Hey all With the end of the school term fast approaching, I've been delt several large project finals. In particular, my Computer Engineering project. We were given simple rules. Using a breadboard, parallel port, buffer chip, and oodoles of wires and chips, to create a software and hardware combination that interacts with each other. As long as it stays fairly simplified, we have full creative freedom. As such, I've come up with a few ideas: -Create a light gun of sorts with software that reconigezes when the "gun" has been shot -Build a DCC type system for model railroads (if at all possible) -Build a simple circuit to control a train forwards and backwards, and operate a few railroad crossings (again, similar to above) -(Dream Project) Build some kind of interface and software to modify or hack a console/handheld Perhaps, members would like to share their ideas and thoughts? Sincerely Ryan
Skip the lightguns; I have seen a lot of people try to do simple things like that, but inevitably fail or run out of time. I think that your railroad idea sounds perfect. By DCC, do you mean that when you supply power to the track, your control board senses the layout (i.e. each track piece has a chip which identifies itself in series to the control)? I have always wanted to play around with something like that. Of course, you could go ahead and build a simple pinball machine too. :nod:
I'd say find something that combines your current interests with the project that he's given you. The model railroad project sounds nice, even though I have no idea what a "DCC type system" is. My only real "project" in Computer Engineering involved me and the only other guy that actually worked mounted a new power switch for a Pentium I computer, since the power switch that we had didn't fit with the case. We drilled a hole in one of the 5 1/2 bays and stuck it there. It doesn't sound impressive, but it was fun. The teacher got a kick out of it, too, especially since everyone else in there just played cards all of the time. By the way, I love your new avatar.
Go for the railroad ideas. Moderately simple, and more importantly, achievable. I saw on a uni open day once a project which solved the towers of hanoi problem with the towers represented by a model train (not a lookup, it was actually computing the solution based on the specific number of carts the train carried). It was pretty interesting actually, If a little slow.
if you hack it to a robosaphien controller, you can remote control the robot, or set it to run at a certain time, or to mark the hours of the day, etc.
Wowzers, I'm surprised that soo many suggest the railraod idea. thus, I've managed to flesh out the idea some more The Hardware -The hardware will consist of: -A simple loop of track with a spur(commonly reffered to as a switch) that leads to a small side track, to that, i'll solder some wires, that would go through the transformer(to lower the voltage, and not fry the trains) from there, 2 power wires will lead into a breadboard, through a buffer chip, and into the computer. Also note, a sensor will be place on the spur track. Software -The Software will consist of: _ The software, will be a fairly simple Visual Basic program. A slider and check box will determine the direction and speed of the train. Another check box, will handle working the spur, determining the track it's on, and lastly, the sensor light will inform the program of how many cars are on the given track and display them. Hopefully it's approved, and works well. To answer your question, to my knowledge there is no such an item. Although the idea, is brilliant, it would be highly unsucessful, as it would probably be uncompatible with normal track. DCC is honestly a pain in the ass. DCC systems involve, sending a signal through the track, and into the engine, where it is decrypted, and the engine does what it is told. This includes, operating multiple trains at the same time on the same track, sound options, and enhanced speed control. However, there are many brands of DCC, and some may not be compatible with others, also, Some engines, do not come equipped with the dcc decoder, thus they are useless on a dcc system. you mentioned a pinball machine, could you elaborate on your idea?...it sounds rather intriguing Hehehe, I thought it was rather funny myself. I remember watching that show years ago, shame it was cancelled, however, it was just released on dvd, which is what sparked my interests in the show again Ryan
Sounds good, but you may find you aren't allowed to play with mains. I'm not at college (*grumble*A-Level in electronics n I'm not allowed to use >30V*grumble*), and whilst thigns may be different over there, I can't see a teacher allowing you to work with direct mains. Probably more likely a standard 5/6/9/12/15V power supply. Good luck, And I wanna see the results - even if I do think that VB is the scum of the universe.
lol, vb is all were allowed to use, as for the "mains" the breadboard is a +5volts, and i hope to use everything from that +5, only use for the transformer from the train set, is that im not quite sure what an average locomotive uses, so there could be some resistors or whatever to convert it,...or so i hope Ryan
Well, the basic idea is that you would use the electrical current in the track itself as a means of information distribution (think broadband over power lines). Each piece of track would have a chip attached to it that, when power is applied to it, sends a message over the "network" identifying its track type to the adjacent pieces. The adjacent pieces would then transmit this information back to the main control board, which would view the track as a simple token based network. The control board would then be able to reconstruct the track layout from this information. It is pretty straightforward for a single closed loop track, but can be really nasty (programmatically) when you start throwing in switches. I cannot say I have ever seen this method applied to a railroad track, but a lot of people have done this with Lego style blocks. As far as the pinball machine, I was just thinking that you could rig up a simple mechanism with a few bumpers (they can be basic kickless sensors) and a couple of flippers controlled by the board. With a couple of proximity sensors, you can have the board kick the flippers when the ball is close. Throw in some form of scoring and you're all set.
Neato, I like your idea, Would it fly?, I Dunno, unlike the gaming world, Model railroaders are slow to embrace technology I can just imagine the cost of track, its already darn expensive We've also been messing around with the Lego RoboLab software and kits, pretty fun stuff Ryan
Got it approved, ill be working on it a bit this weekend, ill post some updates and pics sometime this weekend Ryan
In which assembler, trains, or the project? If Trains, Yea, there's a small camera for them, that streams to a tv, neat but not amazing Ryan
The same basic one that i posted here, except with a few minor tweaks. the sensor that detects wheather the train is on the siding or not, is now working in conjunction with a signal light on the track, and on the computer as well Also possibility might include making a inner loop of track, with a spur and a sensor, detecting if the train is in the proximaty of the sensor, the switch will not allow the other train to go over to the other track... Since im working with +5 volts, i need to determine if thats sufficient for the trains or not Ryan
