My ASHPD Testing shall commence in 3, 2, 1

I discovered The RPF after watching Adam Savage's DL-44 build on Tested. Prior to that I was unaware of prop building. Even though I dabbled in custom action figures, it never occurred to me to build props. After some browsing here and Volpin's site, I decided this was something I could and wanted to do.

With that, for my first prop I wanted to do my own take on the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device. I read through Volpin's build as well as Throwing Chicken's. I don't think I could ever match their builds, I still wanted to tackle this.

Let me say this, I appreciate anyone who is willing to subscribe to this thread and follow the build for the long haul. My progress is slow for a multitude of reasons. Doing it the way I want is high on the list. I will not compromise on the way I want something to look or act. I have built special tools to do one job and this in and of itself, is another project. So I may not get it done in record time, but I know it's done the way I want.

So like all good builds I promptly started putting a plan together...in my head. I started buying supplies that seemed common to a lot of the builds and were good for scaling as well. Soon I realized I needed to really started writing stuff down and putting an actual plan down on paper.

I knew I wanted to use as many commonly available items as I could. This way it keeps availability to a maximum over one off parts. I also knew I wanted to give it all the bells and whistles, lights, movable parts and sound.

I started out using two 4" PVC couplers for the chassis. I figured on working my way forward. Thankfully I determined early on this was silly. So I figured I needed to focus on the barrel and work my way back. Since this is where most of the magic will happen anyways it made the most sense.

I could have just lit the barrel from behind like the prior builds and been ok with that. While there is plenty of prior art to dictate what it would look like, I always felt the business end of an ASHPD should be more "live" than the static version we have seen in the past. More on that later.

The equipment installed decided on what power supply I would use. For my needs I will be running two packs. One 12 volt and one 4.5 volt. They are both filled with AAs. I also wanted to keep the switches/buttons to a bare minimum. So there will be a master on/off switch and what I termed a "Portal Acitvation" button. That's all. I wanted one button to do the work so I used a latching relay to accomplish this. I'm feeling out the idea to add a small lug to the underside so when I dock it in the base it will light from 120 volt power. Haven't made a call on that yet.

Ok. Enough talk onto some pictures.

I first tried to make a barrel from pieces of PVC.

]


My thought was pre-made perforated PCBs for everything. I was going to sandwich the main board between two of the pieces.





While logistically it was simple enough, I struggled for a while trying to get the nose right. In the end, I scrapped the PCV idea and my friend turned some Delrin down on his lathe for me.


This is attempt #s 2 and 3. On the left is the second attempt. It's a great outing, but some bit chatter forced him to cut a bit further down and it threw of some of the measurements. It's my test and back up piece. Attempt 1 was very rough and has some of the first cuts but is still viable for certain testing uses. #3 will go untouched until all the fit and finishes are tested and complete.


You can see in the pic above my first main board build. It worked fine, but being a perforated board required a lot of jumpers to be used and I wasn't a fan of that. Since I scrapped the PVC portion, this forced me to change the design of this as well. I ended up laying out and etching my own board for this.


It's considerably smaller. I free handed the resist, so it's not the best, but it works beautifully. As I mentioned earlier I always felt if you're creating portals, the barrel should seem live. Like it's constantly priming to do its job. So I decided install a fan instead of a static "diffuser" in the bore of the barrel and add a chaser around it. Stick with me here.

First things first. The fan I got from an old little DVD player. I wanted it to be two speeds. One very slow while "idling" and then another when the button is pressed. Problem is, while I wired it as such, it's not the type of fan for the job. It's an asymmetrical fan and I can't remove any of the blades to exaggerate the effect. The minimum voltage to run the fan isn't slow enough to help either. I will still wire it this way, but it's one of the only aspects I've compromised on.


The tricky part is how to achieve the chaser effect. This was no easy task. It was a lot of trial and error and a good amount of hope. Once I settled on the dimensions of my barrel I ordered a polycarbonate tube.


I needed to separate it from everything else as well. So I went to the auto parts store and grabbed an exhaust pipe adapter and ever slow slightly sanded it to fit. I hand sanded this, almost a polish to help slide it in, other than cutting it length it was a perfect fit.



