Automatic cat feeder with stepper motor and ATMega AVR
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 2 ก.ค. 2011
- Here's a project that I built to feed my cat when I am away for short trips. It uses a commercial dry cereal dispenser, stepper motor that was hacked into an old HP Laserjet gearbox, ATMega8 AVR microcontroller, and standard mechanical AC lamp timer.
benkrasnow.blogspot.com/2009/0...
benkrasnow.blogspot.com/2009/0... - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
THANK YOU for the idea of using a cereal dispenser !
Yay happy kitty!!
A well fed and happy cat. success.
Thanks for posting this video. I'm searching for a way to construct an automatic pigeon feeder. Do you have any suggestions as to what procedure to follow? The set up that you have incorporated for your application seems to work quite well and I would like to be able to build something such as this to dispense feed to my pigeons when I am away. Any suggestions?
Nice project, I am looking to do something similar. How did you mount the motor to the round surface?
KISS principle - always works well even if not quite so elegant !! :) Nice idea ..... my cat will hear food going into the bowl (or the bag being rustled as a scoop taken) - from, I kid you not - a good 100 yards away!
Ben, I had to laugh seeing your cat feeder. I also build one of those many years ago. (1986) We had a cat that would eat ALL the food we put out. Yeah, he needed a 12 step program for food control but instead I build an incremental feeder similar to your design. I hacked two cheap plastic watches that had an alarm. It would trigger and feed him twice a day. I like your design better, it look like it would be less troublesome. Good Job.
Frank
much respect 1986...I was 1 year old! haha I love hearing these stories!
Do you remember the motor torque, voltage and amp? And which driver you have been use? Thanks!
Ben, could you share the schematic for your board?
@bkraz333 plus, the timer saves power that would else be wasted in the power supply in the form of heat
What kind dispensing mechanism you use?
any servo? would a standard parallax servo have enough torque?
Doc brown would be proud!
dove trovare dispenser di gomma a farfalla ??
This just made my day
Where did you find that actor cat? He really spices up the video by coming to eat on cue. Must be pretty smart to take direction like that! Here is an idea for next script:
Have the cat patiently waiting by the timer; perhaps checking his own watch; then giving a glace to camera of disgust if the timer is slightly behind schedule.
Cool project
Awww happy cat!
What is the torque on the stepper motor you used for this project? I am trying to build something similar, but my nema 17 is too weak to turn the valve
hi, did you find good motor?
I also have one that is too weak...
That's why he's using a gear box.
that's a cool little project. we had an even simpler automatic cat feeder at our house. when the cat got hungry, it would hunt something and eat it. haha. but your version is much cooler.
That is nice, though I would've added a real time clock and done everything in the micro.
I like the watch alarm idea! That's pretty low voltage though. What did you connect the watches too? Was it something like a logic level mosfet?
What's the output RPM from the motor?
Nice! I was thinking of doing a similar thing. I like how you use a simple timer. Good job. Now if you can only get something to clean up the cat poop for you and take it out to the garbage can. lol
If I went on vacation, my cats would chew through the wires and starve to death.
I do like the idea though of an automatic feeder because it would separate the cats' association between me and food. They're probably a little more kind to me because they know I make the food happen, but every time I'm near them they're like, "Do the food! Do the food!" So in that regard it would be nice if they viewed feedings as some kind of natural phenomenon outside of my control.
What if your feeding device turns on based on the weight of the dish? Calibrate the scale to read 0 ounces (or ounces of the dish) for when the dish is empty... and when the scale reads 0 oz (or ounces of the dish), the mechanism turns on. You can even set the device to turn off when the dish is full (xx.x oz... weight of dish when full). It's something I wouldn't know how to do, but you seem to know enough to be able to do this.
A different sort of valve would be required. I'm thinking about the archimedes screw.
That's a recipe for a fat cat.
Nice device !
better than the back to the future!
nice, well done!
I built mine recently using ESp8266 and open the door every hour for 75 seconds and close the door.
Cool vid.
cool why did you not just program the timing into the chip?
Adds unnecessary complexity? Wouldn't you need a battery backup and an interface to enter the date/time data?
i assume that would make the thing draw power constantly, as opposed to this setup
nice work。
Hi! I'm just starting programming Microchips and working with electronics. I was brought to circuits through my physics teacher, I used some Emulators to emulate circuits and learn how everything is working together. But know I'm kind of workless, I don't know what to do, so right now I'm considering building that thing too. Think I could do that with only a half year of experience with electronic circuits (Programming is easy for me)?
Btw, well done, I love that thing!
and...what if it stops working?
That is so awesome!
What happens if there's a power outage? :D
Hi, what's type motor used?
Where did you get this butterfly rubber dispenser?
Very nice
ingenious!
Nice little project.
Too bad you didn't stick an RTC on it to make it a little more elegant. The micro seems to be more than able to handle an RTC. :)
i need to get my son one of these so i don't have to wake up at 6am
а можно узнать схему сборки и код программы ?
What if you used a servo for the dispenser instead of having to use a gearbox? Granted the servo doesn't do a full 360 like the gearbox would, but you could still use some type of control for the amount the servo would open and use a butterfly valve to control the amount of food it would dispense.
So cool.
It would be interesting to have the cat self feed a certain amount, then a "good kitty" sound byte, from the owner, then they can't use it till the next interval. OR even a "good kitty" when it is time to feed, then a "food gone" sound byte at the end.
A pressure sensor could activate the good kitty, or food gone sound byte. Since cats are sensitive to movement you could have a KITT type LED to signal food time
Very interesting project with a lot of possibilities :)
:P
Can you tell me,, How did you program it? I mean the codes
THANK YOU,,, GOOD LUCK
Do i have to feel bad if i said that i wished you to be my father?
Sure, a servo would work.
Where did you get this butterfly rubber dispenser?
That would be too much food for my cat so I'm thinking of using a screw to push out food slowly instead with a PID controller and feedback from weight sensor.
Thanks for this video,l want to do this project in my final project exams, since am Electrical and Electronics engineering student, l need your help plizzz
OMG I WANT ONE
Good day sir,Can I ask for a help?how to make it?
Clever modification. Looks like a possible shock hazard for a curious cat.
Low voltage DC. Very unlikely.
@Retrode cat goes on a diet. from the looks of it, he'll be just fine missing a few meals.
lol hope it doesn't break while your gone.
I think it would have been a nicer, cheaper and a more practical solution to use a 4017 chip with a discrete BJT astable multivibrator or something similar. But ey, whatever works is good ;)
@czechsanchez01 why would he make something overly complicated for a quick fix.... you fail at keeping it simple.
schroedingers feeder...you either have a dead cat or a fat cat ;p
I hate the idea that the cat could rip the power cord out and then be stuck without food. Probably won't happen... but you never know.
where is there a timer? u fail @ arduino