Animatronic cannon controller

Yes, Alex, I'll take "Things that are way over my head", for $500...

Dude, I'm so jealous. Never could wrap my head around the electrical sections in college physics; really wish I could "get" it. Alas, that's why we are blessed to run into people like you. Can't wait to see your full rig up and running!
 
Here's the design for the transistor adapter board. It measures roughly .75" x 1.125" so it's pretty small. It connects to the controller board with a flat ribbon cable. This board allows you to connect high power LEDs and small motors to the controller board- up to 1 Amp each. It also forms an important part of the cannon system as it actuates two of the servos (rotation and pitch) as well as the firing LED and laser sight. Without this the two servos would always be on, even when the cannon is in its lowered position. So with this board installed, when you press the cannon arming button the laser sight and servos become active.

TransistorBoardv20-1.jpg
 
So here's what my final controller board looks like- you can clearly see the LiPo charging circuit and all the inputs/outputs. The finished board measures just under 2.25" x 1.75".
ServoBoardFinished1.jpg


Here's what it looks like with the wireless radio installed in its socket- it can also be connected with a cable.
ServoBoardFinished2.jpg

ServoBoardFinished.jpg
 
Thanks guys! The tiny transistors should be in this week so as soon as I get the prototype transistor board made I'll be able to do the full tutorial.
 
So I redesigned the transistor board to make it much easier to connect things together. It now has specific pins to connect the cannon LED (marked LED on the board), laser sight, rotation and pitch servos (S1 and S2), cannon arm servo board (BRD- this is another controller board), sound effects board (SFX) and two ground pins to connect two additional boards to a common ground. This board will plug directly into the controller board- no cable is necessary as the board measures .5" x 1" so it's small enough to fit. I just have to change the code and schematic a bit to reflect the change in output pins.

The big deal with this is that now everything will use the same code- it won't matter if you have a P1 cannon (3 servos) or a two servo (pitch and rotation) cannon system. For the P1 system you just have to plug in an extra controller board (it runs different code that controls the raising and lowering of the cannon arm but also allows for additional servos/motors for animatronic head or gauntlet blades.) To add sound effects just plug in the sound board. It's a true modular expandable system.

I will still make a slightly modified version of the previous transistor board for people that want to use it for other costume or creature animatronics (Iron Man, etc.)

I just received my transistors so hopefully I'll be able to etch a prototype board tonight and then it's tutorial time!

P1transistorboardv10.jpg
 
Here's what the prototype transistor boards look like. I decided to go ahead and make two prototypes -one that is directly socketed to the controller and one that will connect with a cable. I'm starting to lean toward the cable connected version as I'm not really liking the way the socketed version sticks out. In the tutorial I'll also show how to build another version that can handle up to 5 Amp loads.

TransistorBoards.jpg

TransistorBoardSocketed.jpg
 
Yes! I was able to rewrite the code so now you only need one controller for the P1 cannon, so that lowers the cost for a P1 system by $90. So now one single controller will work for most any cannon application without having to add a secondary controller or change the code. I also figured out how to do a pre programmed run routine so for people that want something really simple you can push a button and have the cannon raise up, look around, fire (with sound effects) and then center itself and lower itself back down all on it's own.

Jerome
 
Honus said:
Yes! I was able to rewrite the code so now you only need one controller for the P1 cannon, so that lowers the cost for a P1 system by $90. So now one single controller will work for most any cannon application without having to add a secondary controller or change the code. I also figured out how to do a pre programmed run routine so for people that want something really simple you can push a button and have the cannon raise up, look around, fire (with sound effects) and then center itself and lower itself back down all on it's own.

Jerome
Click to expand...
This simple set up sounds like something up my alley Honus. Great job on the improvements and I also have a favor to ask if that is ok PM?
 
jaded said:
This is awfully cool.....
Click to expand...

You should see the Iron Man project I'm working on for a friend- it's sooo cool (and it's not a War Machine cannon either- that would have been too easy!) It's actually how I figured out to modify the code.

Jerome
 
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