Now to work out the electronics. I have a ton of surface mount LEDs sitting around the proper color. So I had that sorted. I went to work on the control portion. You can find an array of these circuit designs online. They include a parts list. So that was easy. There was a lot of bread boarding done to test this circuit, I came to find out what I already knew to be true. Radio Shack had poor QC on their silicon. After pulling what was left of my hair out I figured out I needed a better quality chip. Luckily I have an actual electronics shop driving distance from me. So I went there and bought the place out. Or so it seemed. So nice to actually talk to some one behind a counter who not only knows what I'm talking about, but can teach me a thing or three. Here's the final testing of the circuit.

<---CLICK ME!



The LEDs used here were used for testing only, as putting an SMD on a bread board is prohibitively difficult. The circuit called for a potentiometer which I didn't need. So I set my desired speed and put the appropriate value resistor in there instead.

I had the hard part out of the way. I went on to design and etch another board. I had never done a round board before this and now I've done two.

Here's a pre-etch shot of both sides.


Here's a post etch of the top





At this point I'm sure you've started to figure out the plan. As I move through this, anytime anything is changed I make sure to take the time to do a full electronics test along the way. Be it a mechanical or electrical change, I like to make sure everything is still copacetic before I make too many changes and have to start figuring out my issues.

Here's a fully assembled pic.





As for the sound. I ordered a sound board from Bob at Replica Props. What a neat answer to a problem. Great customer service and simple instructions. The only hiccup here was I wasn't clear on how the chip worked and didn't order exactly what I needed. So I ended Having to build a small relay board to make all the proper sounds go with the proper colors. Other than that, it works flawlessly. I ordered a small amp from eBay for around $5. I believe it was a Class D and it was the perfect compliment to the little speaker.




So in the interest of moving this along...

Here is a main board test

<---CLICK ME!




A chaser test
<---CLICK ME!




And a full electronics test bare.

<---CLICK ME! (Includes audio)

The rundown is as such:

Barrel with chaser board in the bottom. The polycarbonate/metal sleeve combo goes in next. (No pic of that)




Then the layer cake.



From top down:

Fan
Mesh
Foam Diffuser
Main Board
Foam Insulator

All that results in this:




It looks worse than it is. I have already ordered a wiring solution.

And for me the piece de resistance. This worked so much better than I ever anticipated.
<---REALLY CLICK ME!



I have not gotten to a full electronics test in the barrel yet. I am tackling mounting it first then I can move on to that. I hope I can bring you updates in a timely manner and appreciate any interest you have in my first prop build. More to come. Much, much more to come.

TL;DR

I'm building a portal gun, thanks for checking out the pics.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Great build so far, definitely watching this one
As for the adio: It really does sound quite good, maybe I'm going to try a few different speakers and shields to see where the differences are.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Impressive work! I can't wait to see it finished.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Thanks guys. I have been working on learning a PCB fab software. It has sidetracked me and I am now in the process of deciding on putting one large board together. In the meantime, I may just repair the boards I have now to do my full test and move from there.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

If you want to have it manufactured by a company for a cheap price definitely check out iteadstudio.com.
I made my Arduino-shields for the electronic of the Gravity Gun.

Here's a crappy picture of it.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Oh wow. That's really nice. Thanks! I will note them.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Nice work so far. I love the idea of the fan, such a cool little addition, but I struggled to follow what you were saying about it in combination with the chaser. Will the fan spin at the same speed as the chaser circuit while in "idle" mode?

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Thanks!

Let me see if I can explain this better. My vision is as such: the chaser moves at the same speed no matter what. The fan slowly rotates and then speeds up with the button press. My reality is different. While the chaser works as designed, the fan doesn't. The brushless fans do not act like their brushed counterparts. You can limit voltage and bring the speed to a crawl. Think of a ceiling fan with multiple speeds. The brushed fans are purposed built and just shut off at certain voltage threshold. After some testing I shunted as much voltage as I could but the effect is still lost visually. You can hear the speed change on the bench. So, unless I find something else in the meantime I designed the chaser to spin the opposite direction of the fan in hopes to exaggerate the fan rotation to a slower speed. I don't know if it will work yet, but I am willing to try.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

You definitely should!
The only "flaw" they have is that you have to at least order a pack of 10 PCB's. They even give you two additional spare ones if you agree to make your EAGLE-file downloadable to the public giving away your "copyright" on it.
Including shipping it costed me around 35$ Was a nobrainer for me.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

That's really cheap. Although I have no little use for that many boards. Something to consider though.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Gixxer, this is a fantastic build. Following both yours and Mario's with interest!

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Hey Mario,

How did you get the rounded board in EAGLE?

