arduino mega tft lcd projects manufacturer

In this Arduino touch screen tutorial we will learn how to use TFT LCD Touch Screen with Arduino. You can watch the following video or read the written tutorial below.

As an example I am using a 3.2” TFT Touch Screen in a combination with a TFT LCD Arduino Mega Shield. We need a shield because the TFT Touch screen works at 3.3V and the Arduino Mega outputs are 5 V. For the first example I have the HC-SR04 ultrasonic sensor, then for the second example an RGB LED with three resistors and a push button for the game example. Also I had to make a custom made pin header like this, by soldering pin headers and bend on of them so I could insert them in between the Arduino Board and the TFT Shield.

Here’s the circuit schematic. We will use the GND pin, the digital pins from 8 to 13, as well as the pin number 14. As the 5V pins are already used by the TFT Screen I will use the pin number 13 as VCC, by setting it right away high in the setup section of code.

I will use the UTFT and URTouch libraries made by Henning Karlsen. Here I would like to say thanks to him for the incredible work he has done. The libraries enable really easy use of the TFT Screens, and they work with many different TFT screens sizes, shields and controllers. You can download these libraries from his website, RinkyDinkElectronics.com and also find a lot of demo examples and detailed documentation of how to use them.

After we include the libraries we need to create UTFT and URTouch objects. The parameters of these objects depends on the model of the TFT Screen and Shield and these details can be also found in the documentation of the libraries.

So now I will explain how we can make the home screen of the program. With the setBackColor() function we need to set the background color of the text, black one in our case. Then we need to set the color to white, set the big font and using the print() function, we will print the string “Arduino TFT Tutorial” at the center of the screen and 10 pixels  down the Y – Axis of the screen. Next we will set the color to red and draw the red line below the text. After that we need to set the color back to white, and print the two other strings, “by HowToMechatronics.com” using the small font and “Select Example” using the big font.

In order the code to work and compile you will have to include an addition “.c” file in the same directory with the Arduino sketch. This file is for the third game example and it’s a bitmap of the bird. For more details how this part of the code work  you can check my particular tutorial. Here you can download that file:

Welcome to my collection of Arduino projects. As a maker, techie and mechatronics engineer I’ve been using Arduino for more then 8 years. Arduino is an incredibly versatile microcontroller with limitless possibilities for developing electronics applications and prototypes.

We can use Arduino for simple tasks such as controlling LEDs and DC motors, to controlling real CNC machines and robots. That’s right, in the following list I will share my Arduino experience with you. You will find Arduino projects for beginners and more advanced projects for Arduino enthusiast.

Even if you are just getting started with Arduino, you don’t have to worry about that. Each of the following DIY Arduino projects is covered with detailed step by step tutorial on how to do it yourself and includes circuit schematics, source codes and videos.

Using the comments section below, you can also suggest your ideas, as well as discuss anything related to these Arduino projects. I will continuously update this article with all new stuff that I make. Last update: February 2022.

As an Arduino enthusiast, I found making robots with Arduino to be most fun for me. There is so much to learn from them as a maker and an engineer. So, here are my Arduino projects related to robotics so you can learn too.

When it comes to automated manufacturing, robot arms play big role with so many applications. They are often used for welding, assembling, packing, painting, pick and place tasks and much more. This Arduino project is actually a robotic arm made out of 3D printed parts, servo motors joints and controlled using an Arduino Nano. What’s even cooler we can control the robot arm wirelessly via a smartphone and a custom build Android application.

The following project is one of the coolest Arduino project in this list. It’s an Arduino robot car which instead of normal wheels, it employs omnidirectional wheels or mecanum wheels which enable to robot to move in any direction.

Here’s an upgraded version of the previous mecanum wheels robot project. On top of the platform I added the DIY Arduino Robot Arm project mentioned above and now they can work together.

Of course, as for any of my Arduino projects, the Arduino code, the custom build Android application, as well as the 3D model files can be found and downloaded from the particular project article.

