Hello!
I am trying to design a car shade (the thing you put up in your windshield to block the sun) that is automatic with the press of a button. I have an idea of how it will work and the design, but I am struggling with the circuit.
Here is some background:
The automatic shade will be rolled and unrolled from inside of a casing at the bottom of the windshield with the use of a DC motor.
Don't worry about the logistics of how it will stay up/material/etc, that is not a problem.
Here is the requirements of the circuit:
-When a button/switch is pressed, the motor needs to unroll the shade so that it covers the windshield.
-The circuit needs to stop at a certain point (when the shade is fully unrolled).
-When a separate button is pressed, the motor needs to roll up the shade (turn the opposite direction).
-The circuit needs to stop at a certain point (when the shade is fully rolled up).
-It'll probably just run on batteries.
Here are my ideas:
- Use a small regular DC motor for the turning (with a potentiometer to regulate speed if needed)
- Use a DPDT switch in order to turn on the circuit and be able to change the direction of the motor( the switch settings would be CW, off, CCW)
- Use a 555 timer in monostable mode to control the amount of time the motor will turn (rather than using a sensor to stop the circuit when the shade reaches a certain point)
Here are my issues:
- If the DPDT switch as the trigger of the 555 timer, will i need two separate timers for the two separate directions the switch?
- I don't have a lot of experience using any of these parts, so I'm not sure how I would put the circuit together or if it would even work, a circuit diagram would probably help.
Hi.. my suggestion is to use a small microcontroller and connect two push buttons. Also use two limit switches to sense the start and end to stop the DC motor. This way will be better.
For the motor spec, it would be a small and cheap 6-12v DC motor, something like this:
As for the microcontroller, I know that I would be able to program this more easily using timers with an arduino, but I've never used a 55 timer and I am attempting to learn how it would interact with the dc motor and the need of direction change.
As for the requirements of the circuit I suppose it would be:
Press a button, motor turns (slow/medium speed) for about 10 seconds then stops.
Press a different button and the motor turns the opposite direction for the same speed and time, then stops.
I would power it with whatever battery is needed.
Hi, you dont have to use a 555 Timers with arduino, as arduino has its inbuilt timers which you can use to vary the time intervals easily. You can follow the following link for more info:
https://circuitdigest.com/microcontroller-projects/arduino-timer-tutori…
I need someone to help me make the windshield to block the sun from the car windshield
Debashis Das
Joined December 02, 2019 117Monday at 10:02 PM
Hi Shurrie, If you ask me, I would have used a microcontroller instead of going the analog way, because it would reduce the circuit dramatically and you can add or remove any functionality that you like.
I would have used a microcontroller like PIC12F675 to do the job, it's cheap it's, easy to acquire, and it's very easy to code.