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UNIVERSITI TEKNIKAL MALAYSIA MELAKA

THE DEVELOPMENT OF SMALL SCALE OF HYDROPONIC

SYSTEM

This report submitted in accordance with requirement of the Universiti Teknikal

Malaysia Melaka (UTeM) for the Bachelor of Electrical Engineering Technology

(Industrial Automation & Robotics) with Honours

by

MUHAMMAD HANAFI BIN MUJTAHIDIN

B071210177

910507-04-5383

FACULTY OF ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY 2015

UNIVERSITI TEKNIKAL MALAYSIA MELAKA

BORANG PENGESAHAN STATUS LAPORAN PROJEK SARJANA MUDA

TAJUK: THE DEVELOPMENT OF SMALL SCALE OF HYDROPONIC SYSTEM

SESI PENGAJIAN: 2014/15 Semester 2

Saya MUHAMMAD HANAFI BIN MUJTAHIDIN

mengaku membenarkan Laporan PSM ini disimpan di Perpustakaan Universiti Teknikal

Malaysia Melaka (UTeM) dengan syarat-syarat kegunaan seperti berikut:

1. Laporan PSM adalah hak milik Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka dan penulis. 2. Perpustakaan Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka dibenarkan membuat salinan untuk

tujuan pengajian sahaja dengan izin penulis. 3. Perpustakaan dibenarkan membuat salinan laporan PSM ini sebagai bahan pertukaran

antara institusi pengajian tinggi.

4. **Sila tandakan ( )

SULIT

TERHAD

TIDAK TERHAD

(Mengandungi maklumat yang berdarjah keselamatan atau

kepentingan Malaysia sebagaimana yang termaktub dalam

AKTA RAHSIA RASMI 1972)

(Mengandungi maklumat TERHAD yang telah ditentukan oleh

organisasi/badan di mana penyelidikan dijalankan)

Alamat Tetap:

JB 6892 LOT 2179

TAMAN PAHLAWAN

UMBAI MELAKA

Disahkan oleh:

Cop Rasmi:

** Jika Laporan PSM ini SULIT atau TERHAD, sila lampirkan surat daripada pihak berkuasa/organisasi

berkenaan dengan menyatakan sekali sebab dan tempoh laporan PSM ini perlu dikelaskan sebagai

SULIT atau TERHAD.

vi

DECLARATION

I hereby, declared this report entitled “The Development of Small Scale of

Hydroponic System” is the results of my own research except as cited in references.

Signature :………………………

Name : ………………………

Date : ………………………

vii

APPROVAL

This report is submitted to the Faculty of Engineering Technology of UTeM as a

partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Electrical

Engineering Technology (Industrial Automation & Robotics) with Honours. The

member of the supervisory is as follow:

……………………………….

(Khalil Azha Bin Mohd Annuar)

viii

ABSTRACT

In pursuit of modernity country and improve the living standards of the

people, economic activities and tree felling activities of a country cannot be avoided.

People often overlook the environmental problems developed from the

implementation of economic activity and activity logging. These activities led to a

few problem that will contributes to a huge differences in our environment.

Nowadays, so many land has been discovered for development especially in town.

This cause the lack of land that can be used for plantation and when most of the trees

been cutted. This project will improve the current traditional hydroponic method by

providing a system that can be used to monitor and control the important element in

order to help the plant grow up smoothly. This proposed system is quite efficient and

user friendly which can be used by anyone. This project is a combination of

traditional hydroponic system and smart phone. This project is actually been

suggested after observing the needs of our environment and the behavior of people

nowadays whom cannot live without their smart phone. In future, this project will

help in encourage people to use hydroponic method in any plantation activities. Also,

maybe that someday that this project can help other developer‟s project to function

smoothly and comfortably in order to give a great service not just for users, but also

to people that have the interest in trying something new. There are a few steps need

to be completed before this project can be used widely. This report will explain every

details about this project from software and hardware development until its final

form.

