(Affiliated to Visvesvaraya Technological University, Belgaum)

Cholanagar, R. T. Nagar Post, Bengaluru-560032

DEPARTMENT OF BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING

SYNOPSIS ON

DIGITAL TACHOMETER USING 8051 MICRO CONTROLLER

UNDER THE GUIDANCE OF DR.ASHWATH NARAYANA BS

TEAM MEMBERS
1.A Chaitanya Kumar Reddy (1RG20BM004)
2.Darshan BR(1RG20BM008)
3.Yashwanth L(1RG20BM029)
 ABSTRACT
A Tachometer is a device which measures the speed of a rotating object like an
electric motor or a crank shaft of a vehicle engine. Speed of an electric motor is
determined by the number of revolutions made by the motor in one minute. In
other words, speed is measured in RPM (Revolutions per Minute). Here, in this
project, we designed a simple Non – Contact or Contactless Digital Tachometer
using 8051 Microcontroller, which can measure speed with an accuracy of 1
rev/sec.

Outline
 Introduction
 Literature Survey
 Objectives
 Contactless Digital Tachometer Circuit
 Circuit Diagram of Contactless Digital Tachometer
 Components required
 Methodology
o Sensor Circuit Design
o Controller Circuit Design
o Microcontroller Code
 How to Operate the Contactless Digital Tachometer Circuit?
 Specifications
 Applications
 Uses of Digital Tachometer
 Limitations of the Circuit
 Conclusion

Introduction

Contactless Digital Tachometer involves a simple embedded system with a

sensor, a controller and an actuator. The sensor used here is Infrared (IR)
transmitter – receiver pair, the controller used is the 8051
Microcontroller loaded with a compiled code and the actuator is a display
device, for displaying the speed of the motor.
The sensor senses the speed of the motor without being in contact with it by the
principle of light transmission and reflection and generates a signal. This signal
is converted into an electric signal and fed to the microcontroller, which is
programmed to calculate the speed in terms of number of motor revolutions in
one minute. This speed is displayed on the 7-segment display.
Literature survey

The first mechanical tachometer was similar in operation to a centrifugal

governor. The inventor of the first mechanical tachometer is assumed to be a
German engineer Dietrich Uhlhorn; he used it for measuring the speed of
machines in 1817. Since after then, it has been used to measure the speed of
locomotives in automobiles, trucks, tractors and aircrafts. Early tachometer
designs were based on the principle of monostable multivibrator, which has one
stable state and one quasistable state. The circuit remained in a stable state,
producing no output. However, when it receives triggering current pulse from
the ignition system, the circuit transitions to the quasistable state for a given
time before returning to the stable state. This way, each ignition pulse produced
a pulse of fixed duration that was fed to the gauge mechanism. The more of
such fixed duration pulses the gauge received per second,

Objectives
• To design and implement digital tachometer.
• To study the basic circuit and behaviour of IC's and logic gates.
1.2 Significance
The main significance of this project includes:
• A tachometer has the capability to measure revolution per minute (rpm) of the
revolving shaft.

Contactless Digital Tachometer Circuit

A Tachometer is basically used to measure angular speed of a motor. It can be
mechanical device with a warm gear and spindle arrangement or an electrical
device which converts the angular speed into electrical signal. The electrical
tachometer in turn can be an AC tachometer or a DC tachometer.
While a conventional tachometer is a contact tachometer, which can produce
erroneous results due to change in contact parameters, a Contactless digital
tachometer is preferred which doesn’t requires any contact with the device
whose speed is to be measured.It basically works on the principle of retro
reflective scanning, wherein a light source device like LED transmits light
signal to the retro reflective target device which reflects the light, which is in
turn received by the light detector.
Circuit Diagram of Contactless Digital Tachometer

Components Required

 8051 Microcontroller
 8051 Development Board
 8051 Microcontroller Programmer
 IR Sensor Module (Reflective Type)
 4 – Digit 7 – Segment Display
 4 x 2N2222 NPN Transistors
 4 x 470Ω Resistors (1/4 Watt)
 8 x 100Ω Resistors (1/4 Watt)
 If Development Board is not used, then you need
o 11.0592 MHz Quartz Crystal
o 2 x 33pF Ceramic Capacitors
 o 2 x 10 KΩ Resistor (1/4 Watt)
o 10 µF Capacitor (Polarized)
o Push Button
o 1 KΩ x 8 Resistor Pack
Methodology

Sensor Circuit Design

The sensor circuit consists of an IR transmitter and an IR receiver. An IR LED

is used as the transmitter and a photo diode is used as the receiver. A reflective
type of IR sensor is used in this project. In this type, the IR transmitter and
receiver are placed side -by – side.

The IR transmitter circuit is very simple. The anode of the IR transmitter is

connected to 5V supply and the cathode is connected to ground through a
current limiting resistor of 150Ω. Thus, the IR transmitter starts emitting
infrared rays.

IR receiver used in the project is a photo diode and it must be connected in

reverse bias. The negative terminal or cathode is connected to 5V supply and
the positive terminal or anode is connected to ground through a current limiting
resistor of 10KΩ.

And finally, the output of the IR receiver is given to the comparator. The
comparator compares the input from the IR receiver with a reference value
(which is given through a 10KΩ Potentiometer). If the input from the IR
receiver is greater than the reference value, the output of the comparator will be
HIGH or else, the output will be LOW.