This Arduino based SCARA robot is a step-up big compared to the previous projects in every aspect. It has a better and more robust design with precisely controlled stepper motors and custom build GUI for controlling it.

As a controller it has an Arduino UNO board, combined with a CNC shield and four A4988 stepper drivers. It has 4 DOF, driven by four NEMA 17 stepper motors.

For controlling the robot we are using an Arduino Mega board in combination with a RAMPs board. This a popular combination used for 3D printing and it can be used for laser engraving machines as well. As for a firmware, we are using the Marlin 3D Printer firmware and the Repetier control software.

The rover features a rocker-bogie suspension which allows the rover to run smoothly on uneven terrain, just like the real rover. It has six independently controlled DC motors for driving and four servos for steering, and it’s controlled using an Arduino MEGA board. There’s also an FPV camera located in the cameras unit of the rover which can by used for controlling the rover remotely. The remote control is done with the help of a cheap commercial RC transmitter and receiver.

Making biologically inspired robots is very popular among engineering students. This Arduino project is all about it, we will build a hexapod robot which features six legs, a tail or abdomen, a head, antennas, mandibles and even functional eyes. All of this makes the robot look like an ant.

Each leg have three joints, and for each joint we need a servo motor. That means that we need total of 18 servos for this project, and additionally 3 servos for the head movements and 1 servo for the tail. The brain of the robot is an Arduino Mega. We need MEGA because it’s the only board that can control more than 12 servos using the Servo library.

I also designed a custom PCB which acts as an Arduino Mega Shield so we can easily attach all servo connects. We can control the ant robot via Bluetooth and a smartphone, or radio communication. The ant also has built-in ultrasonic sensor in the head. With that it can detect objects in front, and it can even strike if the object is present if front of it.

The following projects show how capable Arduino is. A CNC or Computer Numerical Control is an automated control of machines, like mills, lathes, plasma cutters, 3D printers and etc. So, using the Arduino as a controller we are actually able to build any of these CNC machines.

The CNC machine is composed of just two linear rails which are secured to a base frame made of 8mm MDF board. For controlling it we are using an Arduino UNO board in combination with a CNC shield and two DRV8825 stepper drivers. As a tool it has an laser module attached so this machine is actually a CNC laser engraver.

The idea for this Arduino project was similar to the previous one, to build a CNC machine using minimum parts possible. Here I used 3D several printed parts, and just two MGN15H linear rails for the main construction of the machine.

Building your own CNC machine might seem like a big challenge for many of you, but the following Arduino CNC Machine project shows that building a CNC machine is actually not that hard.

Controlling stepper motors using Arduino is without a doubt one of most satisfying thing for an Arduino enthusiast. There so many machines based on this motors, like CNC machines, 3D printers, various automation machines etc. This Arduino project is all about that. It describes how you can build such a machine. It’s a machine for bending wire, where with the help of stepper motors we can precisely bend wire and make various shapes and forms out of it.

The machine features three stepper motors. With the first stepper we feed the wire to the bending mechanism. Here we have another stepper motor used for the bending the wire at the right angle. There’s also another stepper, for controlling the Z-axis. This stepper enables the machine to create three dimensional shapes. With this project we can also see how useful 3D printers are for Arduino projects of this type or for prototyping.

Many Arduino projects that I make require wireless control and that’s why I build this Arduino based wireless radio controller. With this RC transmitter I can wirelessly control pretty much with a range up to 700m in open space. It features 14 channels, 6 of which are analog and 8 digital inputs.

The brain of this Arduino project is an Arduino Pro Mini board which is the smallest Arduino board. The radio communication is based on the NRF24L01 module, it has 2 joysticks, 2 potentiometers and 4 momentary push buttons. Also an accelerometer and gyro module which can be used for controlling things with just moving around or tilting the controller. I mounted all electronic components on a custom design PCB and made a cover out of transparent acrylic.

This is a follow up project of the above one. Just like DIY RC Transmitter, this DIY Arduino RC Receiver can be used for many application. We can easily pair the two projects together and control anything wirelessly. Among others, I made an example of controlling a commercial RC car model using these DIY transmitter and receiver.

