Arduino optical shutters for free space optical experiments

This is an Arduino project dedicated to automate three home made optical shutters (light caches mounted on a DC motor) used in free space optical experiments. The Arduino board is controlled by a python driver script running on a computer, through a serial (USB) connection.

This repository contains both the microprogram to flash on the Arduino, and the python driver based on the Python library pyvisa.

Elements:

• 1x Arduino Uno Rev 3
• 3x Parallax Standard Servo
• Wires

Wiring diagram:

Python driver:

arduino = Driver('ASRL::2::INSTR')
arduino.shutter1.set_state(True)        # Enable shutter 1
arduino.shutter2.set_state(False)       # Disable shutter 2
arduino.shutter3.invert()               # Invert state of shutter 3
arduino.set_global_config('1x0')        # Enable shutter 1, don't move shutter 2, disable shutter 3
arduino.safe_state()                    # Enable every shutters

You can customize the angles of the ON and OFF states directly in the init function of the Driver class. Use the function set_angleof each shutter to find these particular angles.