Thanks so much! I appreciate that.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

I sadly don't have much of an update. I'm floating between board design and bench testing. I started wiring everything up on the bench but either get sidetracked by the dog or other items or just cant seem to get more than 20 minutes at a time to really get momentum. When I had about an hour the other day I realized I needed to draw up a wiring diagram. When I was in the bread boarding phase, it was easy as I soldered resistors to wire and such for a quick test. Now that I have boards it makes it more complicated as i have to convert everything to pin outs. So I got that done to keep from turning myself around and am in the process of getting it wired up. Hopefully I will have a real update soon.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Sorry, totally overlooked it.
I just drawed it in an circular shape on Layer 20 (Dimension) and asked ITEADstudio if that would be problem to machine.
They responded with "absolutely not" and so, yeah...

Just take your time on the update. It's not always easy to gather a lot of time for stuff like that.
Looking forward to it though!

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Thanks. I realized that after I posted it. I've been using EAGLE more in the past few days and have been learning the nuances. It's a great little program. My problem is running one large board with two discrete voltages. I don't feel like going back and redesigning everything.

I am hoping for a minor update this week. Not enough hours in the day. I was stacking the boards for my test and just had too many issues, this will be alleviated later with some proper pins and connectors. I will be making harnesses. As of right now I'm using jumper wires. I took everything apart and started fresh this time laying them out. Hopefully I'll have some progress soon.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

Just going to sit in the corner and gaze with wide-open eyes at this. So much know-how! One day I shall get beyond pre-wired LEDs and learn about circuit boards.


Who am I kidding?

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

thank you for the kind words. Everyone has their strengths for sure. I do not have your gift for writing, lord knows I try. I do have a rabid thirst for trying new things, I then keep doing it until it's where I want it. Humor aside I think your builds are great. There's never shame in trying. Only shame in not trying. Having extensive amount of patience is big too. I've always loved electronics and did stuff On a hobby level. This is a natural progression of that. I could have had boards made, but I revel in design and execution and seeing it all come to life. Using pre wired LEDs is a great option especially for saving time and money. I won't lie there was a ton of bread boarding. More than i care to think about. There was a lot of Hail Marys and a good amount of help from a friend. I'm always learning which is part of what makes this fun.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device[TXT N IMG]

After a bad LED in my chaser board, a board made wrong, 4 days of sickness, a minor heatwave and tons of wire I finally present an update.

I wasn't going to custom etch a board for the sound chip but after a wire fell off I decided to just do it. That's the 28 pin job on the right. This right after etching. I drew the resist by hand on this one. The other board holds the the resisitors for my chaser lights, since i had no room on the board for it and the control circuit for my fan, more on that in a bit. The resist for that was a rub on transfer. They're pre printed sheets you lay down by rubbing it through the top sheet. That sounds dirty. Anyways, I like the resist pen as it cleans with alcohol. The transfer worked ok. It did a great job of keeping the acid at bay, but ultimately was a lot of work and a lot of clean up.
w



So so here they are after a bath. I don't have a picture of them populated.


After some soldering I was finally ready to test everything out.



After testing I noticed the fan spins so fast you lost it in the mix. I have an idea to slow it down but that will be a little time.

Thanks for looking.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Hell yes! You nailed it with the lighting!
What's the next point on your list? Do you have any plans on how to create the white body parts for the back and the front? Resin casting?

Keep up the great work! Can't wait to see where this is going

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Thanks so much. The lighting came out just as I pictured which is very exciting. I'm still working on the fan speed, I didn't quite achieve the effect I wanted. It seems pulse width modulation is the solution. I 555 timer circuit is what I am trying next. If I can achieve the effect I want, I will leave it and move on.

Up next is mounting the barrel. Since I wanted to make it repairable if necessary, I have a solution worked out, but as of now it's untested. The main body will be PCV, the part that houses the lit chamber and such. As for the white parts, I was going to use floral foam originally, I may still use that as a form. For me, by time I got done casting two parts, it would more money than the rest of the unit. I have never casted before and would need fairly large molds. I may use the foam or even papier mâché as a form then fiberglass them as a final product. Still haven't made a decision.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Great to hear that everything went as expected for you
What kind of effect are you heading for?

Dude that casting material is some expensive stuff, yeah! Anyway I will have to buy quite a lot of it for my project aswell.
Since I heard and read only good things about Smooth-On I'll definitely head for their products, even they are a little bit more expensive than the other brands.
Alon for the Xen-crystals all in all would sum up to about 250EUR, which is CRAZY!
Good choice on using floral foam, definitely the way to go!

