The Bathtub Becomes Automated and Arduino-Compatible

Furniture & Lighting
raptor_demon’s Arduino Compatible Bathtub Controller: complete with soothing bubbles
raptor_demon’s Arduino Compatible Bathtub Controller: complete with soothing bubbles

After a grueling 3-hour workweek, there’s nothing like coming home and soaking in a hot bubble bath. The problem is, most of us are too tired to even attempt to turn on the water, much less pour in the bubble-bath concoction. Lucky for us, inventor raptor_demon has made it remarkably easier to turn on the hot water and add our bubble flavor of choice with the help of an Atmel microcontroller.

 

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His design uses an Arduino-compatible Atmel ATmega328P microcontroller to trip three relays, one for a fill-valve and pump, one to dispense soap and for the drain-valve and pump. Filling the tub with water is time-based rather than using a floatation-switch, which is calibrated manually. To monitor the temperature of the water in the tub, raptor housed another Atmel microcontroller sealed inside of a rubber duck (my favorite part). The duck sends the temperature data wirelessly (using a 434MHz transmitter) to the other controller (AKA- Bath Computer v2), which can then be monitored on an Adafruit LCD Shield.

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Using his setup allows users to take a bath by just pressing a button on the control box rather than doing everything by hand, because taking a soothing bath shouldn’t be an ‘manual ordeal’. Raptor is looking to upgrade a future version for use within an IoT environment and integrate it into smart-home platforms. I can see it now… one button for remote bath running… then flooding. Do that yourself at Instructables!

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