The custom PCB that I made uses the same NRF24L01 module for the radio communication. The controller is an Arduino Pro Mini and it features input/ output 9 channels.

The following Arduino project is a great example of utilizing the DIY RC transmitter from above. It’s a 3D printed hovercraft which I entirely designed on my own, and of course, the 3D printing files are available for downloading. The hovercraft uses two brushless motors, one for creating an air cushion for the lift, and the other for generating thrust or moving forward.

For the wireless control we are using the NRF24L01 module, which accepts the data coming from the RC transmitter. Then using the Arduino and two ESCs (Electronic Speed Controler) we control the BLDC motors speed. On the back side of the hovercraft there is also a servo for controlling the rudders, or for controlling the steering. I must say that driving this DIY hovercraft is so fun.

Anyone who had a chance of playing around with some RC airplanes knows how cool and fun it is. It’s even cooler and more satisfying if you build the RC airplane on your own. The following project steps the satisfaction up even further, because here I will show you how to build your own RC airplane which is 100% DIY build. Also, we have a 100% DIY radio control system based on the Arduino.

The airplane is entirely made out of Styrofoam and what’s cooler, the shapes are made with the help of my DIY Arduino CNC Foam Cutting Machine, a project already mention above. The radio communication is based on the NRF24L01 transceiver modules. For that purpose, I used my DIY Arduino RC Transmitter and DIY Arduino RC Receiver.

You can choose one of the three different methods of wireless control explained in this project, or that’s the HC-05 Blueooth module, the NRF24L01 transceiver module and theHC-12 long range wireless module. Additionally you can learn how to make your own Android app for controlling the Arduino robot car.

This Arduino project idea is rather practical because it features indoor and outdoor temperature and humidity measurement. It is based on the DHT11/ DHT22 sensor, the NRF24L01 transceiver module for the wireless communication and theDS3231 RTC. For the display we can either use 16×2 character LCD or a 3.2 inches TFT touch screen.

The outdoor unit can be powered with batteries and the indoor unit with an AC adapter. The outdoor unit measures the temperature and the humidity and sends the values to the main indoor unit. Here these values are printed on the LCD along with the data and time values from the DS3231 RTC module.

The slider has three NEMA 17 stepper motors controlled via the A4988 stepper drivers and the Arduino Nano board. Using a joystick we can control the pan and tilt movements and using a potentiometer we can control the sliding movement. With this DIY camera slider we can use the Set button to set two different IN and OUT points. Then the camera can automatically move from one to the other point.

If you are interested in building something more complex with Arduino then this project is the one for you. Although complex, you could easily recreate it as there is a detailed step by step explanation on how everything works, including circuit schematics and source codes.

The following Arduino project is a simple gimbal or a self-stabilizing platform. It can be used for keeping objects or the top platform level. The project is rather simple with just several electronic components.

The combination of DC motors and Arduino is always fun, and so is this project. Here we will build our own robot car from scratch. The car will be powered with Li-ion batteries and two 12V DC motors, and controlled using the L298N driver and an analog Joystick.

For this project you just need two components along with an Arduino board, and that’s an ultrasonic sensor and small servo motor. The range of the radar can be adjusted to up to 4 meters with 180 degrees rotation.

The project also includes and accelerometer which is used for the digital spirit level function or for measuring angle. The results are displayed on 16×2 LCD and all components are attached on a custom design PCB.

In this project we will learn how to use a color detecting sensor along with the Arduino. We are going to be sorting out colored skittles but you can use the same sensor and method for sorting out anything else.

In this project we will learn how to use the Arduino to make an RFID controlled door lock. The system consists of an MFRC522 RFID reader and RFID tags/ cards that are based on the MIFARE protocol.

For this project we need a 3.2 inches TFT Touch screen, an TFT Mega shield adapter and an Arduino Mega board. The code is a bit longer but everything is explained in details.

