Connecting Nitinol to Circuit

[Rebecca P.]

What is the best way to connect the nitinol wire to the circuit? And
should it actuate immediately upon contact with the wires?

[Sterling]

Most people are wrapping and tying the nitinol around the ends of the wires coming from the protoboard. If that doesn't work for you, I will have a solder iron set up during office hours. 

[Sterling]

You will also have problems if you switch the 10M and 1M Ohm resistors. This will cause the circuit to have about a 90% duty cycle, which means that the output will be high most of the time, and the nitinol wire will just be contracted constantly.

[Rebecca P.]

My Nitinol isn't responding at all. I thought I might have had the
resistors reversed (though they appeared as they did in the picture
you provided), so I switched them to see if that would make it work,
and it doesn't work either way. I don't know if one of my components
is faulty or what, but I have everything set up as instructed and
nothing is happening. So I'll be coming in to see you tomorrow during
office hours.

[Sterling]

the resistors and the capacitors are non-polarized. It only matters where they are placed in the circuit, not which direction they are facing.

You can come to office hours to check the output with an oscilloscope, or because the output is so slow you can use any multimeter set to measure DC voltage, you should see it change from 0 to 9 volts every second or two. If the output is correct than it is the design of the bandage or the connection to the nitinol wire. Make sure that you measure the voltage on either end of the nitinol wire, this way you will be sure you are making a good connection.