Development of an Arduino based universal testing apparatus

The mechanical properties of agriculture materials are critically important for a wide range of applications such as packaging, transporting, sorting, ...etc. A simple mechanical testing apparatus using off-the-shelf materials and open-source software for a total cost of less than 1000 Egyptian pounds was fabricated. The device consists of a steel frame supporting a stepper motor and its cooling fans, apart for converting motor rotary motion to linear motion, drill chuck fixed to screw that move linear motion, stage to place the tested sample and load cell to determine the force. To perform a mechanical test, a sample is placed on the base of the frame and the load cell. The required force is applied by the stepper motor; many types of grips can be fixed in the drill chuck. moving the main shaft down leads to pressing the sample. The displacement (deformation) precisely controlled by controlling step of stepper motor in the code of the program, while recording the force (measured by a load cell) in a SD card memory and also in a computer serial monitor. The load cell and stepper motor are linked to an Arduino microcontroller connected to a laptop through a USB port for data acquisition and analysis. NEMA 23 stepper motor can holding torque up to 19 kg-cm witch fit testing many of agriculture materials This device was easy to assemble. Because of its low cost and ease of use, this Arduino-based universal material tester can be an acceptable device to introduce the concepts of mechanical properties, among other concepts, to researchers in numerous fields.