To reduce water wastage

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I want to make a water level indicator cum motor control device for my hostel's water tank. I want to make three led's to glow for different levels of water and the moment the third led glows the motor must stop pumping water into the tank. How do I control the motor? Do I have to use a microcontroller, and if yes how?
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Juergen
Employee
Employee
Hi,

Infineon has a number of microcontrollers that can drive a motor via mosfets, the XMC series.
The kits are cheap, there is also a free toolchain that can be downloaded from here:
http://www.infineon.com/cms/en/product/microcontrollers/32-bit-industrial-microcontrollers-based-on-...

How are you sensing the water level? I have experimented with some adhesive copper strip on the outside of a glass tank (aquarium) and used capacitive sensing. This works nicely. Infineon have a XMC1200 that has a capacitive touch sensing module / LED drive module. You could use this and detect gradual changes in capacitance as the water level changes. There are very little external components needed for this and your pcb can become quite simple. You may need to experiment a little with the tank you are using.

Let me know what motor you want to drive and also what kind of water tank you have.

Best Regards
Juergen
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Thanks for your reply. Yes, i am too using the capacitive sensing technique But not with the tank itself as one of the capacitor plates, two wires one connected to supply and other through a transistor to ground. The tank is made of pvc. I am doing this to save water that overflows from my hostel's water tank. So, i want to switch off the pump motor using this circuit.
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Hey kksai18,
Interesting project you want to do there.
Have you decided how to detect the water level?
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