ix

ABSTRAK

Pada hari ini kita sedang menghadapi banyak masalah yang melibatkan alam

sekitar kita. Kita boleh melihat dengan jelas pada masa kini bahawa terdapat banyak

pokok telah ditebang, peningkatan pemanasan global dan masalah kesihatan. Dalam

usaha untuk mengurangkan masalah ini dan menyelamatkan bumi kita, kita perlu

mencari jalan penyelesaian atau cara alternatif lain untuk membantu memulihkan

alam sekitar kita. Seperti yang kita lihat, terdapat banyak cara alternatif untuk

membesarkan tumbuhan dan kaedah hidroponik adalah salah satu teknik yang terus

mendapat tempat dalam bidang pertanian ini. Projek ini akan menaiktaraf kaedah

hidroponik tradisional semasa dengan menyediakan satu sistem yang boleh

digunakan untuk memantau dan mengawal elemen penting bagi membantu tumbuhan

membesar dengan lancar. Sistem yang dicadangkan agak cekap dan mesra pengguna

serta boleh digunakan oleh pelbagai lapisan masyarakat. Projek ini adalah gabungan

sistem hidroponik tradisional dan telefon pintar. Projek ini sebenarnya telah

diilhamkan selepas memerhatikan keperluan persekitaran dan tingkah laku pengguna

pada masa kini yang sentiasa bersama telefon pintar mereka. Pada masa akan datang,

projek ini diharap dapat membantu dalam menggalakkan orang ramai menggunakan

kaedah hidroponik dalam mana-mana aktiviti pertanian dan perladangan. Selain itu,

diharap suatu hari nanti bahawa projek ini dapat membantu para pereka cipta lain

untuk untuk mencipta sesuatu yang berfungsi dengan lancar dan selesa bagi

memberikan perkhidmatan yang besar bukan sahaja kepada pengguna, tetapi juga

kepada mereka yang mempunyai keinginan dalam mencuba sesuatu yang baru.

Terdapat beberapa langkah yang perlu diambil sebelum projek ini boleh digunakan

secara meluas. Laporan ini akan menerangkan setiap butiran mengenai projek ini dari

perisian untuk pembangunan perkakasan sehinggalah bentuk akhirnya.

x

DEDICATIONS

Dedicated to my beloved parents Tuan Haji Mujtahidin bin Husin and Puan Hajah

Aishah bt Abdul Wahab.

Also to my late grandfather Tuan Haji Abdul Wahab bin Haji Hashim

xi

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First of all, I want to thank to Allah S.W.T for giving me the chance of

completing my Final Year Project successfully just in time. I had to face some

challenges and problems throughout this final two semesters in completing this

subject due to lack of knowledge and information related to this project.

Luckily, my supervisor guides me throughout this final two semesters until

the end and I would like to give my fullest gratitude and thank you to him, En Khalil

Azha bin Mohd Annuar thousands of thanks to him for giving me support, assisted

me when I‟m having problem with my project and report, explained and suggested to

me his opinions on some of the problems that I faced, until I manage to finish this

project smoothly.

I would also like to express my thanks to my mom and dad for all the support

and patience they gave to me during this four years of study. Special thanks also to

my friend Mr Awang bin Ramli and Dheeya Farhana bt Hamedon for the help they

provided me and the knowledge that he share. I will remember it as long as I can and

share it with everyone that maybe someday will be needing my help.

xii

TABLE OF CONTENT

DECLARATION ........................................................................................................ vi

APPROVAL ............................................................................................................... vii

ABSTRACT .............................................................................................................. viii

ABSTRAK .................................................................................................................. ix

DEDICATIONS ........................................................................................................... x

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT .......................................................................................... xi

TABLE OF CONTENT ............................................................................................. xii

LIST OF FIGURES .................................................................................................. xiv

LIST OF TABLES ................................................................................................... xvii

LIST OF SYMBOL AND ABBREVIATION ............................................................. 1

CHAPTER 1 ................................................................................................................ 2

1.0 Introduction ................................................................................................... 2

1.1 Project Developement ................................................................................... 3

1.2 Problem Statement ........................................................................................ 4

1.3 Objective of the Project ................................................................................ 5

1.4 Scope ............................................................................................................. 6

1.5 Report Outline ............................................................................................... 7

CHAPTER 2 ................................................................................................................ 8

2.0 Introduction ................................................................................................... 8

2.1 Literature Review .......................................................................................... 8

2.1.1 Arduino UNO ......................................................................................... 8

2.1.2 Float Switch ......................................................................................... 10

2.1.3 Water Pump .......................................................................................... 12

2.1.4 pH Sensor ............................................................................................. 14

2.1.5 GSM (Global System for Mobile)........................................................ 17

2.1.6 DC Motor ............................................................................................. 19

xiii

2.1.7 Phosporic Acid ..................................................................................... 21

2.1.8 Potassium Hydroxide ........................................................................... 23

CHAPTER 3 .............................................................................................................. 24

