Arduino Based Tap Leak Detector

First, I need to detect whether the tap is open or shut. This is important because I don't want to sense the obvious water flow when the tap is open. I used an ultrasonic sensor for this purpose.

Note that the ultrasonic sensor should be placed right in front of the tap valve's CLOSE position. I'm also using a red LED as an output. Thus, when the tap valve is in CLOSE position, the LED should be ON, whereas when the tap valve is in the OPEN position, the LED should be OFF.

How to set up-

The HC-SR04 Ultrasonic Module has 4 pins, Ground, VCC, Trig and Echo.

• The Ground pin of the module needs to be connected to the Ground
• The VCC pin is to be connected to the 5V pins on the Arduino Board
• The trig pin is to be connected to Digital pin 3 on Arduino
• The echo pin is to be connected to Digital pin 2 on Arduino

• Furthermore, set connect the positive terminal of the LED to Digital pin 5 on Arduino. Complete the circuit with a resistor and connect to the Ground.

Since I did not want to detect water flow when the tap is open, I decided to use a servo motor to move the water sensor out of the way, when the tap is open, and back in place when the tap is closed.

Following are the steps to connect a servo motor to the Arduino:
The servo motor has three pins.

1. The darkest black one is usually the ground. Connect this to the Ground.
2. Connect the power cable (usually red) to 5V on the Arduino.
3. Connect the remaining line on the servo connector to a digital pin 4 on the Arduino.

The Water Sensor is attached to the servo motor. Do a little adjustment to make sure that the rotation of the servo motor actually moves the water sensor in and out of the way of the water flow.

How to set up the water sensor:

The water sensor has 3 pins:

• Connect + pin to 5V pin on Arduino
• Connect - pin to the Ground
• Connect S pin to digital Pin 8 on Arduino

If a leak is detected by the water sensor, there needs to be an alarm to alert people nearby to look into the matter. For this purpose, I have simply used an LED. It may be substituted with a buzzer

• Connect the black pin to the ground.
• Connect the other pin to digital pin 6 of Arduino.

<p>//Arduino based tap Leak Detector</p><p>//Initializing Ultrasonic Sensor
const int trigPin = 3; // Trigger Pin of Ultrasonic Sensor
const int echoPin = 2; // Echo Pin of Ultrasonic Sensor
int redled = 5;</p><p>//Initializing Servo Motor
#include <servo.h>  
int servoPin = 4;
Servo servo;  
int servoAngle = 0;   // servo position in degrees
boolean flag=false;</servo.h></p><p>//Initializing Water Sensor
int water_sensor = 8;
int whiteled = 6;</p><p>void setup() 
{
  //Ultrasonic Sensor Setup
   pinMode(redled, OUTPUT);
   pinMode(trigPin, OUTPUT);
   pinMode(echoPin, INPUT);</p><p>  //Servo Motor Setup
   Serial.begin(9600);  
   servo.attach(servoPin);</p><p>  //Water Sensor
   pinMode(water_sensor, INPUT); // 
   pinMode(whiteled, OUTPUT); // 
}</p><p>void loop()
{ </p><p>long duration, distance;
digitalWrite(trigPin, LOW);
delayMicroseconds(5);
digitalWrite(trigPin, HIGH);
delayMicroseconds(10);
digitalWrite(trigPin, LOW);
duration = pulseIn(echoPin, HIGH);
distance = (duration/2) / 29.1;</p><p>if (distance < 10)</p><p>{ 
  digitalWrite(redled,HIGH);
  servo.write(135);  
}</p><p>else 
{
  digitalWrite(redled,LOW);
  servo.write(-135);
}</p><p>if(digitalRead(water_sensor) == LOW) 
  {digitalWrite(whiteled,HIGH);}
 else 
  {digitalWrite(whiteled,LOW);}</p><p>}</p>

All you need to ensure is that you-

1. Place the Ultrasonic Sensor in front of the CLOSED tap valve, such that the sensor detects the change between OPEN and CLOSE position.

2. Place the servo motor(and the attached water sensor), such that the rotation of the motor moves the water sensor in and out of the way of the water flow.

The project is READY! :)