For the first half of the week, I spent most of my time looking at different solenoid options before placing an order. There are different types of solenoids — push type, pull type, and push-pull type. For the external actuator system, push system might be the most intuitive option; however, push solenoids are more expensive than pull solenoids in general. Then, I looked at Adafruit and found that their solenoids are actually push-pull type and offers a reasonable price for their small solenoids. So, for this week, I ordered ONE small solenoid from Adafruit to see if their solenoid is, indeed, push-pull type and its push is enough to play a key on the keyboard we got from the receiving.
I also designed a super rough circuit to just test the push-pull solenoid, which I am attaching below:
For the testing, I would only need a regular power supply that’s already in the A level lab, but for the future building process, I would need to request a “beefier” power supply, which I will reach out to Prof. Budnik to ask about the model that I used in his control systems class.