Robot Overlords

Thought of something last night.

I have my robot, sitting on stands, minding it's own business.  I connect to it's router, in order to debug and program it, using the Codesys IDE.

Now with this new remote sensor/actuator tool, in the form of a cheap Huzzah ESP8266 Wifi and Modbus TCP connectivity, I can have the robot connect to a device in my house, and do stuff.

One of my todo projects is a reflow oven.  I was debating throwing in a simple controller like a Teensy, Arduino, whatever, ordering a TC sensor module, solid state relays, all that stuff.  Mount the controller.  Mount the LCD.  Add some buttons.  Write some code in C or whatever, tie it to expensive TC sensor modules, and a solid state relay or two.  All of this hardware is now tied up for one purpose.  The oven.  Between $100 and $150 no problem.

Now I'm thinking, "I could have my robot run my reflow oven"...  It would be trivial.  Take an AD595 TC amplifier, sample it from the 10bit 1.8V Huzzah A/D, transmit the temp to the PLC on request, and turn on/off a solid state relay when the PLC directs it.  I have a temp profile state-machine running in the PLC, that ramps up, soaks a bit and does the solder temp spike.  I could even set up a nice GUI I could access from my mobile phone whenever I want to solder something.

Take this a step further, and just mount the Codesys Pi PLC brain, ANYWHERE.  Plug it in the wall.  Set it on the table.  Stick it in a closet.  Put it on your head (No, don't do that). Don't care.  Now, you have a controller that can run anything in your house.  A reflow oven.  A light controller.  A security system.  Anything.

Makes my head spin.