3.0 Introduction ................................................................................................. 24

3.1 Methodology of Project ............................................................................... 24

3.2 Methodology of Software Development ..................................................... 25

3.2.1 Software Part of Hardware Development ............................................ 27

3.3 Methodology of Hardware Development .................................................... 31

3.3.1 Mechanical part of Hardware Development ........................................ 32

3.4 Methodology of Overall Project Development ........................................... 47

CHAPTER 4 .............................................................................................................. 52

4.0 Introduction ................................................................................................. 52

4.1 Experimental Setup ..................................................................................... 53

4.1.1 Procedure for 0.1M of potassium hydroxide, KOH in 1000mL stock solution 53

4.1.2 Procedure for 0.1M of phosphoric acid, H3PO4 in 1000mL stock solution 53

4.2 Signal Obtained from pH Sensor ................................................................. 55

4.3 Data of Water Acidity Level ....................................................................... 58

4.4 System Testing ............................................................................................ 61

4.4.1 STATUS Command ............................................................................. 61

4.4.2 ON HIGH Command ........................................................................... 61

4.4.3 ON LOW Command ............................................................................ 62

4.5 Result Comparison of Conventional Hydroponic System with Modern Hydroponic System ................................................................................................ 63

CHAPTER 5 .............................................................................................................. 67

5.0 Introduction ................................................................................................. 67

5.1 Conclusions ................................................................................................. 67

5.2 Recommendations ....................................................................................... 68

5.3 Project Potential .......................................................................................... 68

APPENDIX A ............................................................................................................ 71

APPENDIX B ............................................................................................................ 72

APPENDIX C ............................................................................................................ 73

xiv

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 2 1: Arduino UNO board .................................................................................. 9

Figure 2.2: Arduino UNO board pin directory. ......................................................... 10

Figure 2 3: Horizontal type float switch .................................................................... 11

Figure 2.4: Sunsun JP-032 water pump ..................................................................... 12

Figure 2 5: Sunsun JP-023 water pump ..................................................................... 13

Figure 2.6: Atlatis Scientific pH probe ...................................................................... 16

Figure 2.7: Arduino GSM shield-SIM 900 pin .......................................................... 18

Figure2.8: 12 volt DC Motor ..................................................................................... 20

Figure 2.9: Main sector that use phosporic acid ........................................................ 21

Figure 2.10: basic concentration formula of phosporic acid. ..................................... 22

Figure 2.11: Phosporic acid........................................................................................ 22

Figure 2.12: Potassium Hydroxide ............................................................................. 23

Figure 3.1: Project flow chart..................................................................................... 24

Figure 3.2: Flow Chart of software development ...................................................... 26

Figure 3.3: Flowchart of coding process .................................................................... 28

Figure 3.4: Parts that linked with Arduino ................................................................. 30

Figure 3.5: Flow chart of hardware development ...................................................... 31

Figure 3.6: Design of water tank using solid work .................................................... 33

Figure 3.7: Water tank................................................................................................ 34

Figure 3.8: Process of designing water tank .............................................................. 34

Figure 3.9: Design of hydroponic tank using solid work ........................................... 35

Figure 3.10: Process of installing float switch in the hydroponic tank ...................... 36

Figure 3.11: Process of designing hydroponic tank ................................................... 36

Figure 3.12: Design of hydroponic cover with vase port using solid work ............... 37

Figure 3.13: Process of design hydroponic cover with vase port .............................. 38

Figure 3.14: Process of design hydroponic cover with vase port .............................. 38

Figure 3.15: Design of vase using solid work ............................................................ 39

Figure 3.16: Process of designing vase ...................................................................... 39

xv

Figure 3.17: Process of installing thread or cotton into vase ..................................... 40

Figure 3.18: Process of installing vase into vase port at hydroponic tank cover ....... 40

Figure 3.19: Designed metal rod of 22 inch using solid work ................................... 41

Figure 3.20: Designed metal rod of 36 inch using solid work ................................... 42

Figure 3.21: Designed metal rod of 16.5 inch using solid work ................................ 42

Figure 3.22: Designed framework using solid work .................................................. 43

Figure 3.23: Process of combining metal rod to form a framework .......................... 43

Figure 3.24: Process of finalizing the combining metal rod to form a framework .... 44

Figure 3.25: Complete design of framework ............................................................. 44

