How to Build Arduino Weighing

Scales
By p_leriche in CircuitsArduino

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Introduction: How to Build Arduino

Weighing Scales
By p_lericheFollow
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At the Restart Project in London we hold repair events

where members of the public are invited to bring in all
manner of electrical and electronic items for repair, so as
to save them from landfill. A few months ago (at an event
I didn't actually attend) someone brought in some faulty
kitchen weighing scales which nobody could fix.

Never having seen inside any digital weighing scales and

not knowing how they work, I took it as a challenge to
research them, in the process, building two versions of
my own.

If you wish to build your own weighing scales or

incorporate a weighing function in a wider project, you
can use this Instructable as a basis, whatever your
requirements, from weighing fractions of a gram up to
many kilograms.

Hence I will concentrate on the electronics, the software

and the underlying principles. How you realise your own
project is completely up to you.

I will also show you how to calibrate them, even if you

don't have any standard weights.

Having done my research and having validated it by

building my own scales, I wrote up the principles of
weighing scales, including whatever I could deduce
about fault-finding, in the Restart Project Wiki. Go and
take a look!
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Step 1: Choosing Your Load Cells
All digital weighing scales are built around either a 4-
terminal load cell or four 3-terminal load cells. Which to
get depends on what sort of scales you want to make.
They are all electrically compatible and fairly cheap so
you can change your mind later, or get more than one
type to experiment with.

For kitchen or postal scales with a maximum load in the

range of 100g to 10kg, you can get 4-terminal load cells
consisting of an aluminium bar. This is mounted
horizontally, supported at one end and supporting the
weighing platform at the other. It has 4 strain gauges
attached to it. I explain fully how it works in
my wiki article so I shan't repeat it here.

These are less suitable for heavier loads such as

bathroom scales, where a person's full weight, not
necessarily centred on the platform, is better supported
by 4 load cells supporting the 4 corners of the platform.

This is where four 3 terminal load cells are more suitable.

Ones rated at 50kg each are widely available, which
together will weigh up to 200kg.

Others with even higher ratings are designed for

suspending the weight to be measured after the fashion
of luggage scales
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Step 2: What Else You Need
In addition to your load cell or load cells, you will need:
 An Arduino. You can use virtually any type you like but I
used the Nano as it has the USB interface built-in and
still only costs a few pounds.
 A HX711 module. This may come bundled with your load
cell but is available very cheaply as a separate item from
many sources.
 For prototyping, a 400 point breadboard, jumper leads,
pin and socket strips.
You will also need wood, plastic, screws, glue, or
whatever you require for your particular version of the
project.
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Step 3: Preparing the Parts
To use the HX711 module on the breadboard, solder a
4-wide pinstrip to the interface pins (GND, DT, SCK,
VCC) of the HX711.

For easy connection and disconnection of the load cell

(particularly if you're experimenting with more than one
sort) solder a 6-wide pin socket strip to the analogue
pins. (You only need the E+, E-, A- and A+ pins but I
fitted a 6-wide strip anyway in case I wanted to
experiment with the other two.)

If you are using a 4-wire load cell you will then need to
solder the 4 leads from the load cell to a 4-wide pin strip.
The first two pins will be E+ and E- and the other two A-
and A+. I taped over the solder joints with PVC tape to
protect them. A mark on one end and a corresponding
mark on the pin socket means I know which way round
to connect it, though I don't think it matters.

Different load cells colour code the wires differently, but

it's easy to tell which is which. With a test meter on a
resistance range, measure the resistance between each
pair of wires. There are 6 possible pairs of 4 wires but
you will only get 2 different readings. There will be 2
pairs which read 33% more than the other 4, say,
1,000Ω instead of 750Ω. One of those pairs is E+ and E-
and the other is A+ and A- (but it doesn't matter which).

Once you get everything working, if the scale reads a

negative weight when you put something on it, swap E+
and E-. (Or A+ and A- if it's easier. But not both!)
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Step 4: How to Use 3-wire Load Cells
If you are using four 3-wire load cells you will have to
wire them us together with a piece of stripboard, and
take the E+, E-, A+ and A- connections from the
combination.

Since the wire colours of yours may be different from

mine, let's call the 3 wire colours of each load cell A, B
and C.

With a test meter on a resistance range, measure the

resistance between each pair of wires. There are 3
possible pairs, but you will only measure 2 different
readings. Identify the pair that reads twice either of the
other two. Call this pair A and C. The one you left out is
B. (The resistance between B and either A or C is half
the resistance between A and C.)

Simply stated, you need to wire the 4 load cells in a

square, with the A wire of each connected to the A wire
of its neighbour, and the C wire to the C wire of its
neighbour on the other side. The B wires of two load
cells on opposite sides of the square are E+ and E-, and
the B wires of the other pair are A+ and A-
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Step 5: Wiring Up the Breadboard
Wiring up the breadboard is very simple, needing only 4
jumpers. The Fritzing library only offered me a slightly
different version of the HX711 module from mine but the
wiring is the same. You can follow the diagram, or if
you're using a different Arduino, wire it up as in the table
below:

Arduino Pin HX711 Pin 3V3 VCC GND GND A0 SCK A1

DT
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Step 6: Mounting the Load Cells
The aluminium bar type of load cell has two threaded
holes in each end. You can use one pair to mount it on a
suitable base with a spacer in between. The other pair
you can use in the same way to mount a weighing
platform, again, with a spacer. Just for experimental
purposes you can use whatever pieces of scrap wood or
plastic you have to hand, but for a polished end product
you will want to take more care.