The heart of the table is an Arduino which controls the 45  WS2812B Addressable LEDs. The objects on top of the table are detected using infrared proximity sensors. What’s even cooler it has built-in Bluetooth module which enables interaction with a smartphone for selecting the LEDs colors.

In this Arduino project we are building an Air Quality Monitor which can measure several important air quality parameters such as PM2.5, CO2, VOC, Ozone, as well as temperature and humidity. I designed a custom PCB on which we can easily attach the sensors we need and show the results on a 2.8 inches touch display. The device can also keep track of the sensors values from the last 24 hours.

The following section of this article contains Arduino projects ideas based on my detailed tutorials on various sensors and modules, as well as your suggestions from the comments section below.

We can use NEMA 17 or 23 stepper motors in combination with these drivers which provide high speed reduction ratios. As for controller we could use an Arduino Uno or Arduino MEGA board.

Controlling your home power outlets via a smartphone is the first step in home automation. You can easily make your own Arduino controlled power outlets utilizing the knowledge you can get from my Arduino tutorials.

For this project you just need two components along with the Arduino board. An HC-05 Bluetooth module and a5V Relay module for which I already have detailed tutorials. For powering the Arduino and the relay you can use 220/ 110V AC to 5V DC converter.

Using your smartphone you can connect and control your power outlet via Bluetooth. You can either use some already made apps for controlling Arduino from the Play Store or create your own custom made app. In this way we can also control the power outlets through voice control commands.

Home automation is one of the most popular Arduino projects nowadays. The goal of this project is to remotely control anything in your house like lights, appliances, temperature, security devices and so on, with a single device or your smartphone.

In order to make such a project we need decent amount of knowledge in Arduino. The following home automation concept that I suggest is based on my detailed Arduino tutorials for various sensors and modules.

Of course, there are endless possibilities and combinations for building a home automation system using the Arduino board. You can always change and add more devices. You can also make a Bluetooth communication so you can control all of this using your smartphone etc.

The idea for this project is to remotely control an Arduino project using hand gestures. Let’s say we want to control the Arduino Robot Car that we mentioned above. So instead of the joystick we will use an MEMS module for the control.

In this guide we’re going to show you how you can use the 1.8 TFT display with the Arduino. You’ll learn how to wire the display, write text, draw shapes and display images on the screen.

The 1.8 TFT is a colorful display with 128 x 160 color pixels. The display can load images from an SD card – it has an SD card slot at the back. The following figure shows the screen front and back view.

This module uses SPI communication – see the wiring below . To control the display we’ll use the TFT library, which is already included with Arduino IDE 1.0.5 and later.

The TFT display communicates with the Arduino via SPI communication, so you need to include the SPI library on your code. We also use the TFT library to write and draw on the display.

The 1.8 TFT display can load images from the SD card. To read from the SD card you use the SD library, already included in the Arduino IDE software. Follow the next steps to display an image on the display:

In this guide we’ve shown you how to use the 1.8 TFT display with the Arduino: display text, draw shapes and display images. You can easily add a nice visual interface to your projects using this display.

Spice up your Arduino project with a beautiful large touchscreen display shield with built in microSD card connection. This TFT display is big (5" diagonal) bright (12 white-LED backlight) and colorfu 480x272 pixels with individual pixel control. As a bonus, this display has a optional resistive touch panel attached on screen by default.

The shield is fully assembled, tested and ready to go. No wiring, no soldering! Simply plug it in and load up our library - you"ll have it running in under 10 minutes! Works best with any classic Arduino (UNO/Due/Mega 2560).

Of course, we wouldn"t just leave you with a datasheet and a "good luck!" - we"ve written a full open source graphics library at the bottom of this page that can draw pixels, lines, rectangles, circles and text. We also have a touch screen library that detects x,y and z (pressure) and example code to demonstrate all of it. The code is written for Arduino but can be easily ported to your favorite microcontroller!

For 5 inch screen,the high current is needed.But the current of arduino uno or arduino mega board is low, an external 5V power supply is needed. Refer to the image shows the external power supply position on shield ER-AS-RA8875.