Figure 3.26: Completed hardware design using solid work ....................................... 45

Figure 3.27: Upper part of hardware design .............................................................. 45

Figure 3.28: Lower part of hardware design .............................................................. 46

Figure 3.29: Overall hardware design ........................................................................ 46

Figure 3.30: Overall hardware design ........................................................................ 47

Figure 3.31: Flow Chart of Overall Project Development ......................................... 48

Figure 3.32: Process of combining mechanical part and software part ..................... 49

Figure 3.33: Completed combination of mechanical part and software part ............. 49




Figure 4.1: Sketch flow of water, Phosporic Acid and Phosporus Acid .................... 52

Figure 4.2: Preparation of KOH and H3PO4 ............................................................. 54

Figure 4.3: Sample of 0.1M of KOH and H3PO4...................................................... 54

Figure 4.4: Weighing scale ........................................................................................ 54

Figure 4.5: Data from pH sensor presented in Arduino‟s serial monitor ................... 56

Figure 4.6: Real term software ................................................................................... 57

Figure 4.7: Data and Graph of pH 7 (neutral) ............................................................ 58

Figure 4.8: Data and Graph of pH below 7 (acidic) ................................................... 59

Figure 4.9: Data and Graph of pH larger than 7 (alkaline) ........................................ 60

Figure 4.10: Feedback obtained for STATUS command........................................... 61

Figure 4.11: Feedback obtained for ON HIGH command ......................................... 62

Figure 4.12: Feedback obtained for ON LOW command .......................................... 62

Figure 4.13: Seeds that planted in the vase for the conventional hydroponic system 63

xvi

Figure 4.14: Result of week 1 .................................................................................... 63





Figure 4.19: Part of plant measured ........................................................................... 66

xvii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Specification of Sunsun water pump JP-032 ............................................... 12

Table 2: Sunsun JP-032 water pump specification .................................................... 13

Table 3: Type of plant and pH. .................................................................................. 15

Table 4: Specification of Atlatis Scientific pH probe ................................................ 16

Table 5: Comparison between conventional and modern hydroponic method .......... 60

1

LIST OF SYMBOL AND ABBREVIATION

GSM Global System Monitoring

USB Universal Serial Bus

pH Potential Hydrogen

DC Direct Current

KOH Potassium Hydroxide

H3PO4 Phosphoric Acid

SMS Short Messaging Services

PWM Pulse Width Modulation

W Watt

V Voltage

L/h Litre/hour

EPA Environmental Protection Agency

CO2 Carbon Dioxide

Hz Hertz

IDE Integrated Development

Environment

2

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1.0 Introduction

Hydroponics is the activities of planting without soil. Most people thought of

hydroponics, when they think of plants that grown with their roots drown directly

into water with no growing medium. This is actually referred as Nutrient Film

Technique (N.F.T )

Hydroponics provides healthier, desease free plants and faster than growing

in soil. In soil less culture, plants are cultivated using a liquid solution of water and

nutrients. Plants need light, water, nutrients, and carbon dioxide order to grow.

Appopriate temperature and suitable level of nutrients are important for the plants to

grow. There are so many types of plant that can be grow up using hydroponic

method such as lettuces, tomatoes, celery and etc. In hydroponics, all its nutrients are

delivered directly to it's roots by bypassing the soil, which is much faster and

efficeient at providing all the nutrients need to the plant. to the plant. Also In

hydroponics, all that we are are doing is providing nutrients directly to a plant's roots

because roots can only take in pure elements.

Together with hydroponics, the particular facilities are usually expanded

within an inert developing medium (see below) as well as a correctly well-balanced

pH adjusted vitamin solution will be transported to the particular root base in the

remarkably soluble type. This gives the plant the advantages to absorb its nutrients

with very little effort as compared to soil where the roots must search out the

nutrients and extract them and this explains why some root are big and long. This is a

fact even when using rich, organic soil and top of the line nutrients. The energy spent

3

by the roots in this process is should be better spent on vegetative development and

flower production.

1.1 Project Developement

The developement of small scale of hydroponic system are the title chosen

this project where the main idea of this project is to use the Global System for

Mobile (GSM) as a monitoring method for hydroponic cultivation. The cellphone

will be the tools for user to get the current status of their plant and control the pH

value. Basically, the ph sensor will send input data which is the current water ph to

arduino and arduino will transfer the data to cellphone using GSM. The

programming of the Arduino is burn by using Arduino Programmer Editor and

transfered using USB cable from computer port. The motivation for this project

came after observing the needs nowadays.