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Originally I was trying get it to idle slow and then when the button press is performed it would speed up momentarily. I would still like that effect, but I would settle for a slow enough speed it can be seen. The brushless motors make this very hard to achieve. I am going to grab some components tonight and see if I can make it happen. If it doesn't work, I will need to rethink my plan.

Yeah. Single castings are a lot of money. I even have a friend who worked at Smooth-On for a while and said they have some of the best and easiest products out there. Once I get a shape constructed I'll make a decision, I know the foam requires some special handling to be durable, so there is a trade off.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

I have been working with different circuits to achieve the fan effect I want. After some looking it seems that regulating the fan isn't an option. So my friend suggested another route. Here's a quick video of a test of that. It shows promise.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

That lightshow looks utterly incredible!

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Thanks! I am trying to get out to the store to get the rest of the parts to maybe have another test, but I'm struggling to get there.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

I know it has been a while since an update. Let me start by thanking those still following along. Progress has been nil. I know everyone wants pics, as do I. Soon hopefully. Here is where I am at.

After exhaustive testing and prototyping, I have come to the conclusion the fan idea wasn't going to happen. I was at a stalemate...with myself. I knew just putting a light in there was not going to cut it for me. While the fan was possible, I decided after some time away, it was a really cool idea to shelve for a later project but a different route was required for this.

In the interest of full disclosure, once the warm weather hits, prop making goes to the wayside for another passion of mine, riding. So all the free time I would dedicate to building goes to riding until the cold weather creeps in.

The other day I had an epiphany on how to finally get this barrel done and move on to the rest of the project, I know some people like to move to other parts while the "problem" simmers, but this being my first big build wanted to make sure I had one part tackled in order to focus on the next with my undivided attention. As quickly as my bulb turned on, it burnt out. I started to explore my backup idea again and the details just wouldn't flesh out.

With the help, and my never-ending thanks, @PropBox came through.

He recommended Arduino a while back and I steered away from it for a couple of reason.

1) I was really looking forward to strengthening my electronics skill with this project. Particularly the design and implementation phase. I have done that to a fairly good extent.
2)I tried coding and we have a mutual agreement, we hate each other.

After some research, and a lot of PM-ing we have put together a plan, that is simple, feasible, and won't break the bank.

Stay tuned.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Small update, but significant. My Adafruit items arrived this morning.



From left to right:
-16 pixel Neopixel ring
-12 pixel Neopixel ring
-7 pixel Neopixel jewel
-Adafruit Trinket in the 5 Volt flavor

Off to learn some programming.

Keep your dial locked.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

So coding is going slow but sure. I have started my sketch and ran my first test today. Its not where I want it, but its a step in the right direction. Hopefully I will get what I need done sooner than later. Here is a little video from this morning's test run.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!



I fixed my code and have both rings lighting proper now. Mostly. Still have one more tweak to fix then I can move on.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

After a lot of hair pulling and trial and error I finally got my initialization on its way. Still some tweaking to do, but it's taught me a lot and got me back on task. These aren't the final colors, I just wanted to be able to differentiate easier during testing.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

This should be it for the initialization procedure. Now that this is done, time to start working on the idling sketch then the Input portion.

Thanks for looking!

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Now that I removed what was left of my hair, I have a strong base sketch going. The startup procedure is finalized. The "idle" pattern however was a test sketch to help me understand the process involved getting there. Now that I have a sketch that tests all the requirements I need I can start writing my final sketch and get back to the mechanics of the build. Here's a little video for you.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

I actually quite like the test idle pattern. One thing i've noticed is that all of the patterns seem to be quite slow. Is that a limitation of the hardware, or are you deliberately setting them to that speed?

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

The pattern is not quite what I wanted yet. It's not bad, I want something similar to this, but not as muddled to the eye. There will be a diffusing layer in front of it.

From what I can tell, there's aren't many limitations to the hardware. I am keeping one spinning ring from my original design and it runs a little slow, that's by design. I set these to this speed until I can get everything together and then decide on how I want it to look. It helps for me to see what the pattern is doing too so I can tell if it's doing what's it supposed to.

