Scope Calibrator

Flood Alarm
lHOO1.

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4011

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12.5, .c.

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50KQ

Pr Dbe.-

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R2 33Il
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SpN hr

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R4 101m NOTE :

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2NJ9114

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4011 .-r

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4011

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) To Pin 1401 4llt1

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Many oscilloscopes, designed pri meril)' to display waveforms, p rovide only rel at ive a mplftu de mca su reme n t s . These sco pe s eas ily can be use d to measure am plitude with the a ddition of this handy scope calibra tor. The h eart of the ca libra tor is an l HOO70 in tegrated circui t voltage ft:'gu 1,1tOr. O perat ing from any 12.5 to 15-\'011 de so urce, the U1 OO70 produces exactly 1 0 volts. Thi s 1O-vol t ou tp ut is ap plied to ,1 4001 or 4011 CMOS quad gate, con nccted to produce sq ua rl! wave output. Becau se CMOS logic has no voltage o ff se ts . th e squa re W.Wl' ou tp ut swi ngs between zero and the in -volt o utp ut of the LHOO70. T he freq ue ncy o f the sq uare wave produced by the 4001 14011 fli p- flop circuit is determined by the .01 uF capaci to r and the se lling of the SO,OX) ohm variable re sistor. The switching rate of the CMOS logic is fa..t enough to provide a sq uare wan' w ith reasonabl y sharp corners. T\...'o o utp u ts a re provided , o n th e inverse of the other . The arra ngemen t C,lO prow very useful for se tting gain on inverting amplifiers w hen usi ng a d tJ.11tra ce scope. Calibrating your scn pt.' with this ca librator is very easy . Just co nnect one of the o u tp u ts to th e vertical in pu t o f t he scope, and ad just the ve rtical se naitivijy to a convenient mea su remen t stan dard-one d ivis io n of trace deflection , for example. In this case, a waveform de fl ecting 3- 1J2 d ivisions wou ld haw a peak-to-peek amplitude of 35 volts.

- T, Pi n 7 of 4011

a.

If you 're worried about a flooded basement . or your swimming pool overflowing. you'll really like thi s inexpensive fl ood alann . The ala rm is built a round two audio osc illa tors , each using t w o NAND gates. The det ection oscillator, shown at the top of the schematic, is ga ted o n by a pair of remote probe s, w hich yo u locat e in the area you want to protect. One of th e probes is co n nected to the battery supply, the other to the inp ut of one of the ga tes . When wa ter flows between the p robes. th e d etectio n oscillator is gated o n . The alarm oscillator, shown at the bottom of the schematic, is sim ila r in design and is gated on by the output of the de tection oscillator. The values given produce an audio to n e of about JOC() Hz. The detection osci llator gates thi s audio tone at a ratt' of a bout 3 Hz. The result is a unique pulsa ting note , sure to draw yo ur a tte nt ion . You can cha nge th e audio to ne by cha nging th e valu e s o f R5 and C2, and the bleep speed by changing the values of R1 and

You can use a ny s ma ll ei g h t-o h m s peaker to so und the ala rm . The 2N3904 can be replaced by any sim ila r N PN transistor. TIll' circuit will work from any six to t z- volt supply-a standard nine-volt transistor ba ttery is ideal. Current drain in the off condition is ncgbg jble. so batte ry IIfl' should be well over a year.

100

CO

February, 1979