Martin Lukac » electronics

Ant capsule

martin.lukac@iaac.net — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 19:18:25 +0000

The final object installment. Two acrylic capsules interconnected, one containing ant colony, other one with a series of capacitor membranes forming an electric field when being actuated. Rather than an ant habitat model, this is an encapsulated experience for ant species attracted to electric fields. Sound sensor could actuate the capacitors based on the activity of ants. The system could detect ant activity and regulate the intensity of electric field and thus influence the behavior of ants.

Another day, another actuation test

martin.lukac@iaac.net — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 13:17:16 +0000

Another actuation testing, this time using a different shape. Two shapes are connected to each other, one is just a stretched membrane without the powder, the other one is complete capacitor. Actuation starts around 1.4 kV. Breaking point should be around 6.5 kV. Finally one capacitor that remained intact after testing.

Actuation tests

martin.lukac@iaac.net — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 15:10:42 +0000

Testing the actuation with high voltage electricity and material properties of the membranes at the same time. Membranes appear to be very sensitive to voltage above 4kV. They tend to damage quite easily. Actuation usually starts around 1.3 / 1.5 kV. Discharging capacitor and converter is done manually, via bleeder resistors board. Capacitor should store electric charge after it is switched off for certain time. After that moment it should discharge gradually and the time of discharge should be influenced by outer level of humidity and the conductivity of the capacitor itself. This could be an interesting moment in the behavior of an array of capacitors being switched on and off.

test object

membrane elasticity testing

Polymer actuation test 1.0

martin.lukac@iaac.net — Fri, 07 Jun 2013 18:41:32 +0000

Testing the actuation of the polymer film. Materials and electronics: VHB polymer film, conductive graphite powder, acrylic glass, high voltage converter, variable power supply, cables.

Sound sensor

martin.lukac@iaac.net — Mon, 20 May 2013 15:16:42 +0000

Simple preamplification of the electret microphone. Can be used as sound sensor for the arduino microcontroller. Electronic components needed: electret microphone, transistor 2N3904, two capacitors 0.1 uF, two resistors 10 kohm, one resistor 100 kohm. Input voltage is 3-9 Volts.

D.I.Y. electroactive polymers / high voltage test circuit

martin.lukac@iaac.net — Mon, 20 May 2013 14:36:28 +0000

An electronic test circuit for electroactive polymer actuator. The aim of this circuit is to test the possibility of controlling the polymer actuator with a microcontroller (Arduino). The circuit consits of 3 blocks 1) Variable power supply – provides stable voltage 0-12V and current of 125 mA for the high voltage converter. 2) High voltage converter and polymer actuator – converter converts incoming voltage of 0-12V and transforms it to high voltage (0-6kV). High voltage is essential for actuation of polymer. Graphite cathode and anode start to actuate the polymer matter around 2 kV. Positive and negative output of the converter are directly connected to the anode and cathode of the actuator. Bleeder resistors discharge the electric charge after the circuit is off. 3) Arduino microcontroller and digital potentiometer MCP4131 – control the behaviour of the actuator. Digital potentiometer has a range of 128 values. It is possible to add sensors to this circuit.

digital potentiometer MCP4131 test circuit variable power supply test circuit

variable power supply test circuit