inclination sensor

Forum 2005-2010 (read only) Hardware Interfacing
1

Hi all!

I'm looking for an inclination sensor. I don't need any precision. I just need to know whenever the PCB is flat or above 45 degrees.

What do you recommend me?

/me

2

A ball-bearing and a couple of pins?

3

Tilt ball sensor . . .

4

Can you get mercury switches these days? Or are they banned now because they contain mercury?

5

I think you can get them on Venus.
If you have the inclination.

6

some lead weights hanging from couple of pots would give you a multi-axis clinometer with approx 2-degree precision.

7

http://cgi.ebay.ca/ARDUINO-Mercury-TILT-Switch-Sensor-Module-/130421501806?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1e5dba2f6e#ht_685wt_905
Made especially for Arduino.

AWOL, I really enjoy your postings. Keep up the good work.

8

Just buy a mercury switch from just about anywhere and jam the two leads into the Arduino sockets.

Job done.

Rob

9

I just need to know whenever the PCB is flat or above 45 degrees.

well it depends on some things if posssiblre you could just install a bump switch ( if it wer hinged or somehomw fixed at a place)

10

'just buy a mercury switch'

Are these things even legal?

11

Are these things even legal?

Yep, I've got a dozen of them. Despite the nanny state trying to protect us from everything you can still buy them in any electronics store (in Aus anyway).

Rob

12

That's one of the big problems in proper photography — those of us that use vintage cameras, rangefinders* etc, often find that the meter was designed for a mercury battery, and about all you can legally get these days are the silver oxide or alkalines that fit the same button cell compartment but have different characteristics (higher voltage for silver oxide, widely varying discharge curve for alkalines). Typically, the meter and battery was all that constituted “components” with the shutter and aperture coupling usually nudging a switch arrangement around which adjusted a passive bridge circuit.

  • like I do. Voigtländer VF-135 is in the bag at the moment, with film that's too slow for this weather, and Ricoh RF-500 is up in the attic because it goes “CLACK!” when the shutter is pressed. Users of the classic Olympus OM-1 (which I started out with, decades ago — a pair of) are affected too.
13

Are these things even legal?

Yep, I've got a dozen of them

Psst, possession != legality

14

one of the big problems in proper photography

You can use an AgO battery for 1.55V plus a Ge diode to drop 0.25 volts and get you in range of what an HgO battery would have given you. There are adapters available that do this as well as instructions for making your own.

The ban, so I gather, in the USA is on sale of batteries absent a reclamation program. I know folks used to just mail-order them in. There's no law against having them.