Some Success

I'm still tinkering with the magnetometer. I found the position I had chosen for the detector was far from satisfactory. The unit is temperature sensitive and when the Sun actually shone the readings drifted about. I keep looking for a suitable fully waterproof enclosure so I can put the detector outside, preferable buried. As yet I have not really worked out a suitable place away from metal objects. As a temporary measure I dug out an old plastic box, lined the six sides with 10mm thick dense foam. The rest of the space I filled with lengths of pipe insulation with the detector in the centre, snugly shielded from excessive or rapid changes in temperature.



A possible geomagnetic storm had been forecast for this weekend. It duly started about 8.30 p.m. last night. I soon found I had to re-work some of the Arduino program (sketch they call them) and finally things were looking and behaving much as expected.



This morning the display is showing some large rapid jumps in the readings. I can't work out whether that is something metal moving nearby, the high speed Solar wind still hitting the Earth or the Earth's magnetic field recovering after the storm. I need to see local readings from more geomagnetic storms to gain more experience.