A product developer/seller of volleyball practice equipment needed a replacement actuator memory position controller that could save up to 10 actuator positions. For this project we used an actuator with two (2) hall sensors that were used to determine position. The controller was an Arduino Uno with a MegaMoto motor controller shield used to drive the actuator. The user interface was a Nextion 5-inch basic touchscreen that was located about 5 feet from the controller. A local 12V/5V buck converter was used to power the display.
The UI had a splash screen that once touched sent the actuator home to reset/establish the actuator position. UI functions included:
- UP/DOWN to move the actuator to a desired position
- SAVE to store the current location to a position button
- ERASE to invalidate a position button
- HOME to return the actuator to a fully retract position
- 10 position buttons with bright green indicating a stored position location
UP/DOWN the user had to continue pressing the button for actuator movement. HOME and position buttons required a single touch to start the actuator moving. The actuator would automatically stop when it reached the stored/home position. Pressing the button during movement would stop the actuator at the current location.
The display was developed using the Nextion HMI editor and the controller code used the Arduino environment. No additional libraries were required.
This project is easily adaptable to handle more position locations, background images, and other functions.
Anyware, LLC 