xl97's Iron Man motorized face plate tutorial

Dio

You are still confusing amperes and ampere-hours. The way to measure the current in a circuit is to plug in your multimeter in series with the battery (as if it was a battery). If you are struggling with a power supply providing enough current, it's usually better to measure the voltage, which is done by connecting the multimeter in parallel with the power supply. If the voltage drops sharply when the load is active (you are running the servos or whatever), then either the servo is trying to pull more than intended or the power supply isn't strong enough.

To measure voltage, you plug the leads on the multimeter to the ground (black) and the voltage measurement connector. To measure current, you have to move the red plug to the current measurement connector. If you have the plugs in the wrong connectors, the readings will be pretty much nonsense.

There's no fast way to measure the ampere-hours that a battery can provide, but then you usually don't need to know and you just read it from a spec sheet somewhere. The slow way is to fully charge the battery, then attach a reasonable load and observe how long the battery lasts (measure the voltage and plot it on paper, for example).

To measure how a battery behaves when loaded, you can use a resistor and measure the voltage across the resistor and compare that with the voltage of the battery when it's not connected to anything.

If you currently have a whole bunch of AAs and use a regulator, you might be OK. Remember though that regulators also have ratings and that the way they work is to just burn the excess voltage as heat, so if you plug in 12V and the regulator is 5V and you are using 1A current, the regulator is being heated with (12V-5V) * 1A = 7W power. If it's small and doesn't have much of a heat sink, it might get pretty hot and burn out if you use it for a long time.

I'm not going to try to troubleshoot the servo circuit or capacitors - those are well outside my range of knowledge.
 
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@ tiga,

Thanks for the knowledge. Originally I thought mah = ma just different initials. Now I see what they are stand for.

Thanks for the clarification.

@ xl97

I'm trying to use the exact setting as your diagram. Since I don't have 0.33uf cap, is there a alternative way for the caps? This is what I have:

IMG_5740.JPG

I want to see if the result is different than my 5v regulator module.

@ xl97 & tiga

The battery I'm using for testing is non rechargeable Li-Soci2 14500. Base on the data sheets it has 2600 mAh.

Hope this will solve the issue. I will also try to put a 5v regulator module on each servo.

Will keep you posted for any update.

Thanks

Dio
 
those are the caps the datasheet says to use for the LM7805 voltage regulator I believe...

(its been a while)
 
those are the caps the datasheet says to use for the LM7805 voltage regulator I believe...

(its been a while)

Got it. I guess the next step for me will be use these two Li-Soci2 14500 batteries hook up my 5v regulator module see if that works. At the same time I will see if I can find 0.33uf cap somewhere and other type of servo. Once the circuit has been tested ok with the 14500 battery, I will switch them with the 16500 rechargeable batteries (the 14500 battery that I have is non rechargeable).

I just find there are 2 stores in my city sell servos and 3 electronic cigarette stores carry 18650 rechargeable li-on batteries. Since I want to got it work ASAP, I will check these stores to see if they have what I need. I don't want to wait another month or so for the shipment if I shop online.

Also may I ask when you did your helmet, did you do the same way as mine? so from paper -> resin-> fiberglass, etc? If so may I ask what type of servo did you use for your helmet? I think if we did the helmet in the same way, the weight of the faceplate shouldn't have much difference.

The only reason I use 1501 MG servo is because it was refereed by some posts. If the other servo can meet the requirement (lift the faceplate up, not easy be damaged, longer life time) and at the same time won't cause so much trouble for the circuit, I will switch to that servo with no doubt.

Really appreciate your help

Dio
 
those are the caps the datasheet says to use for the LM7805 voltage regulator I believe...

(its been a while)

Hi xl97,

I'm back in town and will start working on it either tonight or tomorrow night. I do find a store in states sell electronics with good quality and decent price. It is called Micro Center. Not sure they have a branch in your area or not. The UNO R3 board they sell $5.99, and same with the mini pro. They do carry other stuff such as servo, EL wire, electronic parts such as caps, NPN, etc (However, I didn't find the 0.33uf cap in their store). If they have a store in your area, you may want to consider buy something over there if the price difference is not that big compare with the price online due to you can get it immediately and they also have 30 days return policy. In case something is not suitable to your project or goes wrong:)

Please let me know your thoughts about the servo.

Thanks

Dio
 
I personally dont have a Micro Center in my area.. but other areas do..


I still havent been able to find ANYTHING cheaper than eBay/Chinese sellers.

the wait doesnt bother me usually as I plan ahead..

if I want it 'right now' I pay the premium.

What are you asking about the servo?

I dont have those.
I dont have a bucket to try it with.. I have 2 Iron Man helmets.. but quality wasnt great so I didnt put in the time to finish them)

I would have purchased some other servos ANYWAYS..

1.) just to test.. and see if they behave differently.
2.) to have extra servos for other projects in the future..
 