The easiest way to mount the four 3-wire load cells is

between two pieces of chipboard. I used a router to
make 4 shallow indentations in the base so as to
positively locate the four cells. In my case the
indentations needed a slightly deeper central well so that
two rivets on the bottom didn't rest on the base.

I used a hot melt glue gun to hold the load cells in place
on the base and also to fix the stripboard onto the base
in the middle. I then pressed the weighing platform hard
down on them so that the pimples on the tops of the load
cells made slight indentations. I deepened these with the
router and checked they still aligned nicely with the load
cells. I then put hot melt glue on and around each
indentation and quickly pressed the weighing platform
onto the load cells before the glue hardened.
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Step 7: Programming the Arduino
I assume you have the Arduino IDE installed on your
computer and know how to use it. If not, check out one
of the many Arduino tutorials - that is not my purpose
here.

From the IDE drop-down menus, select Sketch - Include

Library - Manage Libraries...

Type hx711 in the search box. It should find HX711-

master. Click Install.

Download the attached file HX711.ino example sketch.

From the IDE File drop-down menu, open the file you
just downloaded. The IDE will say it needs to be in a
folder - allow it to put it in one.
Compile and upload the sketch, then click on the serial
Monitor in the IDE.

Below is some example output. In the initialisation phase

it displays an average of 20 raw readings from the
HX711, then sets the tare (i.e. the zero point). After this it
gives a single raw reading, an average of 20 and an
average of 5 less the tare. Finally, an average of 5 less
the tare and divided by the scale factor to give a
calibrated reading in grams.

For each reading it gives the calibrated average of 20,

and the standard deviation. The standard deviation is the
rage of values within which 68% of all measurements are
expected to lie. 95% will lie within twice this range and
99.7% within three times the range.It's therefore useful
as a measure of the range of random errors in the result.

In this example, after the first reading I placed a new

pound coin on the platform, which should weigh 8.75g.

HX711 Demo<br>Initializing the scale

Raw ave(20): 1400260

After setting up the scale:

Raw: 1400215
Raw ave(20): 1400230
Raw ave(5) - tare: 27.00
Calibrated ave(5): 0.0
 Readings:
Mean, Std Dev of 20 readings: -0.001 0.027
Time taken: 1.850Secs

Mean, Std Dev of 20 readings: 5.794 7.862

Time taken: 1.848Secs

Mean, Std Dev of 20 readings: 8.766 0.022

Time taken: 1.848Secs

Mean, Std Dev of 20 readings: 8.751 0.034

Time taken: 1.849Secs

Mean, Std Dev of 20 readings: 8.746 0.026

Time taken: 1.848Secs

Attachments

 HX711.ino

Download
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Step 8: Calibration
The Arduino sketch in the previous step contains two
calibration values (or scale factors) relating to my 1kg
and my set of four 50kg 3-wire load cells. These are on
lines 19 and 20. You will need to perform your own
calibration, starting with any arbitrary calibration value
such as 1 (on line 21).

I didn't have any standard weights, so for the 1kg load

cell I used a new £1 coin, which weighs 8.75g. Ideally
you should use something weighing at least a tenth of
the scale's maximum.

Find something - anything - of a roughly suitable weight.

Take it down to your local post office, pretend you need
to post it, and put it on the scales there and make a
careful note of the weight. Or you could take it to a trader
such as a friendly local greengrocer. Any reputable
trader should have their scales calibrated regularly to
comply with trading standards.

You now have an object of known weight. Place it on

your scales and note the reading. Multiply your current
scale factor by the reading you got and divide the result
by what the reading should have been, whether in
grams, kilograms, pounds, micro-elephants or whatever
units you choose. The result is your new scale factor. Try
your know weight again, and if necessary, repeat the
process.
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4 People Made This Project!
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scienceboyroy made it!

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

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37 Comments
gracieo1234567grace
11 months ago
ReplyUpvote
hi, I am just wondering if i could get in contact to ask some questions
about a school project similar to this.
5 replies

dromanin
11 months ago
ReplyUpvote
Hello,
nice project!
I could realize a first draft setup quite easily... only point is that I think
that your figure on step 4, about wiring the 4 3-wides load cells, has a
bug: the A terminals are connected cross wise, and if one follows that
exactly (as I did at first) then the readouts are not good, they come out
all zeroes... (after the first setup lines). Instead your text and the
scheme given in the wiki link are good and specify that the A and C
terminals should connect to opposite cells on the sides of each cell.
After changing that it all worked. I see actually the comment of
somebody having all zero readings, he/she might have done the same
as me...
Bye
Daniel