Hi I'm having a problem with the robotic xylophone poject you did. I'm building one for my capstone at ITT. I need to know what mosfet you used between the voltage regulators and the solenoids. I understand they are a P-channel MOSFET. But not much was explained about them in the video or on the page for the project. the model number would be the best thing for me cause then i could order some of them, but any assistance is greatly appreciated! thanks so Much.

Drew Clark

Hi Drew,

The MOSFETS we used are n-channel mosfets. I believe they are the same 2n7000s that are included in the kit. Either way, when doing a project like this you should always take the time to figure out what sort of current requirements you need, and pick your components based on that.

I also very much recommend you take the time to go over the Motors and Microcontrollers Tutorial. Driving the inductive load of a solenoid is very similar to driving a motor.

Humberto

thanks very much i was just confused cause the schematic shows p-chanel MOSFETS.

Hi quickpenn,

I went and double checked the schematics on the Robotic Xylophone page, the schematics on that page all use a very common symbol for an n-channel mosfet with an arrow pointing out of the source node.

Humberto

huh. then it seems my teacher is a moron. your definately right though. i had to look it up in my digital book. NPN (not pointing in) lol. thanks again!

Hi. having major troubles compiling the xylophone.c file. would there be away to get a zipped pre-compiled version of the files i need to load into this microcontroller? or can someone contact me so I cant get this working. the whole project is built and done but I don't know how to use cgwyn. This project is due friday 8/26/11 and i really need major help!!!! I am not a programmer! so, even though i understand the basics of programming a microcontoller, i have only used proview for the c51 family of controllers. tried using proview to compile this file and after i added the correct libraries it was giving me syntax errors in stdint.h I would like to chat with someone and have them walk me through this! thanks!

Drew