I disassembled a very old optical computer mouse (so old that it has a PS/2 connector and not USB). I was mainly interested in the optical sensor chip, which I found and it has a lot of literature online that set me straight on how I can salvage it.
My question is regarding the rotary encoder for the scroll wheel
Here's the picture
The pointed thing is the IR blaster of course and the black thing on the other side should be the encoder. The scroll wheel sits in the middle of these two things.
There's my problem, I don't know what kind of rotary encoder that is. It doesn't have a parts number of anything. It just has 3 terminals, how do I figure out what terminal does what? I want to salvage it and use it with my arduino. Any clues?
Can you say "LED" instead of blaster?
The black thing is a transistor that is turned on and off when the encoder wheel is moved to allow the light to shine through the encoder wheel or when it is stopped.
Paul
I can't either. The transistor is actually two transistors so the direction of the encoder wheel movement can be determined. So, that device will have 4 pins, two for each transistor.
Paul
The 3 pins may be one ground connected to both phototransistor emitters and one each for the phototransistor collectors. If so the way to wire them to an Arduino is: Collectors go to digital inputs (may want interrupt inputs for one or both). There will need to be pullup resistors on each collector to Vcc. Those can be external or they can be the internal pullups on the digital inputs. Then, of course, ground to ground.