I personally dont have a Micro Center in my area.. but other areas do..


I still havent been able to find ANYTHING cheaper than eBay/Chinese sellers.

the wait doesnt bother me usually as I plan ahead..

if I want it 'right now' I pay the premium.

What are you asking about the servo?

I dont have those.
I dont have a bucket to try it with.. I have 2 Iron Man helmets.. but quality wasnt great so I didnt put in the time to finish them)

I would have purchased some other servos ANYWAYS..

1.) just to test.. and see if they behave differently.
2.) to have extra servos for other projects in the future..

Thanks for the advise

I was asking what's the servo did you put on your helmet. I thought maybe I can use the same one.

Thanks

Dio
 
If i want to ve able to turn it off without removing battery do i only need to add a switch between the battery pack and the first cap

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put a latching switch in-line on the GND wire BEFORE the caps/regulator


if you use re-chargeable li-ions.. you can use a re-charge port that can be configured as a 'kill key' when not recharging the batteries.
 
Hi xl97,

I found 0.33uf caps. So I followed your design and the servo still acting weird. And the Regulator become soooooo hot (almost burned my finger when I touch the back of the LM7805 regulator). I used 2 18650 rechargeable li-on batteries as my power source. It labeled as 3.7V each but when I measure them together when they are fully charged, it shows 8.4V.


Anyway, when I switch to a different servo (torque 3kg so it way less than what I used before) it works perfect. Not sure maybe the circuit need adjustment if hook up with bigger servo?

BTW, the servo now that worked using plastic gear. I heard a lot of people saying that the plastic gear will be broken and suggest using the metal gear servo. Is that true?

Also, is there anyway to solve the super hot issue for the regulator?

Thanks

Dio
 
?? If the regulator is getting -that- hot... things is NOT wired correctly..

The pack sounds right, and should be around +8v fully charged.

Yes.. metal geared servos will have more strength..

Post a picture of the set-up..

are you using a polarized cap? Is it installed backwards?
 
?? If the regulator is getting -that- hot... things is NOT wired correctly..

The pack sounds right, and should be around +8v fully charged.

Yes.. metal geared servos will have more strength..

Post a picture of the set-up..

are you using a polarized cap? Is it installed backwards?

For the cap, they are not polarized cap. The 0.33 uf cap that I find is Ceramic capacitor (The first on the list below). The 0.1 uf cap is either Silver Mica Capacitor or Polyester Film Capacitor (4th or 6th on the list below).

http://www.vbotix.com/capacitors/

I will upload a pic or video for the set up when I got home tonight.

Dio
 
this is what I did:

Test 10.jpg

The little cap on the left is the 0.33 uf. And the right bigger one is 0.1 uf. Not sure why the regulator is so hot?

Thanks

Dio
 
I think I find out the reason cause this issue. I switch to a different servo and looks like it works fine now. Will do more test see how it goes. Thanks for the your help:)

Dio
 
I was wondering if anyone wrote code for a RGB color strip version? I am a little picky and instead of reinventing the wheel I thought I would ask
 
You'd need another transistor.. for each color..

and then of course the use of more pins.. (at least 2.. maybe 4)..

buts its really no different then current set-up in the diagram.

are you trying to 'color mix'? or just have a red or green or blue color?
 
I want to say thank you for your thread but sadly I decided that for my first build I will forget the moving faceplate to save money and to raise the difficulty slowly I decided that im gonna wait and put electronic only on my future 3d printed iron man mk 45 since it look more easier to add electronic system in 3d printed suit because you can for exemple on the back when you print it there is no rear flaps only the detail under and the rear flaps are printed apart which is really helpfull and easier for me I think as I would say I dont give up I leave to come back stronger :₩

Envoyé de mon SM-G530W en utilisant Tapatalk
 
I think I find out the reason cause this issue. I switch to a different servo and looks like it works fine now. Will do more test see how it goes. Thanks for the your help:)

Dio
Since your canadian too I have one question for you if you ordered your servo from china does the clearance fees were expensive ? because yeah free shipping is nice but often the clearance fees are a pain

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Since your canadian too I have one question for you if you ordered your servo from china does the clearance fees were expensive ? because yeah free shipping is nice but often the clearance fees are a pain

Envoyé de mon SM-G530W en utilisant Tapatalk

If you order from Amazon.ca with regular free shipping. I would say the chance is really small to get charge for the clearance fee. I have done couple times, and it was fine with the regular shipping (Canada post) But once switch to premium (DHL, FEDEX, etc) It kind of risky. I got charged once from DHL.The clearance fee include 3 parts, the import tax, processing fee and transaction fee. The import tax is only about 13% just like GST/HST for electronics. However the transaction fee and processing fee is the big part. Ex last time my import tax is only $3.53. But the process fee is $10.5 and transaction fee is $4.25.

Hope this helped.
 

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