United Kingdom
Asked — Edited

Another Potentiometer

I've been looking at potentiometers and I'd like some advise on the type to get. Linear or Log.

Here's the list I'm looking at jprelec. Does anyone understand the 10K bits and explain them a little to me please.

Thanks Guys


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Netherlands
#1  

Lin/log: It depends on what you're planning to use it for. Linear potentiometers increase their resistance linearly, while Log does so exponentially. For audio purposes, I'd use the log potmeters and for any other purpose the linear ones.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'bits'

United Kingdom
#2  

Sorry that's just the way I speak. By example, one of the descriptions is '16mm Rotary pot. 2K2 lin'. in there it says 2K2. another is '16mm Rotary pot. 4K7 lin' that one is 4K7. My question was what do these mean and is it important.

Cheers

Netherlands
#3  

16mm is the lenght of the potmeter's shaft. Rotary means the shaft is twisted in order to move the wiper. 2K2 stands for the resistance of the resistive strip. When connecting the potentiometer to a microcontroller's analog in (like the EZ-B's), you should ideally use 10K (10 thousand ohms) to make sure your battery power does not go to waste. Anything higher than 1K would probably be fine. 2K2 = 2.2 kOhms (kilo ohms) or 2200 Ohms. 'lin' of course stands for linear like I explained to you in my previous reply.

Here's how you hook it up: User-inserted image

Hope I've answered all of your questions :D

United Kingdom
#4  

it does thank you. You answered everything

#5  

Is one turn on the shaft enough? Most pots only turn one turn. You can also buy multi turn pots. Most common are 10 turn multi turn shafts. Here's a good one for under $5 USD:

www.robotshop.com/dfrobot-rotation-sensor-v2.html

There are other more expensive ones for about 5 times more but I'm using 2 of the above one and it works great and has a metal shaft.

Have fun, Dave Schulpius