Window/Fan Controll

Products & Technology Grove
#1

Hi Guys,



I want to do my first Arduino Project, and while I do have programming experience, the electrical things are not always as clear to me. :frowning:



I’m planning on controlling the ventilation of my Basement. Multiple things are supposed to happen:


  1. Two humidity/temperature Sensors are supposed to monitor the humidity inside and outside of the building.
  2. When the outside humidity is less than the one in the basement, and the temperature is not below a certain level, then:
  3. Open/close a small window with a linear actuator and switch on/off a fan via relais for a certain amount of time. After that recheck, and adjust.
  4. Show the values of the sensors on a display
  5. (Maybe in the future) Add a rain sensor for closing the window if it rains. Maybe the change in humidity is enough to detect rain, so optional.



    So far I’m planning on using an Arduino Uno, and a base shield V2 for connecting the sensors, the lcd screen, and for the relais.



    For driving the linear actuator (12V, 3A Max) i’ve been looking into using the 4A motor shield (Arduino Motor Shield Rev3 would also do, as far as I can tell). Now I do have some questions left:


  6. Can I stack and use the motor shield on top of the base shield? I’ve been reading that in general the shields are stackable, as long as they don’t use the same pins. Unfortunately even after reading through the specifications manual, I’m not really able to answer this myself. If thats not possible, do you know any other option to control a motor with the specs I’ve mentioned?


  7. I’m planning installing everything in a nice box (The Basement is used for woodworking, so there will be dust I want to offer protection against). Due to the temperature warning in the specifications manual of the motor shield I’m worried about temperature buildup in the case. Would you guys consider this to be a problem? Note that the linear actuator is probably not going to run for long and often in a short amount of time. I thought about adding a small computer fan to the motor shield of this is going to be a problem.


  8. Should I use the normally open grove relais for controlling the window fan? Would it be a better choice to use a normally closed relais for this?



    If you notice anything else were I might plan wrong, please tell me! :slight_smile:



    Thanks already to anyone!



    Kind Regards



    Chris
#2

Hi Chris,


  1. Can I stack and use the motor shield on top of the base shield? I’ve been reading that in general the shields are stackable, as long as they don’t use the same pins. Unfortunately even after reading through the specifications manual, I’m not really able to answer this myself. If thats not possible, do you know any other option to control a motor with the specs I’ve mentioned?



    yes, you can stack, but the pin6~11 are occupied by 4a motor shield.
  2. I’m planning installing everything in a nice box (The Basement is used for woodworking, so there will be dust I want to offer protection against). Due to the temperature warning in the specifications manual of the motor shield I’m worried about temperature buildup in the case. Would you guys consider this to be a problem? Note that the linear actuator is probably not going to run for long and often in a short amount of time. I thought about adding a small computer fan to the motor shield of this is going to be a problem.



    computer fan is good choice.


  3. Should I use the normally open grove relais for controlling the window fan? Would it be a better choice to use a normally closed relais for this?



    you can use the grove -relay to control the ac fan. thanks.



    Bill