Motorized Pinwheel: Using 9v battery, DC motor, and a Transistor to make a pinwheel

    This project was the second one based around a motor, but instead of the accurate servo meant for specific angles, the DC servo is meant for pure spinning power, which is why we needed the extra 9v battery for the first time since starting that class. I though I would have had to make a Wal-mart run for the 9v, but I didn't realize that they actually sold them and other battery types at the campus shop at RIT, which is a good not for future reference for myself and anybody who reads this.

    The main component of this project was the DC motor we used to turn the pinwheel itself. But on top of that, we used a MOSFET (transistor). A transistor is a switch of sorts, that allows large current to flow from one input if it detects a smaller charge from a second input, and will send the large current out a third pin/output. We also used a diode to control the power flow on the right side of the breadboard. A button to turn on the DC along with the a resistor to block some of the charge.




The code was super simple, utilizing the MOSFET and button to control the DC Motor. The motor pin (9) was set as output and the switch pin (2) was set as input. Then while constantly looping, the Arduino would check the switch state of the button, and if it was High, it would allow power flow through the transistor, and if not, then it wouldn't allow that power flow.


As you can see in the GIF below, I didn't utilize my pinwheel because the CD disk I found had a interior hole bigger than the diameter of the yellow contraption given to us, so I wasn't able to use it. But none the less the circuit still worked, and the DC motor ran when the button was pressed.


This project was fun because we got to use the DC motor for the first time. This has always been a part that has been essential whenever I have worked on a lot of personal and professional projects in my life, and it is nice to know it will be apart of out utility belt for future use in this class, for future project we will have.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Final Project: Reusing the Snake board design to create Tetris with the Arduino

Image
      This project is my final one, and I am super happy and sad to be at the end. I have learned so much in this course, and also had so much fun. There was a lot of creativity and design in making these projects, and I got to work hands on in NMID for the first time, which is something I will never say no to. This project layout will be the one I keep my Arduino as. The board setup works between my Snake and Tetris code, and is a great way to show what I learned in this class. The components for this one are the same as the Snake Arduino setup. The joystick is necessary for movement controls, like it was in Snake. Left and right move the pieces, down sends the pieces downwards, and up rotates the pieces so you can control their fit. The 8x8 LED array is meant to convey what the current game-board looks like, and when your current piece under control is moving. The last parts are the wire connectors, which connect the 5v, Ground, 8x8 LED array, and Joystick all to the Ar...
Read more

Art Meets Engineering: Using an Arduino compatible microphone to create light based on sound

Image
      This weeks project was based on using good engineering principals to create art. I tend not to be a very artistic person in general, but when I thought about art, I tend to think of movies, and moving colors, so I can up with the idea for colors to move based on the "strength" of your voice. While the piezo can detect stuff such as taps, I needed a microphone to detect actual sound input, so I had to order one off of Amazon. In the parts diagram below, swap out the piezo for the microphone, but everything else is exactly what I used. I connected all the regular LED's to digital pins 2-8 and 12, so that way I could just send a simple High/Low when I needed them on or off. I connected the RGB LED's pins to digital 9-11, so that way I could use the PWM technique to get analog results from a digital pin. I connected the final pin to ground. The microphone is connected to the 5V, ground, 0 digital pin, and the A0 analog pin to out put the digital and analog results. ...
Read more