Every Foosball Table Needs This Electronic Scoring System
Joey Cumeras Khan's setup detects when the ball enters the goal and displays the score on a smartphone.
Like many of us, Joey Cumeras Khan has been stuck at home for the last two months. To take advantage of this time, he added a custom scoring system to his foosball table, which makes sense as there aren’t a whole lot of actual soccer/football games going on these days.
The build features an Arduino Nano to register when a ball travels through the goal, using an LED emitter and LDR to detect when it hits the storage tray. When the ball is in position, this lowers light levels significantly, allowing the Arduino to record the ball presence as a goal. One of each LED/LDR setup is mounted to each tray, with 3D-printed parts holding it in place and a recycled USB cable cut up to connect the sensor assemblies.
While the Arduino has a small beeping speaker to signify when each goal happens, the real user interface is via the players' smartphones. Data is passed along to an Orange Pi Zero board, which serves a web app that displays the score to anyone connected. The app can also play a variety of customizable sounds and reset the game as needed.
Khan even included 3D-printed holders for phones near each goal, for easy access when playing. Code for the project is available on GitHub.
