Hi
I’m new to using Arduino but with a bit of electronics and programming capability. Working on my first Arduino project and i’m stuck, after 3 hours+ of trying to find an answer, resorting to asking here.
Project is to do with a billiards game. A snooker ball rolls down a gutter inside the table (little ambient light which is helpful). I need to measure if it is a red ball or a white ball (only two possible colours). I am using an arduino mega and an IR grey sensor (DFRobot Gravity:Analog Grayscale Sensor V). Other IR sensors have too short a range or are high/low output only. Ball rolls under the sensor. White ball sends back a stronger IR signal, reflecting more light than a red ball. I have got that part working fine, at least in my test rig.
Problem I have is its only registering the white ball signal when it rolls very slowly past the sensor. If it goes even remotely quickly then it misses it. So, i am guessing its sampling too slowly. All the forum advice i can find discusses very high sampling rates about what is technically feasible, but by my calculations, i “just” need to take 100 samples a second to ensure i capture a signal from it passing the sensor. That should be easy for it, right?? I would guess its taking a few reads per second at the mo. Any idea why so few? I am guessing its something too simple going wrong for me to find an answer online, or maybe a limitation of the sensor, which i doubt.
void loop()
{
int sensorValue = analogRead(A3);
myArray[Arraycount] = sensorValue;
if (Arraycount > 4) {
Arraycount = 0;
}
if (sensorValue < aaaa) {
myGLCD.print("White “, 110, 30);
delay(1000);
myGLCD.print(” ", 110, 30);
}
zzzz = (myArray[0] + myArray[1] + myArray[2] + myArray[3] + myArray[4])/5;
aaaa = zzzz - 10;
Arraycount = Arraycount + 1;
}
