesh guard to stop the flap getting clogged by the incoming grass clippings.

If you’re the forgetful sort, or your enthusiastic children aren’t always emptying the catcher when they should, this gauge might be a useful tool for you. Alternatively, consider robotizing your mowing in the vein of other builds we’ve seen, including one by yours truly. If you’ve got your own nifty gardening hacks, be sure to drop us a line!

2022 Hackaday Prize: Plant Monitoring System Grows To Include LoRa

August 23, 2022 by Bryan Cockfield 7 Comments

Change on industrial scales is slow, but if you’re operating your own small farm or simply working in a home garden there are some excellent ways to use water more effectively. The latest tool from [YJ] makes it possible to use much less water while still keeping plant yields high.

This is an improvement on a previous project which automates watering and lighting of a small area or single pot. This latest creation, called FLORA, includes a LoRa module for communication up to 3 kilometers, and the ESP32 on board also handles monitoring of soil moisture, humidity and other sensors. It also includes a pump driver for managing irrigation systems so that smart decisions can be made about when to water. Using this device, the water usage when testing was reduced by around 30% compared to a typical timed irrigation system.

Using a smart system like this is effective for basically any supply of water, but for those who get water from something like an off-grid rainwater system or an expensive water utility, the gains are immediate. If you aren’t already growing your own food to take advantage of tools like this, take a look at this primer to get you started.