For example, hydroponics method provides more quality product and use less

space. The conventional method nowadays use so many chemical products and took

a lot of space for cultivation. We can reduce this problem by improve a several

element and start producing a healthy product for a better living in future.

Futhermore, cultivation need a lot of intensive care to avoid the product from

infected by desease or parasite. Since people are too busy for intensive care due to

daily work or routine, the idea to use mobile phone for intensive care splited outsince

mobile phone and man nowadays cannot be saparated. By using mobile phone, user

can monitor the plant by using the technology that they are familiar with,

4

1.2 Problem Statement

In pursuit of modernity country and improve the living standards of the

people, economic activities and tree felling activities of a country cannot be avoided.

People often overlook the environmental problems developed from the

implementation of economic activity and activity logging. These activities led to a

few problem that will contributes to a huge differences in our environment.

Nowadays, so many land has been discovered for development especially in

town. This cause the lack of land that can be used for plantation and when most of

the trees been cutted. We know that since there are limitation for plantation, many

problem will occur such as raise in price for raw materials and due to limitation of

land, only a few products or plant can be planted and of course, only plant that have

high request from user will be considered as important and been planted widely. Not

only that, price for plant that didn‟t get a high request from user will raise since it is

so hard to get due to limitation of land that can be used for this products‟ plantation.

As we known, there are so many erosion of lands that cause death and

losses each year. The land loss all its strength when the trees that hold‟em gone.

When its raining, the land will experience direct hit from the raindrops and this is

one of the factors that cause erosion of land. The disssaperence of trees in most of the

land is actually cause the increase in temperature. The trees is actually indeed help us

to reduce the environmental temperature increases. Deforestation causes temperature

increases locally because there is no canopy layer that prevents sunlight from

reaching the ground.

Forest burning for agricultural causing air pollution. For example, poor

haze caused by open burning that occur on a large scale in Sumatra and Kalimantan,

Indonesia in 1997. In addition, deforestation in the end of the river also causes water

and air pollution. When forests are been being eliminated, the rain will erode the

exposed soil slowly. The eroded materials will be taken to the river and deposited on

the riverbed. At the end, the water becomes turbid and cloudy which is not good for

living things.

5

In an old school soil-based garden, plants wastes a huge amount of its

strength designing a complex root circuit because it has to seek all over the soil for

its meals. Futhermore, in soil-based plant, the chances of having plant with worms

and pest are high. As we can see, some pests and worms lived in soil environment,

the risk of having them in our plant is high since the activity is placed in the

environment that conquered by them. Not only that, in order to eliminate them or

avoiding them from damaging their plant, some farmer put pesticides on their plant

and in some cases, they poisoned the soil just to make sure that these creatures didn‟t

eat or damaging their plant. This might be effective in eliminating these creatures but

we should not forget that this action will also effect the plant as they absorbs

nutrients from the poisoned soil as well. User will be enjoying poisonous food and

many health problems will brings effect on them later on.

Thus, Hydroponic is an alternative method to overcome these problem and

this method will offer more healthier and desease-less products and help us to save

environment from all these problem.

1.3 Objective of the Project

To realize this project, the project objectives have been finished in duration

time granted. The main target of this project is to invent a smart system that can

monitored and control pH value which is one of the main factor that effect the

growth of an hydroponic plant. Basically, the idea of this project is also to encourage

people to apply the hydroponic method as the sollution for all the problem stated

before. This poject will improvise the current hydroponic system by adding the

controller to control the pH and adding the usage of mobile phone for monitoring.

This project will offer an alternative way to overcome these problem and help to

provide clean, desease-less and healthier products for a better future development.

6

1.4 Scope

This project is one of the small fundamental that has been prepared in the

earlier of the semester. Scope of this project will include:-

i. The usage of arduino as a controller. The input for arduino is gained

from ph sensor. Then this input data will be send to cellphone using

Global System for Mobile (GSM) when user send message for status

of their plant.

ii. User also can control the value of pH by using mobile phone. User

can choose either to increase or decrease the value of pH according to

the plant‟s need. There will be two water pump that will pump out the

water nutrient mix into the main tank.

iii. The choosing of sensor and other component is choosen after doing

some research from the journal, books, internet, tutorials, megazines,

and other resources and discussion between the experience in

hydroponic fields and project supervisor.

iv. Planting a few plant manually will be the beginning of this project.

