Making an Arduino Touch Sensitive LED Sign

I love to work with electronics. In the near future I’m going work on a dedicated place for all the electronics work I do. To decorate this place I would like to build all kinds of cool stuff and gadgets. For starters I build this Arduino Touch Sensitive LED Sign.

Some time ago I found the Arduino capacitive touch library. Immediately I could think of several cool applications. For this project I use an Arduino Nano to detect when the sign is touched. I programmed a ON/OFF function and when the sign is touched for a couple of seconds the colour changes. When releasing the sign the present colour is selected.

A new experience with this Arduino Touch Sensitive LED Sign project, was polishing aluminium. I used five different grits of sanding paper and two polishing compounds. Getting this mirror finish took a good three hours. Maybe some good polishing equipment can help to speed thing up

.Although the engraving isn’t spot on, I’m happy with the result of the Arduino Touch Sensitive LED Sign. I’m sure it will look great when the new workshop is finished !

Arduino code

#include <Adafruit_NeoPixel.h>
#include <CapacitiveSensor.h>
#define PIN 10
#define LEDS 1

int DELAY_TIME = 500;
int COUNTER = 0;
boolean LIGHT_STATE = false;

Adafruit_NeoPixel strip = Adafruit_NeoPixel(LEDS, PIN ,NEO_GRB + NEO_KHZ800);
CapacitiveSensor   cs_4_2 = CapacitiveSensor(4,2);        // 1 megohm resistor between pins 4 & 2, pin 2 is sensor pin, attach to metal body 

void setup() {

  Serial.begin(9600);
  
   cs_4_2.set_CS_AutocaL_Millis(0xFFFFFFFF);     // turn off autocalibrate on channel 1 - just as an example
   Serial.begin(9600);
  
  strip.begin();
  strip.show();  //
  strip.setPixelColor(0, 69, 255, 0); // ORANGE RED
  strip.show();
 
}
 
void loop() {

 long total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

 if(total1>400)
 {
  COUNTER++ ;
 }

 else
 {
  COUNTER = 0; 
 }

if((total1>400) && (!LIGHT_STATE))     
{
  strip.setPixelColor(0, 69, 255, 0); // ORANGE RED
  strip.show();
  delay(400);
  LIGHT_STATE = true;
}

total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if((total1>400) && (LIGHT_STATE))
{

    strip.setPixelColor(0, 0, 0, 0); // ORANGE RED
  strip.show(); //.
  delay(400);
  LIGHT_STATE = false;
}

while(COUNTER>3)  // while loop to sellect the led colour
{
  
  strip.setPixelColor(0, 255, 0, 0); //GREEN
  strip.show(); //.
  delay(DELAY_TIME);

total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if(total1<400)
{
  break;
}

  strip.setPixelColor(0,0,  255, 0); //RED
  strip.show(); //.
  delay(DELAY_TIME);

total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if(total1<400)
{
  break;
}

  strip.setPixelColor(0, 0, 0,  255); //BLUE
  strip.show(); //.
  delay(DELAY_TIME);

total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if(total1<400)
{
  break;
}

    strip.setPixelColor(0, 69, 255, 0); // ORANGE RED
  strip.show(); //.
  delay(DELAY_TIME);

total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if(total1<400)
{
  break;
}

  strip.setPixelColor(0, 255, 255, 10); // YELLOW
  strip.show(); //.
  delay(DELAY_TIME);

total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if(total1<400)
{
  break;
}

  
strip.setPixelColor(0, 69, 139, 19); // BROWN
  strip.show(); //.
  delay(DELAY_TIME);

total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if(total1<400)
{
  break;
}

  strip.setPixelColor(0, 0, 139, 139); // Purple
  strip.show(); //. grb 
  delay(DELAY_TIME);

 
total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if(total1<400)
{
  break;
}



  strip.setPixelColor(0, 165, 218, 32); // GOLD
  strip.show(); //. grb 
  delay(DELAY_TIME);

total1 =  cs_4_2.capacitiveSensor(30);

if(total1<400)
{
  break;
}


}

}