South Georgia | WildBuckwheat - 6/11/2019 20:16
Adrian,
The boom tilt and raise/lower switches on my Hardi are very small switches soldered onto a circuit board. I am sure the switches don’t directly drive the solenoids, and that there is more complicated circuitry in between the switch and the solenoid. That is why the approach you stated would not work out well for me.
I did think of one other approach that would work. It would be better for pull type sprayers than self propelled sprayers? Disconnect the solenoids at the solenoid plugs and completely abandon all parts of the factory system. Make your own box with toggle switches for manual control. I guess in your case you could even connect that into your factory joystick handles.
If the homemade system fails, just plug the solenoids back into the factory harness.
Okay, I hadn't considered the factory switches being on a circuit board. Mine are in the hydrostat handle, and I'm pretty sure each runs down into the console to its own connector. The point that the switches don't directly drive the solenoids I thought could be a positive, as they could perhaps be low enough voltage and amperage that the Arduino may be able to control it directly, instead of dealing with relays and 12VDC. But then I haven't actually done any research on that either.
Your other suggestion may be the most universal. It wouldn't be as nice for a self propelled machine, but could probably be made fairly user friendly.
Adrian |
DIY auto boom height control
