Friendly wager: controlling high pressure hydraulics with Arduino

[superUnknown]

I was challenged that Arduinos couldn't reliably control industrial valves and that I would end up using a $500 PLC...I'm using a $2 MCU to settle this.

I used the Arduino to breadboard a little circuit to control my hydraulic rock crusher. I wanted to use an ATtiny in a home etched PCB. After struggling for a bit with the bootloader, I found out that Texas Instruments MSP430 MCUs come from the factory with the bootloader pre-installed!!! Less frustration, more CRUSHING? YAY!



The control itself is quite simple: the MCU monitors a pressure switch as well as forward/reverse selector; then if the pressure switch closes it de-energizes the forward hydraulic solenoid and briefly energizes the reverse hydraulic solenoid. It's an automatic crusher anti-jam!



Works like a charm!
You can see it working on my blog:
hydraulic crusher

[zener]

Whoever made that bet doesn't know much about Arduinos or electro hydraulics. I hope you got some money out of that. But if not then at least you got glory!

[superUnknown]

Yep, I'm the proud owner of a yet to be delivered 6 pack of Moosehead beer!