When I first started on this project I wanted to do something with coffee cups. I realized that I have a habit of twisting my cap when I drink my coffee. With this I made a project that when I twist the cap in a certain position, it lights up the two LEDs at the top, but when I keep twisting the lights go off because the circuit ends.
Firstly, I attached a 9 volt battery inside the cup. I made the ground connect to one side and the power to another. I also used to copper wire as the switch, and in some way, glue for the wires.
Next, I hooked up the two LEDs with a 330 ohm resistor. I didn’t have a soldering gun so I twisted the cables and attached them with black wire. This part I had the most trouble with because I couldn’t figure out why the LEDs did not light up when I connected the cables. Later I solved the problem with a little more work.
Here, you can see that I hooked up the ground and power with a copper wire to two sides of the cap. It was a little difficult to attach the wires with the copper, since I ran out, but I managed to make it work. This was a easy process that just required me to make sure the ground and power are in the right spot.
In this image you can see that i made sure to put the two copper wires in the same spot on the cap and the cup. This is to make sure when the cap twists, the two wires will conduct together and the battery will reach the LEDs. I had to connect the ground on the cup, to ground on the cap. I did this by having cool colors in the wires be ground, and warm colors the power.
Lastly, when the the cap is twisted in the right direction, the LEDs on the top of the cap light up. This is done by the two sides if the copper wires matching up and creating a switch. When the wires touch the switch is closed and lights go up, but when you twist the cap some more, the circuit ends and the LEDs go off.
Paulina Zlahoda