I want to make a quiet book for my niece to use in church. Her dad is an electrical engineer, and I am currently studying computer science. My niece will be almost 1 1/2 years old when Christmas 2014 rolls around, and I want to put some simple circuitry and LEDs in her quiet book to make it more interactive. Her mom is also very musical, so the first page I'm working on is a piano. I want to put pressure sensors in the keys, which will then light up the key being pressed and/or a note on a staff. I'm wondering what sort of sensor to use, and what sort of microcontroller I'll need for this project. This is my first time taking on a project like this! (Most of the other pages I have in mind just involve closing a very simple circuit.) It is further complictaed by the fact that the book will be made of felt! I'm deciding whether to reinforce the pages with cardboard or something like that.
P.S. Does anyone know whether a wire with voltage from a coin cell battery would be enough to heat thermochromatic ink? I want to explore as much science as possible with this quiet book, in a way that will engage her while she's young but also stimulate her curiosity as she gets older.
Quiet Book w/ circuitry!
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Please be positive and constructive with your questions and comments.
- adafruit_support_mike
- Posts: 67485
- Joined: Thu Feb 11, 2010 2:51 pm
Re: Quiet Book w/ circuitry!
Take a look through the tutorials our Wearable Electronics expert Becky has created:
https://learn.adafruit.com/users/bekathwia
She's created a whole range of soft sensors and IO circuits.
https://learn.adafruit.com/users/bekathwia
She's created a whole range of soft sensors and IO circuits.
- myhousemd
- Posts: 2
- Joined: Wed Oct 29, 2014 12:48 pm
Re: Quiet Book w/ circuitry!
I looked at some of those, but I'm unsure how much pressure is really necessary to operate some of the pressure sensors. My niece is only 1.5 years old, so it needs to be a sensor that she can sort of stumble across by touching the pages with variable amounts of pressure. Also, the felt pages will absorb some of the pressure. I like the sensor on the firewalker sneakers, because it won't interfere with the bendiness of the felt pages, but it seems to need a ton of pressure! Or can it be programmed to react to much smaller amounts of pressure?
- adafruit_support_bill
- Posts: 88152
- Joined: Sat Feb 07, 2009 10:11 am
Re: Quiet Book w/ circuitry!
The capacitive touch sensors do not require any pressure at all. Capacitive sense pads can be made using either conductive fabric, or just thin wires under the surface of the fabric. It can be implemented with a processor like the Flora.
https://learn.adafruit.com/capacitive-t ... -and-flora
We also have standalone capacitive sense breakout boards.
https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-cap ... -breakouts
https://learn.adafruit.com/capacitive-t ... -and-flora
We also have standalone capacitive sense breakout boards.
https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-cap ... -breakouts
Please be positive and constructive with your questions and comments.