Touch Sensitive counter project question Answered

Hi everyone,
Great to be part of this community.

I am trying to make a touch sensitive counter, the sensor has to be as flat as possible, something like a thick cardboard, or I can put a flat sensor in between two sheets. It needs to handle about 10-20lbs of weight. It will go under fabric like carpet, so it cannot be super sensitive, clickable is fine.

It will be connected to a very simple 1 or 2 digit counter.

Any suggestions?

PS: Eventually I'd like to upgrade this with a system that can instruct something else, for example 5 counters, display etc. Or be able to use bluetooth or wifi or arduino, and be able to count back. For example input 10 and it will count 1/10, 2/10, 3/10, etc..

Tags:touch sensitive sensor LED LCD Counter

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Kiteman

5 years ago

Sounds like the perfect sensor for you:

This conductive material (also known as "Velostat" or "Linqstat") is a
nice addition for your wearable/sensor hacking toolkit. It's
pressure-sensitive: squeezing it will reduce the resistance, so it's
handy for making flexible sensors. And it's a lot less expensive than
off-the-shelf pressure or bend sensors too! Each order comes with a
11"x11" (28cm x 28cm) 8mil (0.2mm) thick piece. We may fold the sheet
into quarters to ship it to you. To remove any hard creases, simply lay
flat on a table and put a heavy book on top to flatten it out.

https://www.coolcomponents.co.uk/pressure-sensitiv...

You should be able to connect it to a version of this DIY counting hack, and you're away:

https://www.instructables.com/id/Versatile-and-Low-...

tees_deney

Reply 5 years ago

Thank you very much for the suggestion, in my application I am concerned there may not be enough pressure to get Velostat to register, however in a certain other application it would be really good. For example Velostat might be really good for the kindergarten class where we have a big carpet and we can mark everyone's position and actually keep kids in that circle by connecting it to a counter or lights. Pretty cool idea.

What I thought about, instead of using a pressure sensor, I now think about using a line-of-sight detector with a very narrow field of vision, (exactly a single line in between) and then hook that up to a counter. Do you have any suggestions for that?

Kiteman

Reply 5 years ago

Google for laser trip wire...?

tees_deney

Reply 5 years ago

Thanks! I've been trying to figure out the correct term for it. Thanks a million.

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Touch Sensitive counter project question Answered

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