Magnetic Stirbar Lamp

A lamp that uses a spinning magnetic stir bar to swirl an illuminated flask of liquid. Still a work in progress

Overview

My vision is a lamp that illuminates a spinning flask of liquid – and maybe some floating iridescence! It will have a speed control dial to regulate the motor speed, and a capacitive touch sensor to cycle through different light patterns. I have aspirations of doing some woodworking to build the case/frame, though that is likely very far away at this point.

Components

Assembly

So far this is such a work in progress that really all I have are tests that I’ve run to see if the basic components I have will work. The majority of this thing is currently just a salsa container, a destroyed baby bottle, and the cap to a bottle of orange juice – so really it’s currently a literal pile of trash.

Testing the use of the potentiometer to control the motor speed via PWM. I suspect this motor isn’t going to be good enough – its torque is just too weak, and it doesn’t start spinning until like it’s at >50% of it PWM power.

Testing the use of the potentiometer to control the motor speed via PWM. I suspect this motor isn’t going to be good enough – its torque is just too weak, and it doesn’t start spinning until like it’s at >50% of it PWM power.

A NeoPixel chain to play with light patterns.

Testing the capacitive touch sensor and light patterns with a testing board.

Testing the capacitive touch sensor and light patterns with a testing board.

Code

Future Improvements