Ben Holko wrote:
> what are you building Frank?
I recently built the "APS 2014" for a theater project, a "mysterious
device from the future" that prints out documents describing the lead
character's life. The device had to shoot out paper about 4-8 feet on
queue, with lots of mechanical sounds and flashing lights. I used an
EV-Warrior driven at 5 volts to drive some foam rollers as the main
mechanism. An oblong wheel scavenged by Will about 15 years ago from a
printer was connected to another motor to select a sheet of paper from a
spring-loaded bin. After the show closes, the APS 2014 will be used
during our static shows to dispense brochures to kids walking past our
table.
I also finished a batch of "animation circuits" for Steel Dragons LLC, a
1/6 scale supplier down in Florida. They sell to the detailed
large-scale modeling crowd and they provide detailed figures as tank
drivers, gunners and commanders, which are controlled by one or more
servos. They used to sell a very expensive single-board controller
(massive overkill for the purpose) to animate those figures. They will
soon start selling inexpensive C6C-based controllers that have twice the
capability. The circuit randomly moves up to 4 servos in life-like
manner across various ranges of motion. Very interesting specs for that
project ... they didn't want any programmability or user inputs of any
kind. They simply connect the circuit to a power source (anything
between 6-24v), an LED lights to indicate it is working and the servos
start randomly moving.
On the tank front, I've been helping Paul with the electronics for his
new tank. Had to spend a little extra time on that project, after
connecting the red/black wires backwards, thereby releasing the magic
blue smoke from one of the controllers. Fortunately, scooter
controllers are cheap and readily available, so the replacement device
was done in less than a week. As a result of that detour, I found a new
scooter model that has fewer wires to deal with (we only use 7 of the
20+ wires normally found on a scooter controller) and that has a nice
large case that can be used to hide the control circuit and some of the
wiring if desired. Slightly larger than necessary, but at $25 for a
500W controller I can't complain.
This weekend, the Navarone Gun got some quality time when I finally
finished an item sitting on "the list" for over a year. I replaced the
two-battery system (required 12v for control circuit and 6v for
rotate/elevate motors) by a single 12v battery system by installing an
inexpensive manual speed control. We used the same circuit in the
Brumbar to tune the speed of the elevate/rotate and it worked well
enough that it's time to give it a tougher test in the Navarone Gun.
After our demonstration event next weekend, I may convert that speed
control to R/C control, which will finally give insidious operators like
John and Steve the variable speed control they crave when operating
artillery in the middle of the field.
Frank P.
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