Vizier87
Active Member
Hello guys, I'm building a disdrometer for my weather station project. I'm currently using a piezo speaker from an old radio mounted on a cd (small type) disc to increase it's sensitivity. When rain hits the surface, the transducer gives some output.
I got no pictures yet, but I'll post it later.
I've checked the output from a scope, and to put simply: If I tap gently on the cd platter, the output goes to around 100mV in a flash, and for a stronger one (that I render would be equivalent to a large raindrop) is around 2V.
Question:
1. I don't know if the scope is not good, but is the output too big for a small piezo transducer? It's just around 4.5 cm in diameter.
2. I'm planning to use an LM386 to amplify the readings up to 5V max (to be fed into a PIC18F) so before I do that is that okay? Or are there better parts to use?
Thanks to John (jpanhalt) who suggested using SoundRuler to analyze the readings.
Here's the link to a less defined project: **broken link removed**
Cheers.
I got no pictures yet, but I'll post it later.
I've checked the output from a scope, and to put simply: If I tap gently on the cd platter, the output goes to around 100mV in a flash, and for a stronger one (that I render would be equivalent to a large raindrop) is around 2V.
Question:
1. I don't know if the scope is not good, but is the output too big for a small piezo transducer? It's just around 4.5 cm in diameter.
2. I'm planning to use an LM386 to amplify the readings up to 5V max (to be fed into a PIC18F) so before I do that is that okay? Or are there better parts to use?
Thanks to John (jpanhalt) who suggested using SoundRuler to analyze the readings.
Here's the link to a less defined project: **broken link removed**
Cheers.