Tracking Snow Fall at the Laurel Highlands Snowmobile Club with ioBridge and MaxBotix Range Sensors

The polar vortex may have bundled up this week, but if you are into riding snowmobiles, then get out to the trails since there is 8.7 inches of snow out there!

ioBridge Snow Meter LHSC

The members of the Laurel Highlands Snowmobile Club (LHSC) created a system of cameras and wireless level sensors connected to the Internet with ioBridge Cloud Services to provide real-time monitoring of snow levels on the snowmobile trails in the Laurel Highlands of Pennsylvania. Knowing the snow levels means whether or not you show head to the trails or stay home. You need around 6 inches of snow to have a lot of fun. This is a great professional application of ioBridge technology and internet connected services. We use the very same technology in our TideAlerts.com system that monitors and alerts boaters of the time levels in Cape Cod.

“It’s not fun driving all the way out to the mountain to find out there is not enough snow to ride our snowmobiles,” said Bill Bennett, LHSC Member. “With the automated and wireless snow tracking system with ioBridge the snowmobile club members know exactly how much snow is on the trail.”

ioBridge Gamma with Wireless Endpoints System Overview

The ioBridge Gamma Web Gateway is designed for professional applications that require easy-to-install connectivity to remote sensors and controls commonly found in M2M applications. Once connected, your solution gets the benefit of the ioBridge Cloud Services such as Data Logging, Alerting, and Dashboards. Everything from orchard monitoring to alerting snow levels is possible with the ioBridge Gamma Web Gateway with Wireless Endpoints. Full documentation is available on ioBridge Connect.

ioBridge Wireless Endpoints System Overview

Getting Started

On ioBridge Connect, we have created a complete tutorial on how to use the MaxBotix Range Sensor for measuring water or snow levels connect to ioBridge Cloud Services via the Gamma Web Gateway and Wireless Endpoints. We also have kits that include the Gamma Gateway and Wireless Endpoints for Sensors available on the ioBridge Store.

Happy Trails!

Make Your Own Snowbird Snow Meter

If you head over to Instructables, you will find many how-to guides and step-by-step instructions on how you can make things. It’s kind of like recipes for everything. Today I came across another brilliant project from Noel Portugal from the My Web of Things blog. This time Noel builds a snow meter displaying the live snow fall for any ski resort right on your desk before heading out to the slopes.

As my snowboarding trip approaches, I find myself checking Utah Snowbird’s snowcam a few times a day, wishing for more snow to accumulate on my favorite ski resort.

Snowbird Snow Meter

Snowbird Snow Meter

Noel shows you how to create your own snow meter using the ioBridge IO-204 and the Servo Smart Board. He connects the Snowbird’s weather data to ioBridge using the Widget API that controls a servo motor position that corresponds to the snow accumulation. Here’s a video of the Snow Meter in action:

As a bonus project, Noel also shows you how to link the Snowbird weather feed to Twilio, so you can get personalized snow updates via the phone or SMS. Check out the complete “” on Instructables.com.

Let it snow!