Figure A: Block Diagram of Localized Water Level Monitoring and Road Access Information System with Central Control
The systems block diagram is composed of 5 primary blocks, namely; the
Input, Level Detector, Wireless Transmission, Central Control, and Output block. Input block is simply the level of water on the road. It is the variable to be measured which will be analyzed and interpreted by the system. Level Detector block is responsible for the sensing and interpretation of water level. The block is sub-divided into 4 components; the microcontroller unit (MCU), level sensor circuit, power supply, and solar panel charging circuit. The power supplys function is to power the MCU, it is supplemented with a renewable energy source with the use of solar panel charging circuit. The level sensor circuit is used to detect the actual level of water and then each level will activate specific number of pins in the MCU. The MCU will interpret the level of water by examining the number of activated I/O pins. Wireless transmission is accomplished with the use of Ultra High Frequency (UHF) Transceivers. The UHF transceiver modules used in the transmission and reception sides are exactly the same and only differ on which data pin is used; the RX pin for the transmitter side and the TX pin for the receiver side.
The server is responsible for the reception, interpretation, and retransmission
of the data given by the remote sensor (level detector). It is composed of the MCU, Computer, Visual Basic Interface, and the web based MySQL database. The MCU will receive and decode the signal coming from the UHF receiver. The computer is the electronic device that will interconnect the microcontroller and the software based Visual Basic interface. The Visual Basic interface will fetch data from the serial port of the computer and decode it then retransmit its equivalent functionalities and data to the web based MySQL database. MySQL database stores data that will be fetched by the output website. The website includes the level of water and the corresponding list of vehicles that cannot access the road at its current state based on the level of water.