If you"ve had a lot of Arduino DUEs go through your hands (or if you are just unlucky), chances are you’ve come across at least one that does not start-up properly.The symptom is simple: you power up the Arduino but it doesn’t appear to “boot”. Your code simply doesn"t start running.You might have noticed that resetting the board (by pressing the reset button) causes the board to start-up normally.The fix is simple,here is the solution.

TFT LCD screens combined with Human Machine Interface (HMI) technology result in exciting project ideas applicable to a wide variety of industries. STONE HMI TFT LCD Arduino project ideas. After all, HMI is a smart technology that uses touch to draw out information from both the human user and the display machine.

And when high-quality display screen modules such as STONE Tech’s TFT LCD products are laden with HMI technology, the result is outstanding machine performance capable of bringing out the best in every customer and business.

Now, this article will feature STONE HMI. Furthermore, we will also present some exciting project development initiatives carried out by the company using its vast range of TFT LCD modules paired with HMI technology, and the TFT LCD Arduino project.

What makes HMI a good choice for industrial use is that it is fully flexible and customizable to fit several industrial needs. The TFT LCD screen sizes can be tailor-made to suit the HMI’s application. Furthermore, the software that comes with the machines can be adjusted as well.

STONE Technologies is a proud manufacturer of superior quality TFT LCD modules and LCD screens. The company also provides intelligent HMI solutions that perfectly fit in with its excellent hardware offerings.

STONE TFT LCD modules come with a microcontroller unit that has a cortex-m4 32-bit CPU. Such a module can easily be transformed into an HMI screen. Simple hexadecimal instructions can be used to control the module through the UART port. Furthermore, you can seamlessly develop STONE TFT LCD color user interface modules and add touch control, features to it.

Each customizable TFT-LCD HMI display module comes with free access to STONE’s dedicated design software. STONE TOOLBox software is an easy-to-use program that allows you to set up graphical user interface functions such as:

Intricate and intuitive interfaces will require a bit more steps. Nevertheless, using the TOOLBox program allows you to save time on developing HMI projects due to its ease of use.

HMI projects can quickly be done with Stone’s HMI-ready display modules. As previously mentioned, STONEprovides complete modules that include hardware and a free downloadable GUI design software – everything you need to get started on your HMI concept.

Also, STONE manufactures several TFT LCD touch screen sizes that range from 3.5 to 15.1 inches. Customized options are also available depending on your needs. There are also plenty of options and models for each screen size.

Indeed, STONE produces a plethora of HMI-ready TFT LCD screens. You won’t have a hard time finding the right display module compatible with your microcontroller projects.

Over the years, Stone’s modules have been used to create numerous projects featuring its reputable HMI technology. These project ideas cater to a wide variety of fields and industries.

STONE developed an oxygen monitor for an Italian customer. The monitor uses Stone’s 7-inch TFT LCD screen and was connected to an oxygen tank for medical use.

STONE’s display screen was connected to the Arduino development board through UART. But this required a level conversion achieved by the MAX3232. Meanwhile, the same Arduino board was wired to the MAX30100 module through an IIC interface.

Some modifications to the MAX30100 module were made, specifically to the IIC pull-up resistor. The remainder of the project was finished using Arduino codes to finally create a responsive display for heart rate and blood oxygen monitoring.

This project aims to create a fingerprint door lock that can enter, scan, compare, and delete fingerprints. It utilized an STM32 development board, fingerprint identification module, and Stone’s STVC050WT-01 LCD display.

STONE LCD screen’s role here is to display the fingerprint module’s status. As with all other projects, STONE TOOLBox software was used to generate the user interface flashed on the screen. Meanwhile, Stone’s LCD screen was connected to the development board and fingerprint identification module with MCU through UART-TTL signals.

The idea for this project is a real-time display of pictures collected by the camera on the LCD display screen. The TFT LCD STONE module used for this project is a 7-inch serial display module with 800×480 resolution. A camera module, development board, and some wires are needed to complete the project.

