The sensor comes with three wires: red (5-24VDC power), black (ground) and yellow (Hall effect pulse output). By counting the pulses from the output of the sensor, you can easily track fluid movement: each pulse is approximately 2.25 milliliters. Note this isn't a precision sensor, and the pulse rate does vary a bit depending on the flow rate, fluid pressure and sensor orientation. It will need careful calibration if better than 10% precision is required. However, its great for basic measurement tasks!
Adafruit has made an
example Arduino sketch that can be used to quickly test the sensor - it will calculate the approximate quantity of fluid in liters and display on an LCD or the serial monitor.
Specifications:
- Working Voltage: 5 to 18VDC
- Max current draw: 15mA @ 5V
- Working Flow Rate: 1 to 30 Liters/Minute
- Working Temperature range: -25 to 80°C
- Working Humidity Range: 35%-80% RH
- Maximum water pressure: 1.75 MPa
- Output duty cycle: 50% +-10%
- Output rise time: 0.04us
- Output fall time: 0.18us
- Flow rate pulse characteristics: Frequency (Hz) = 7.5 * Flow rate (L/min)
- Pulses per Liter: 450
- Durability: minimum 300,000 cycles
- 1/2" NPS nominal pipe connections, 0.78" outer diameter, 1/2" of thread
- Size: 2.5" x 1.4" x 1.4"