This is important step to measure the data needed for this project such

as the pH value and the time taken for the plant to grow up.

v. After collecting all the data from day 1 (planting seed) until day 30

(estimated day for seed to produce product) , project will be proceed

based on the data gained.

7

1.5 Report Outline

For this study‟s report, there are five chapters included in order to explain

everything. For Chapter 1 is introduction, shows the general information included in

every other reports, such as introduction of the studies, problem statements,

objectives and scopes.

While for Chapter 2 is the literature review, this chapter will share some

previous studies that some are related about the component that were used in this

project. Each component that were used in this project are also used in other project

and literature review about other usage are focussed more on this chapter.

Meanwhile in Methodology for Chapter 3 of this studies will explain the

procedures from design process using software from software developement until

mechanical and hardware developement

In chapter 4 covered the analysis and discussion of this study, and also shows

the results obtained from all the experiment and test conducted for this project

Last but not least Chapter 5 that discussed about the conclusion for this study.

Here, the conclusion was made based on the results obtained and some suggestion

for references in the future studies.

8

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

2.0 Introduction

This chapter explains about previous project in which are related to this

project and research theories will be discussed. The information from this topic will

be advantages and additional source for implement this project more successfully.

The literature review has been done for a clear explaination and better vision about

the project. This chapter can be summarized as the fundamental and basic

information that contained the theories of the components, equipment and

programming that is used in the project.

2.1 Literature Review

2.1.1 Arduino UNO

Arduino UNO R3 is a microcontroller board which contains 14 digital input

and output pins which 6 of it can act as PWM outputs, and another 6 act as analog

inputs. It also includes with a 16 MHz crystal oscillator, a USB connection, a power

jack, an ICSP header, and a reset button. It contains everything needed to support the

microcontroller by simply connect it to a computer using a USB cable or power it

with a DC adapter or battery to get started. There are a few types of arduino board

that used nowadays but the most commonly used nowadays are arduino UNO and

MEGA. The difference between these two is only the number of input and output

pins which arduino MEGA have better number of input and output pins compared to

9

arduino UNO. In these modern day, Arduino are commonly used in microcontroller

programing among other things due to its user friendly and easy to use setting, like

any microcontroller, an Arduino is a small circuit board with chip that can be

programmed to do numerous number of tasks, it sends information from the

computer program to the Arduino microcontroller and finally to the specific circuit

or machine with multiple circuits in order to execute the specific command.

According to Yusuf Abdullahi Badamas, Arduino can help to read

information from input devices such as sensors, antenna, Trimmer (potentiometer)

and can also send information to output devices such as LED, Speakers, LCD

Screen, and DC motor. According to Shamsul Aizal Zulkifli and Mohd Najib Russin,

Arduino also can be used as microcontroller for 3 phase inverter while Tiffany Tang

state that there were also a project that linking Arduino with Kinect to control motion

This shows that there are so many application an Arduino can be used for and in this

project, Arduino will be used to process data gained from ph sensor before being

transmitted to mobile phone. Arduino also will be used to turn on the water pump

and motor.

Figure 2 1: Arduino UNO board

10

Figure 2.2: Arduino UNO board pin directory.

2.1.2 Float Switch

Craig Schneider state that the purpose of a float switch is to open or close a

circuit as the level of a liquid rises or falls. Most float switches are in normally

closed position, meaning that the two wires coming from the top of the switch

complete a circuit when the float is at its low point, resting on its bottom clip. To

complete a circuit, float switches utilize a magnetic reed switch, which consists of

two contacts sealed in a glass tube. When a magnet comes close to the two contacts,

they become attracted to each other and touch, allowing current to pass through. In a

float switch, the magnetic reed switch is hermetically sealed in a stem, most often

made from plastic or stainless steel. The float encases a sealed magnet, which moves

up and down the length of the stem as a fluid level rises and falls. As the magnet

passes by the contacts in the encased reed switch, they touch and complete a circuit

between the two lead wires, as shown in the cutaway below.

These are the basic principle of floating switch however, there are a few

different purpose of float switch in the previous study. For example a study

conducted by Mei-Chao Yeh shows that some of the project use float switch to

improve power performance. Another advance application in some previous work

done by Muhammad Talha Gul used float switch for phase shifting. For this project,

float switch is used to turn of the water pump by stopping it when the water pumped

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