Snap Circuits® - Snapduino Motor Back Current

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Overview

What Are Snap Circuits?

Snap Circuits makes learning electronics easy and fun! Learn how to integrate Snap Circuits with your hardware. Fun for Kids!

Introductory Project

If you have not completed the introductory project, please see Snap Circuits - Introduction. This project also contains a complete index of Snap Circuit projects.

Let's Get Started

Project Objective

This experiment will demonstrate how a motor can store electricity and release it when it stops.

Building the Circuit

The minimum set requirement for this project is SC-300 and the Snapduino. Build the following circuit by following the directions in the PDF file:

Scroll down to see and download the PDF file containing complete build instructions (the PDF file can also be found in the GitHub repository).

Completed Circuit

How this Works

The Circuit

This is the same circuit as the Snapduino NPN Motor project except the diode D3 is replaced with LED D1.

The LED will work in the same way as D3 in the previous circuit but in addition it will flash breifly when the motor stops.

The Software

The sketch in this example sets the Snapduino pin to output mode and then toggles the pin between HIGH and LOW for three seconds each. This results in the motor running for three seconds and then turning off for three seconds, repeating this pattern indefinitely. Each time the motor stops, the LED will flash. it is best to run the circuit in low light so that it is easy to see the LED flash.