Hi guys! I'm new to tinkering with electronics, but I would like to design a reactive archery target that consists of two foil plates, that connect when pierced with an arrow, closing a switch, causing a photography strobe to go off. Does anyone know where to start? I bought an arduino and a breadboard but haven't been successful in getting this thing to work yet.

I would also like to add multiple targets for a round of shooting (without walking up to the circuit to reset the system).

Any help would be much appreciated. Thank you!!

 

Welcome to AAC!
I'm unclear as to the purpose of triggering the strobe. The photo will show a static arrow, so could have been taken at any time without a strobe.
What does the right-hand side of your pic show?
What will the Arduino be used for?
What do you mean by "reset the circuit"?

 

Parallel lines on right appear to be the foil switches. I do not see much success with this approach but piezo impulse detectors might work, worked well with paper target hit with rubber bands or b--b's from blow gun ( straw ).
There is somewhere in Projects by dthx way back in May, 2013 a project for multiple" Bow & Arrow Target". The controller is still available.

 

My approach would be to rather make an optical "curtain" right before the target that would be interrupted by the passing arrow. This would also allow you calibrate the moment at which you wish to take the photograph, by simply moving that curtain either closer to or away from the target. A piezo or mechanical switch would maybe be too late for the picture to be taken, since a delayed response by the camera is inevitable.

 

When do you want the strobe to fire?

 

I agree with ALec. As described, the project doesn't sound very useful. What is it you are trying to achieve?

ak

 

I'm not trying to take a photo, the flash is meant to be seen by the archer as an indication of a hit target (it gets hard to see if you hit the target when you start shooting from further than 40 yards). It doesn't matter when the strobe fires. Immediately to a few seconds.

Looking at photography forums seems like a good idea, I will take a look.

I can try a piezo impulse detector, is there a way to calibrate it to only fire above a certain threshold?

 

It's called a volume or amplitude control ie a pot. The sensor used for testing was a 20 mm piezo disc with a small weight ( dead LR41 battery ) glued to center of active side, piezo glued to thin plastic disc on which was also glued a small alligator clip. I think it fed into a 555 IC.
Looked in old files & found Paper Target. It's start.

 

I'm not trying to take a photo, the flash is meant to be seen by the archer as an indication of a hit target (it gets hard to see if you hit the target when you start shooting from further than 40 yards). It doesn't matter when the strobe fires. Immediately to a few seconds.

Looking at photography forums seems like a good idea, I will take a look.

I can try a piezo impulse detector, is there a way to calibrate it to only fire above a certain threshold?

Can you post a picture of said target?

 

These days, high brightness, narrow angle LEDs are common, low cost, and way easier to deal with than a photo strobe.

ak

 

I'm not trying to take a photo, the flash is meant to be seen by the archer as an indication of a hit target (it gets hard to see if you hit the target when you start shooting from further than 40 yards). It doesn't matter when the strobe fires. Immediately to a few seconds.

Looking at photography forums seems like a good idea, I will take a look.

I can try a piezo impulse detector, is there a way to calibrate it to only fire above a certain threshold?

Instead of a piezo impulse detector I'd use an electret microphone to capture the sound of the arrow hitting the target and a voltage comparator to trigger the strobe. The sensitivity of the system could be changed by adjusting the comparator's reference voltage and, if need be, by a filter after the microphone.

 

I like it.
A pffft detector.

 

I think an acoustic sensor will generate more false positives than a contact sensor.

ak

 

I think an acoustic sensor will generate more false positives than a contact sensor.

ak

Proper lensing should take care of that misgiving.