The user interface was designed using STONE TOOLBox and Adobe Photoshop. Then, the hardware parts were wired together; some parts needed welding. After that, a simple program was written following MCU to the command control TFT-LCD module.

This particular project used a STONE serial LCD touch display screen. This functions as the main display for the coffee machine. With the screen installed, you can:

RGB lamps that can be controlled through a touch display – this is the aim of this project idea. STONE’s 7-inch TFT LCD display module in STVC070WT-01 was used to connect and control an RGB lamp.

Last but not least is a basic appliance controller made using STONE’s 7-inch TFT LCD touch screen and an STM32 development board. The touch screen controls lights for various parts of the house. The finished product also collects data about humidity, temperature (indoor and outdoor), and air quality.

STONE’s TFT LCD intelligent touch modules can be paired with Arduino technology to automate a variety of processes. This project clearly demonstrates this.

Here, a sensor directly connected to Arduino Uno is monitored by the display screen in real-time. Moreover, two light bulbs connected to Arduino are directly controlled by the display screen as well.

This project is all about making a car display dashboard using a 10.1-inch STONE LCD touch screen. The on-board display interface for a used car contains the following:

We presented an overview of what HMI technology is, how it works, and which applications use it. Also, we covered Stone’s range of HMI-capable TFT LCD display modules. Furthermore, we discussed a lengthy list of exciting project ideas made using Stone’s superior quality HMI displays.

STONE Technologies is truly your best bet for powering your HMI-driven development ideas(projects based on TFT LCD Arduino, STM32, ESP, etc.). Take inspiration from the actual examples we’ve shown you and build your very own HMI display device today.

There is little information on the Internet with a combination of this 1.77 inch TFT LCD work on Arduino Mega board. Most of the information is covering the 1.8 inch TFT LCD, and it is a little bit tricky to make this works since the connections on the board, and the code/driver may be different from other LCDs. We use this opportunity to explain the technology behind it besides just showing the readers its schematics. Later, we"ll show how to display both the temperature and humidity on the LCD with the DHT-11 sensor.

In a simple analogy, a computer uses a computer program, device driver, to talk to hardware like a printer and in the Arduino board, there is a microcontroller also uses some drivers to communicate with the LCD device. The communication between the microcontroller and devices can be parallel and/or serial when we look at it from the data transmission level. When we wired two LED lights with two separate I/O PINs on the board, we let the microcontroller sending the data in a parallel fashion. In the serial transmission, the data transmit one bit of data at a time, sequentially, over a communication channel called the bus. In web programming, we have the luxury of sending more complex data on a broader bandwidth, like JSON, a key-value pair data, when comparing with the low-level programming in electronics. There is a pulsing technique controlled by a clock, transmitting one bit every clock pulse. In this way, it compensates for the narrow path for data to pass through while maintaining the understanding of who is talking to whom or how to interpret the pieces of bit information that a device receives. With the clock speed, we can distinguish the data chunk out from the signal stream. It acts like traffic lights in the busiest city where all devices in the SPI bus shared the same clock as it maintains the data flow synchronized and controlled. As a result, paired its data line with a clock signal, the data is transferred synchronously. Many protocols are using this type of methods to communicate, such as SPI, and I2C. In our case, the LCD uses the Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) protocol to communicate with the microcontroller on the Arduino board. Just like on the Internet, HTTP is a protocol for data communication between a web server and a client computer.

​The sequence of the events in serial data transmission is initialized when the SS pin set low as in active mode for the slave device. Otherwise, it simply ignores the data sent from the master or the microcontroller on the Arduino board in this scenario since all devices on the SPI bus share the MISO, MOSI, and SCLK lines and the message arrives at the slave devices at the same time. Only the devices that the master wants to communicate have its SS pin set low. During the data transmission, the master begins to toggle the clock line up and down at speed supported by the slave device. For each clock cycle, it sends one bit on the MOSI line, and receive one bit on the MISO line. Until stopping the toggling of the clock line, the transmission is complete, and now the SS pin is returned with a high state. A reset is triggered, and the next sequence of data transmission can be started again. It looks like a controlled escalator moving people up and down in light speed!

