Inspiration

It was hot in the room and I was messing with a DC motor and realized that it would make a good fan. However, I wanted to automate it.

What it does

Automatically turns on a fan when it gets above a certain temperature in the room. You can configure the temperature requirement to turn on the fan using a Python GUI, and you can switch the units of temperature displayed on the LCD screen connected to it.

How I built it

I used an Arduino UNO for this project, and I hooked up a temperature sensor (DHT11), an LCD screen, and a DC motor (using the L293D chip). I also used pyserial to have the arduino communicate with a Python script i wrote.

Challenges we ran into

Had some issues communicating between the Arduino and the Python script (It was giving "zero" as the minimum requirement for temperature when I ran it. However, I was able to fix it by setting the minimum requirement only when the value wasn't zero.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

Managed to get the circuits done nicely (or at least nice for me).

What we learned

Learned how to use a temperature sensor, and I got much better at connecting circuits together.

What's next for AutoFan

Decorating and adding onto the GUI that controls the whole circuit a bit more.

Built With

Share this project:

Updates