I'm planning a lamp-project with RGB leds and changing their colors manually. The idea is to do this with turning a knob or something similar. I'm really new to this whole Arduino-/electronics-thing, but the way I've understood my Arduinos (noob-)beginners kit I can use potentiometers for this. I've sort of got it working on a breadboard already.
Problem is, I can't find a potentiometer that does look like crap! every pot i find looks like the one in the link below.
(i weren't allowed to link in my first post, guess i have to do that in a reply or something :))
where can i find a more esthetically looking pot, one that doesn't have this industrial boring look? or can i put some knob or makeup or something on it?
where can i find a more esthetically looking pot, one that doesn't have this industrial boring look? or can i put some knob or makeup or something on it?
They are designed to be stuck inside the device with the shaft coming through a hole and then you fir your own choice of knob to it.
Potentiometer shafts are designed to have knobs put on them, and you can find places that sell knobs in all sorts of assorted fancy styles. Here are a few from surplus:
Some equipment is all about how pretty the outsides look (apparently), and you can find knobs that are sort-of arbitrarily beautiful and expensive.
Be careful to match the knob to the pot shaft, since there are several diameters and styles of shaft...
Good question. Dressing up a project nicely is quite important, I think.
Lots of people have posted links to off-the-shelf knobs, but it's also not too hard to make them. A great many potentiometers have 1/4" or 6mm shafts, a size it's pretty easy to match at home with a hand drill. Then there's no reason why you shouldn't use polished wood, or acrylic cubes (maybe backlit with surface mount LEDs?), or cogs from scrapped machinery, or whatever suits your aesthetic. Just gluing them to the shafts seems to work well enough, although is probably not totally abuse proof.
Maybe you need to be more imaginative. For a start there is a liner pot and several ways you can dress it up. Then you can make a pot from a zippier and conductive thread.
Then you could make the equivalent of a pot from conductive foam or you can make a pot by placing two objects closer together or further apart.