Adafruit_ST7735 tft = Adafruit_ST7735(TFT_CS, TFT_DC, TFT_MOSI, TFT_SCLK, TFT_RST);Two constructors in this class mean that there are two ways to create the tft object. For 1.8 inch LCD, you should use the first constructor shown above. In our case, the 1.77 inch LCD requires us to use the second constructor.

I hope this article helps you set up the 1.77 inch TFT LCD successfully. Sometimes it is difficult to know which library to use when your manufacturer does not provide you with anything else except this label on the package. Remember to make sure that the background and text colors must be different to display characters or else you cannot see anything.

TFT LCDs are the most popular color displays – the displays in smartphones, tablets, and laptops are actually the TFT LCDs only. There are TFT LCD shields available for Arduino in a variety of sizes like 1.44″, 1.8″, 2.0″, 2.4″, and 2.8″. Arduino is quite a humble machine whenever it comes to process or control graphics. After all, it is a microcontroller platform, and graphical applications usually require much greater processing resources. Still, Arduino is capable enough to control small display units. TFT LCDs are colorful display screens that can host beautiful user interfaces.

Most of the smaller TFT LCD shields can be controlled using the Adafruit TFT LCD library. There is also a larger TFT LCD shield of 3.5 inches, with an ILI9486 8-bit driver.

The Adafruit library does not support the ILI9486 driver. Actually, the Adafruit library is written to control only TFT displays smaller than 3.5 inches. To control the 3.5 inch TFT LCD touch screen, we need another library. This is MCUFRIEND_kbv. The MCUFRIEND_kbv library is, in fact, even easier to use in comparison to the Adafruit TFT LCD library. This library only requires instantiating a TFT object and even does not require specifying pin connections.

TFT LCDs for ArduinoUser interfaces are an essential part of any embedded application. The user interface enables any interaction with the end-user and makes possible the ultimate use of the device. The user interfaces are hosted using a number of devices like seven-segments, character LCDs, graphical LCDs, and full-color TFT LCDs. Out of all these devices, only full-color TFT displays are capable of hosting sophisticated interfaces. A sophisticated user interface may have many data fields to display or may need to host menus and sub-menus or host interactive graphics. A TFT LCD is an active matrix LCD capable of hosting high-quality images.

Arduino operates at low frequency. That is why it is not possible to render high-definition images or videos with Arduino. However, Arduino can control a small TFT display screen rendering graphically enriched data and commands. By interfacing a TFT LCD touch screen with Arduino, it is possible to render interactive graphics, menus, charts, graphs, and user panels.

Some of the popular full-color TFT LCDs available for Arduino include 3.5″ 480×320 display, 2.8″ 400×200 display, 2.4″ 320×240 display and 1.8″ 220×176 display. A TFT screen of appropriate size and resolution can be selected as per a given application.

If the user interface has only graphical data and commands, Atmega328 Arduino boards can control the display. If the user interface is a large program hosting several menus and/or submenus, Arduino Mega2560 should be preferred to control the TFT display. If the user interface needs to host high-resolution images and motions, ARM core Arduino boards like the DUE should be used to control the TFT display.

MCUFRIEND_kbv libraryAdafruit TFT LCD library supports only small TFT displays. For large TFT display shields like 3.5-inch, 3.6-inch, 3.95-inch, including 2.4-inch and 2.8-inch TFT LCDs, MCUFRIEND_kbv library is useful. This library has been designed to control 28-pin TFT LCD shields for Arduino UNO. It also works with Arduino Mega2560. Apart from UNO and Mega2560, the library also supports LEONARDO, DUE, ZERO, and M0-PRO. It also runs on NUCLEO-F103 and TEENSY3.2 with Sparkfun Adapter. The Mcufriend-style shields tend to have a resistive TouchScreen on A1, 7, A2, 6 but are not always in the same direction rotation. The MCUFRIEND_kbv library can be included in an Arduino sketch from the library manager.

