Resistance of a mouse?

[Pommie]

Trying to build a better mouse trap for my daughter. Looking to do something similar to this,

I'm guessing that the mouse bridges the two aluminium coated parts and causes the spin. Thought I'd try something similar but have no mice to test with. I'll probably test it by bridging the gap with my fingers but no idea if this will be even remotely close. I know larger animals can be killed by relatively low (50V) voltages which suggest a low resistance so maybe mice are much higher. Anyone any idea?

Second, assuming a resistance of 1MOhm and a 12V supply, I'll get a current of 12uA. Will feeding this into the base of a small signal NPN produce enough conduction to register in the collector current. Assuming a gain of 100 will give me a collector current of ~1.2mA, is this correct?

Thanks,

Mike.

 

[gophert]

Restart by playing with a good ohm meter. Measure across two fingers on same hand, two fingers opposite hands, you'll see that resistance depends on distance. Also, resistance depends on dry vs salty/sweaty hands. Not all animals sweat, fur conducts less than skin.

you might want to look at other physical properties than resistance and do some experiments.

 

[shortbus=]

I'm guessing that the mouse bridges the two aluminium coated parts and causes the spin.

Been thinking about this. Wouldn't a capacitive sensor work better than a resistive one?

Capacitive sensing - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Pommie]

I've decided to use an optical beam to trigger it as I can also use it to level the platform.

Mike.