Automatic Paper Hole Punch Device Using Arduino

Hello readers in this instructables i will show you how to make Automatic Paper Hole Punch Device Using Arduino Uno in the simplest way possible

to begin with let me give you the idea that drived me to make this project, being a student i have seen many others uisng this device and during my student life this machines were rare to find

Now as the time passed by it is commonly seen everywhere and almost all of them work with the same principle

Manually you have to press the machine handle after you place the paper and this looks good for once or twice later it will be too much frustrating

I wanted a device that is automatic and when you simply place the paper it should punch the hole and after think for some time i thought of this design and went on to give a try

I made the mechanism using 3d printed parts so that it is accessible to most of the people, The choice of motor was MG995 since the handle of my punch needed more load to work and punch the holes

I also recommend you guys to use MG995 servo since it has got a great torque and has metal gear that will assure great torque at the time of working

The real challenge in this project for me was to achieve a press mechanism, I came up with this setup after a lot of trial and error and also it needs a lot of refinements

If you find any simple mechanism setup that could do this job let me know in the comments box i will be happy to consider all your suggestions

I tried this and the results were satisfactory, if you are building this project i have given all the sources like program, circuit diagram and videos for better understanding

List of components to build this project

Arduino Uno from here

MG995 Servo

Jumper Cables

Ultrasonic Sensor

OLED Module

Hole Punch Machine

Piece of Cardboard

Breadboard empty piece

5V DC Adapter

USB Cable

Hot Glue

Arduino IDE

3D Printer from here

Slicer Software

Note that these are amazon affiliate links and upon qualifying sales i may receive a small percent at no extra cost to you

I have designed all these components for this project using Tinkercad application

There are total of 3 parts in this project, The Body, Gears, Slider and overall print time for this project is less than 3 hours

I have sliced the models using cura slicer and later imported the model to printer and later printed them

The circuit seems complex at the first look but it is not, let me even break it down even more so it is understandable even for a absolute beginner

Circuit consists of 3 main components, Ultrasonic sensor, OLED module and Servo and apart from this we can also say that this has 2 different circuits

The first circuit is powered by UNO board and has all the components except the servo, we are using separate circuit for servo since it consumes too much power and arduino board power cant do the job

For this reason i will use 2 seperate power source one will power the arduino and the other will power the servo

Connections that makes this circuit work is as follows

OLED comes with 4 pins

Scl to A4

Sda to A5

Vcc to 5v

Gnd to Gnd of Uno

Ultrasonic as known and HCSR04 connections

Echo to D8

Trig to D9

Vcc to 5v pin

Gnd to ground of Uno

Servo Connections

Servo Gnd is connected to power rail gnd, Gnd of arduino to this ground and the ground of power source to the power rail this will create a common ground

Vcc of servo to 5v pin on adapter

Signal is connected to D6 pin of the arduino uno board

After you made this connections, u can upload program to arduino board

Conect uno to computer, open arduino ide, paste this program and select proper board type and click on upload and now you are good

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This is the step where you will feel your project coming to life since we are merging the electronics part to look like actual project

I will start by preparing the piece of board, Use double sided adhesive to connect uno with the board

If you dont have it use mild hot hotglue for this purpose, allow to dry completely and then remove the back sticker of breadboard power rails and stick on the board

I will use a small piece of 3d printed tube to make a stand that will hold the OLED module, and another piece to hold the ultrasonic sensor

The white sheet of board that i used had a layer of paper underneath, this needs to be removed before gluing base of the punch device to adhere properly to the base

Mark those layers first and now add superglue to the base of the machine and later press the base to this and wait for some time

At this stage we have the punch machine ready and we only need to add the working mechanism of servo slider and now we will see how we can achieve this

Before installing the mechanism on the sheet of board first you need to check for the working of slider and servo

To do this all you have to do is connect the frame of servo to the MG995 servo first and secure the edges with hot glue and allow to dry completely

Place the slider to the servo holder part, Now attach the gears to the servo shaft, if needed add the screws to shaft for good strength

Power the servo part first and then connect power to arduino uno, When you wave the hand infront of ultrasonic sensor the slider will start to slide

First it will slide counter clockwise and then after few seconds it will go back to its original position

Check for this action multiple times and if needed you can adjust the position and placement of slider too

This can now be installed to the board, use superglue for the purpose, use metal wire to connect this mechanism to the punch device handle

The strong threads are also a great option to consider, The flexible wires dont work well and you need to look after this fact

It was a little tricky for me to connect these two parts together, anyways i have showin in a very simple way in my video and you can consider watching that

Using this is simple but the real question is when you will actually use this

The situation arises where you need to punch a lot of holes, if you think of a situation where you need to punch hole for 100 paper by listening to this question only you are worried!

In this circumstances this device is super useful, all you have to do is connect this device to USB source in my case i will be using power bank

The mg995 servo cant work properly with on board power supply so i will use a 5v adapter to power this servo

When both are connected to power supply the OLED module will show message, Now to test this all you have to do is wave your hand infront of the ultrasonic sensor

The servo will be triggered and now you can keep the paper that needs the gole to be punched, you can wave again and place paper below to make the hole

Repeat the steps a hundred times and you can make holes effortlessly without any problems

There is a issue that needs to be improved here, since the mechanism is using too much torque the base of the servo is not able to handle the load effectively so it gets bent a little when the hole is being punched

Not a problem but still if the mechanism is distributed very well this can be minimized to a larger extent, Let me work on this and if you know any solution im willing to hear your comments

This is all for now, hope i will get a chance to see the build version of yours in the i made it section

Thank you all and have a great day!

Here is the detailed video tutorial of this project, i have shown in detail how to assemble the 3d printed parts for achieving the press action and also the circuits

I recommend to give a try to all of you who made it till here, if you have any ideas in your mind that you think will make this project even more advanced let me know

This was all about this project, If you have any concerns let me know in the comments, Have a great build, Thanks