The following image shows the circuit diagram of the Reflective type IR Sensor
used in this project.
Controller Circuit Design

The controller circuit consists of the microcontroller and its interfaces. Here, we
chose AT89C52 microcontroller. Microcontroller reset circuit consists of a push
button, a resistor and a capacitor with values such that the voltage at the reset
pin doesn’t falls below 1.2V and the timing constant is never less than 100ms.
Here, we selected a 10 KΩ resistor and 10µF capacitor.

Since the oscillating frequency of the microcontroller is 11.0592MHz, we

selected the values of ceramic capacitors to be 33pF. The EA’ pin must be
pulled high via a 10KΩ resistor as we are not using any external memory.

The interfacing between the Microcontroller and the IR Sensor is accomplished

by connecting the output pin of the IR sensor to PORT3 pin P3.4. Next is the 4
– Digit 7 – Segment Display. The following image shows the pin out diagram of
this display
The Segment inputs of the 4 – Digit 7 – Segment display i.e. A, B, C, D, E, F, G
and DP are connected to PORT0 through individual 100Ω Resistors. The Digit
Selection Pins of the 4 – Digit 7 – Segment display (Dig1, Dig2, Dig3 and
Dig4) are connected to the Emitter terminals of 4 2N2222 NPN Transistors. The
base terminals of these Transistors are connected to PORT2 pins P2.0, P2.1,
P2.2 and P2.3 through 470Ω Resistors.

Microcontroller Code

Once the circuit is designed and drawn on a piece of paper, the next step is to
write and compile the code. Here, we used the Keil µVision software to write
the program in C language.

Prior to writing the code, general steps needs to be followed like creating a new
project and selecting the target device or the required microcontroller. Once the
code is written, we saved it with .c extension and then added it to the source file
group under the target folder. The code is then compiled by pressing F7 key.

Once the code is compiled, a hex file is created. In the next step, we use
Proteus software to draw the circuit. The code is dumped into the
microcontroller using an 8051 Microcontroller Programmer and the software
associated with it.

How to Operate the Contactless Digital Tachometer Circuit?

When the IR sensor is powered, the IR transmitter starts emitting IR rays. A

motor is placed in front of the IR sensor, with its shafted marked with a white
dot.As the motor shaft rotates such that the white spots comes in contact with
the sensor, the IR rays are reflected by the dot and falls on the IR receiver.
The photo diode, which is used as the IR receiver, starts conducting whenever
the IR rays are reflected.
At this point, the output of the IR sensor is given to the comparator and the
output of the comparator is HIGH when the IR rays are reflected and the output
of the comparator is LOW when there are no reflections.
Hence, the output of the comparator is in the form of an ON-OFF pulse.This
pulse is given to the microcontroller as a timer input and the microcontroller is
programmed to calculate the number of times the motor rotates in a second.
The speed of the motor is calculated by multiplying the value of final count by
60 to get the speed in revolutions per minute. This value is then displayed on the
4-digit 7-segment display.
Related Post
Specifications

Measures: RPM, surface speed and length

Measurement Unit: RPM, surface speed: inches, feet, yards, meters (per minute)
and length (inches, feet, yards, centimetre, meters)
Range:0.10 to 25,000 RPM with floating decimal
Accuracy: 0.10 to 999.99 RPM: ± 0.06 RPM; 1,000.0 to 9,999.9 RPM: ± 0.6
RPM; 10,000 to 25,000 RPM: ±0.006% RPM

Applications

1. The Contactless Digital Tachometer circuit can be used to calculate speed

of rotating wheels, discs and motor shafts.
2. This circuit can be used at places where direct contact with motor shafts
or wheels is not possible to be made, as in case of vehicles and also in
industrial machines.
3. This circuit can be used at homes to check speed of small battery operated
fans and other motor based devices.
4. Application:
5. It is used to measure rotational speed.
6. It can measure the flow of liquid with the help of an attached wheel with
an inclined angle.
7. It is applicable for the medical sector to measure the blood flow rate of the
patients.
8. It is used in vehicles to display the rate of engine crankshaft rotation.

Uses for Digital Tachometers

1.Digital tachometers have an extensive range of industrial and commercial

applications including
2.Modes of transport such as car, planes, trucks, tractors, trains, trams and light
rail
3.Industrial and farm machinery
4.Manufacturing facilities, and Research and education.
Limitations of the Circuit

1. The ICs used in this circuit are CMOS devices and are highly static, making
it impossible to touch them with bare hands.
2. It has limited lifetime due to use of battery for powering the circuit.
3. Speed calculation may be affected by the varying duty cycle of the timer .

Conclusion

The tachometer is one of the crucial elements in industrial motor control. Few
of its basic functions include monitoring of motor’s speed, counting, process
control, and ratio/draw application. Whereas it is applicable for equipment like
conveyors, windmill, rotary feeders, grinders, dryers, augers, elevators, etc. And
the suitable industries include power plants, recycling and chemical plants,
automotive and material handling, food and beverage, paper mills, etc. Now,
ensure the safety of your equipment and automobile by measuring the working
speed of an engine and maintaining the safe speed range with the help of a
tachometer. Some of our best-selling tachometer includes Beetech HTM 560 -
99999 RPM Non-Contact Tachometer, Kusam Meco KM 2234BL - 5 to 99999
RPM Non-Contact Digital Tachometer, and Metravi NCTM 500 - 99999 RPM