Thanks goes out to ThePropBox and xl97 for all of their help.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

This is the pattern I am using for the final product. I need to tweak the speed and possibly the color a bit. I may also only leave the two bigger rings chase and do something different with the center. But this sketch is about 98% complete.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Another update. My sketch is complete for the most part. It needs a little timing tweaking but that will be easier after I get it together and add a diffuser plate.

I want to thank xl97 and ThePropBox for all of their help. Learning coding on the fly isn't easy for me, but they were huge in helping.

I have some stuff coming up that will prevent me from being able to work on this for the next week and half or so, it was important for my sanity and motivation to get this done by tonight. It's a huge boost to get this done.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Dude this more than awesome! I tried my best to be a good teacher in the basics of the stuff but it seems you already got a hang of it!

It's great you got your motivation back to move on with this project as I cannot wait how it's going to evolve further.
Again, incredible job on the sketch!!

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Thank you for the kind words. I can't wait to get back to it. Saturday maybe Sunday. I'm hoping to have a full electronics test with everything mounted in the barrel by the end of next week.

Did you use stranded wire for yours? I used solid core for my testing, but would like to be able to use stranded core for final assembly.

Thanks again

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

I used stranded wires, yes. Haven't worked with ones having a solid core yet but most likely never will since I don't really like them that much!
Just ordered a bunch of different colored wires for all the motors and leds to have it more easy to seperate them in the end

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Where did you source them from? I got a box of standard colors from Amazon. I'm looking for stuff that it different since I have so much working to install.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

I bought a few of them on http://www.conrad.com/ce/ (hope it's okay to post shop links here).
For example this wire here (http://www.conrad.com/ce/de/product...Conrad-SH1998C407-100-m?queryFromSuggest=true) in orange.

You can buy all the colors (even pink, magenta, azure, whatever) but not all cable diameters got all the different color palettes.

A few of them I ordered on Adafruit themselves and a few off of eBay somewhere from China

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

There seems to be a lot of German(?) on those links. Lol. I will check adafruit and I didn't have much luck on eBay, but I try to stick to American sellers for speed of shipping. Thanks!

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Just click on the language symbols on the very top or replace .de with co.uk. but I understand. I try to avoid ordering from outside of Europe too

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Shows I know how to use a website. Strange it's hard to find anything off color for wiring without buying huge spools. Which makes sense.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

So I have made some progress. On with the pictures!

I needed to have the three rings nestle inside of each other and still center in the barrel. From largest to smallest you have the 24, 16, 12, and 7 pixel rings. You can ignore the largest ring. Photo credit to @ThePropBox




I was initially trying to find something to hold the 16 pixel ring in the center of the board using an interference fit. After a lot of measuring, test fitting, searching, and more testing I found what I needed. A small oil cap I had. I cut the tip off leaving a perfect hole in the center, more on that later.



An in progress shot and final after the sides were cut off.





Ok. I needed to center everything. I found a piece of 1/2" tubing. Drilled a couple of holes in the side and then cut it to length and cleaned the cut up.





More to come

EDIT: I'm not entirely sure why the photos are rotating. They are proper while I'm building the post. As soon as it posts everything rotates. If anyone knows a solution, please let me know.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Heres the test fit of the cap in the 16 pixel ring. I cut a notch for the 12 pixel ring signal wire route through.




A little dab'll do ya. Some hot glue to keep it all together. It may not be high tech, but it will allow for maintenance if need be.



The pipe in place and a little more hot glue.



I actually had to glue in the 7 pixel jewel first due to wiring.



This is all three rings installed. You can see the white/brown wire sneaking through the cut out I made in the cap.



Heres as the face of the assembly. I was able to eliminate running two wires from the second ring all the way down. I daisy chained them to the third ring.



More to come

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device UPDATED!

Here's the barrel before. I originally had a 1/4" hole for wire pass through with my old setup. So I needed to open that up a little to accept a 1/2" pipe



There you go. 1/2" hole drilled to 1/2" depth



And installed!



I am currently wiring everything up. I still need to test the input to trigger the color change for the Arduino. I used a button for sketch testing but have a different method for the final build as I am using a single button for everything. That has yet to be bench tested. I will update with more as fast as I can.

Thanks for looking.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device PICS ADDED

For me none of the attachments work unfortunately

Thanks for the credits mate :lol

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device PICS ADDED

ugh. Thanks for the heads up. I'll have to fix it when I get home.

I give it where it's due.

 

Re: My ASHPD Please look directly into the operational end of the device PICS ADDED

Attachments should be working.