Introduction: How To: Squishy Circuits

This is a how to Instructable over squishy circuits. In this Instructable you will see how to make a circuit with LED lights and Buzzers all using insulated and conductive play dough circuits.

Step 1: Conductive Play-Doh

Ingredients

  • 1 cup Water
  • 1 1/2 cups Flour
  • 1/4 cup Salt
  • 3 Tbsp. Cream of Tartar (or 9Tbsp of lemon juice)
  • 1 Tbsp. Vegetable Oil
  • Food Coloring (optional)

Cooking Procedure

Mix water, 1cup of flour, salt, cream of tartar, vegetable oil, and food coloring in a medium sized pot.

Cook over medium heat and stir continuously.

The mixture will begin to boil and start to get chunky.

Keep stirring the mixture until it forms a ball in the center of the pot.

Once a ball forms, place the ball on a lightly floured surface.

The ball will be very hot.

We suggest flattening it out and letting it cool for a couple minutes before handling.

Slowly knead the remaining flour into the ball until you’ve reached a desired consistency.

Store in an airtight container or plastic bag.

While in the bag, water from the dough will create condensation. This is normal.

Just knead the dough after removing it from the bag, and it will be as good as new.

If stored properly, the dough should keep for several weeks.

Step 2: Insulated Play-Doh

Ingredients:

  • 1 1/2 cup Flour
  • 1/2 cup Sugar
  • 3 Tbsp. Vegetable Oil
  • 1/2 cup Deionized (or Distilled) Water

Cooking Procedure

Mix solid ingredients and oil in a pot or large bowl, setting aside ½ cup flour to be used later.

Mix with this mixture a small amount of deionized water (about 1 Tbsp.) and stir.

Repeat this step until a majority water is absorbed by the mixture.

Once your mixture is at this consistency, knead the mixture into one “lump”.

Knead more water into the dough until it has a sticky, dough-like texture.

Now, knead in flour to the dough, until a desired texture is reached.

Store in an airtight container or plastic bag.

While in the bag, water from the dough will create condensation. This is normal.

Just knead the dough after removing it from the bag, and it will be as good as new.

If stored properly, the dough should keep for several weeks.

Step 3: LED Circuits

In order to create a working LED squishy circuits, there are things you must remember first...

  1. The conductive dough acts as a wire. If the two conductive play dough parts are touching at all, the LED will not light up and they circuit will not work.
  2. Any LED not connected to two conductive doughs will not light up

As seen in the example, the snail made out of the blue conductive dough is connected by the bowl also made out of the conductive dough. The two blue doughs are not touching, which will cause the LED to glow.

Step 4: Completing the Circuit

Using a Power source, connect both ends of the incomplete circuit to the two conductive parts of the dough to complete the circuit.

Attachments

Step 5: Ninja Example

The two LED lights are connected by the top and bottom halves of the guys head. The Conductive dough is separated by the red insulated dough, causing the circuit to complete when hooked up to the power source.

Step 6: Buzzer and LED

Attachments