The 3.5-inch TFT LCD shield needs to be plugged atop the Arduino board. The Mcufriend-style shields are designed to fit into all the above-mentioned Arduino boards. The shields have a TFT touch screen that can display colorful images and interfaces and a micro SD card reader to save images and other data. A 3.5-inch TFT LCD touch screen has the following pin diagram.

Arduino has always helped to build projects easily and make them look more attractive.  Programming an LCD screen with touch screen option might sound as a complicated task, but the Arduino libraries and shields had made it really easy. In this project we will use a 2.4” Arduino TFT LCD screen to build our own Arduino Touch Screen calculator that could perform all basic calculations like Addition, Subtraction, Division and Multiplication.

Before we actually dive into the project it is important to know, how this 2.4” TFT LCD Module works and what are the types present in it. Let us take a look at the pinouts of this 2.4” TFT LCD screen module.

As you can see there are 28 pins which will perfectly fit into any Arduino Uno / Arduino Mega Board. A small classification of these pins is given in the table below.

As you can see the pins can be classified in to four main classifications such as LCD Command Pins, LCD Data Pins, SD Card Pins and Power Pins, We need not know much about the detailed working of these pins since they will be take care by our Arduino Library.

You can also find an SD card slot at the bottom of the module shown above, which can be used to load an SD card with bmp image files, and these images can be displayed in our TFT LCD screen using the Arduino Program.

Another important thing to note is your Interface IC. There are many types of TFT modules available in the market starting from the original Adafruit TFT LCD module to cheap Chinese clones. A program which works perfectly for your Adafruit shield might not work the same for Chinese breakout boards. So, it is very important to know which types of LCD display your are holding in hand. This detail has to be obtained from the vendor. If you are having a cheap clone like mine then it is most probably using the ili9341 driver IC.You can follow this TFT LCD interfacing with Arduino tutorial to try out some basic example programs and get comfortable with the LCD screen. Also check out our other TFT LCD projects with Arduino here:

If you planning to use the touch screen function of your TFT LCD module, then you have to calibrate it to make it work properly.  A LCD screen without calibration might work unlikely, for instance you might touch at one place and the TFT might respond for a touch at some other place. These calibrations results will not be similar for all boards and hence you are left on your own to do this.

The 2.4” TFT LCD screen is a perfect Arduino Shield. You can directly push the LCD screen on top of the Arduino Uno and it will perfectly match with the pins and slid in through. However, as matters of safety cover the Programming terminal of your Arduino UNO with a small insulation tape, just in case if the terminal comes in contact with your TFT LCD screen. The LCD assembled on UNO will look something like this below.

We are using the SPFD5408 Library to get this arduino calculator code working. This is a modified library of Adafruit and can work seamlessly with our LCD TFT Module. You can check the complete program at the end of this Article.

Now, open Arduino IDE and select Sketch -> Include Librarey -> Add .ZIP library. A browser window will open navigate to the ZIP file and click “OK”. You should notice “Library added to your Libraries” on the bottom-left corner of Arduino, if successful. A detailed guide to do the same is given in the Interfacing Tutorial.

Now, you can use the code below in your Arduino IDE and upload it to your Arduino UNO for the Touch Screen Calculator to work. Further down, I have explained the code into small segments.

As said earlier we need to calibrate the LCD screen to make it work as expected, but don’t worry the values given here are almost universal. The variables TS_MINX, TS_MINY, TS_MAXX, and TS_MAXY decide the calibration of the Screen. You can toy around them if you feel the calibration is not satisfactory.

As we know the TFT LCD screen can display a lot of colours, all these colours have to be entered in hex value. To make it more human readable we assign these values to a variable as shown below.

The final step is to calculate the result and display them on TFT LCD Screen. This arduino calculator can perform operation with 2 numbers only. These two numbers are named as variables “Num1” and “Num2”. The variable “Number” gives and takes value from Num1 and Num2 and also bears the result.

The working of this Arduino Touch Screen Calculator is simple. You have to upload the below given code on your Arduino and fire it up. You get the calculator displayed on your LCD screen.