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Building an Air-Quality Monitor
Ed

Imeundwa na

Ed

13. Julai 2026FI
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Building an Air-Quality Monitor

Build a traffic-light air-quality monitor. An MQ-135 sensor responds to smoke, fumes, alcohol, CO2 and other gases; the Arduino compares the reading to clean air and lights a green, yellow or red LED for good, moderate or poor air. A hands-on way to watch indoor air change — with the honest limit that it shows RELATIVE quality, not a calibrated ppm figure.

Kati
1-2 hours

Maagizo

1

Wire the sensor and three LEDs

On the breadboard: MQ-135 VCC to Arduino 5V, GND to GND, and its analog output (AOUT) to A0. Wire three LEDs — ideally green, yellow and red — to pins 5, 6 and 7, each through a 330 Ω resistor to GND (long leg to the pin).

Vifaa kwa hatua hii:

Arduino Uno R3Arduino Uno R31 kipande
MQ-135 Air Quality Sensor ModuleMQ-135 Air Quality Sensor Module1 kipande
LED - Basic 5mm (25 pack)LED - Basic 5mm (25 pack)1 paketi
Resistor 330 Ohm 1/6 Watt PTH - 20 packResistor 330 Ohm 1/6 Watt PTH - 20 pack1 paketi
BreadboardBreadboard1 kipande
Jumper Wires (Male-to-Male)Jumper Wires (Male-to-Male)1 paketi
2

Connect and open the IDE

Plug the Arduino into your computer with the USB cable, open the Arduino IDE, and select Arduino Uno and its serial port.

Vifaa kwa hatua hii:

USB-B CableUSB-B Cable1 kipande

Zana zinazohitajika:

Computer with Arduino IDEComputer with Arduino IDE
3

Upload the traffic-light sketch

Paste this sketch and upload. It warms the sensor, records a clean-air baseline, then lights green for good air, yellow for moderate and red for poor. Open the Serial Monitor to see the raw reading.

air_quality_monitor.inoarduino
// Traffic-light air-quality monitor using an MQ-135 sensor.
// Shows RELATIVE air quality vs a clean-air baseline - not a calibrated ppm meter.
// MQ-135 analog out on A0; green LED pin 5, yellow pin 6, red pin 7.

const int MQ135_PIN = A0;
const int GREEN_PIN = 5;
const int YELLOW_PIN = 6;
const int RED_PIN = 7;

int cleanAir = 0;             // baseline, set at startup
const int MODERATE = 80;     // rise above baseline -> moderate
const int POOR = 200;        // rise above baseline -> poor

void setup() {
  pinMode(GREEN_PIN, OUTPUT);
  pinMode(YELLOW_PIN, OUTPUT);
  pinMode(RED_PIN, OUTPUT);
  Serial.begin(9600);

  Serial.println("Warming up MQ-135 (2 min) in clean air...");
  delay(120000);
  cleanAir = analogRead(MQ135_PIN);
  Serial.print("Clean-air baseline: ");
  Serial.println(cleanAir);
}

void loop() {
  int reading = analogRead(MQ135_PIN);
  int rise = reading - cleanAir;
  Serial.println(reading);

  digitalWrite(GREEN_PIN, LOW);
  digitalWrite(YELLOW_PIN, LOW);
  digitalWrite(RED_PIN, LOW);

  if (rise >= POOR) {
    digitalWrite(RED_PIN, HIGH);       // poor
  } else if (rise >= MODERATE) {
    digitalWrite(YELLOW_PIN, HIGH);    // moderate
  } else {
    digitalWrite(GREEN_PIN, HIGH);     // good
  }
  delay(500);
}
4

Warm up, baseline and test

Run it in fresh air and let the 2-minute warm-up set the baseline (a new MQ-135 also needs a 24–48 h burn-in to settle). Then test it: breathe on it, spray a little deodorant nearby, or hold a blown-out match's smoke close — it should climb to yellow then red, and return to green in clean air. Tune MODERATE and POOR to change the thresholds.

5

Know the limits

The MQ-135 reacts to many gases at once and gives a RELATIVE reading, not a calibrated CO2 or ppm value — despite what some tutorials claim, real ppm needs proper calibration against known concentrations. It also drifts and needs re-baselining. Treat this as an air-change indicator and a great sensing project, not a laboratory instrument.

Vifaa

7

Zana Zinazohitajika

1
Jumla inayokadiriwa
$54.00

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