| Welcome to Locate and Cement - Plastic Model Kit Review, Advice and Exchange of ideas.. We hope you enjoy your visit. You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free. Join our community! If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features: |
| Just found this section | |
|---|---|
| Tweet Topic Started: Feb 7 2016, 12:59 PM (474 Views) | |
| IanW | Feb 7 2016, 12:59 PM Post #1 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Having only recently joined up to this forum, I have only just found this section and thought I might get involved. Since returning to the hobby I have become increasingly drawn to the diorama aspect of displaying the models, especially since I got involved with displaying on the AMSiG table at various shows. From some time behind the tables it seems to me that what really attracts interest, especially amongst the younger generation who we really ought to be trying to attract into the hobby, are models that exhibit a bit of 'wow factor' with flashing lights etc . One of my earliest attempts at this was adding a simple lighting effect to the shell explosion of my WW1 tank diorama. This was achieved by installing a simple 'tea light' that flickers the LED in a pseudo random fashion. It works reasonably but owing to the low power/light output of the LED this does not really show up under the lighting conditions prevalent at most show venues. As a result of one of the effects I want to try on a planned build for an Indycar dioramas, I have been looking round for some method of show some movement by controlling a sequence of LEDs in order to try and get a fireball to move along behind one or two of the cars. Ideally I want to controll each LED in a rising and falling intensity. While I was killing some time waiting to my wife a couple of weeks ago I wandered round Maplins and started looking at the Rhasberry Pie kits. They also had an Arduino Tutorial Kit at a reduced price and having had a quick look at what it could be made to do I decided to buy give it a try. The Tutorial kit consists of an Arduino Uno board, a patch board, some LEDs and resitsors etc to allow initial exploration and also a tutorial book that takes you through the development process and presents several sample programs to play around with and a CD with several sample programs. I have spent the last 10 days or so playing around and am impressed, as there appears to a lot of potential - so much so that I have ordered a couple more experimenters/developers kits that supply a Uno compatible board and a whole raft of components, for £13.57 each, including postage from China. The Uno is a complete microcontroller system on a board with multiple digital and analogue inputs/outputs. It is programmed using a downloadable Integrated Development Environment (IDE) from a PC via a USB cable, using a subset of the C program language. The IDE also links to a series of sample programs from the Tutorial kit. It is dead easy to use - insert a few components into the patch board, plug leads into the IO sockets, load a sample program into the IDE, compile and upload it an away it goes. After trying some of the sample programs I ventured into the unknown and tried some ideas - my latest experiment is into creating an 'explosion' that uses white, yellow and red LEDs that simulate the explosion going from an initial white flash followed by fading yellow and red phases - I have got a simple version working and am now rewriting the code to try make it more configurable so I can reuse it for multiple applications. As the Uno has six suitable output ports I am trying to design the code so it should be capable of running two such 3-LED explosions simultaneously. Will post more later with some photos/video of work so far. |
![]() |
|
| Grant | Feb 7 2016, 04:04 PM Post #2 |
|
Italian correspondent
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
This sounds good Ian. The way components have improved and shrunk over recent years makes this all a much more 'do able' proposition. Looking forward to following your progress. |
![]() |
|
| IanW | Feb 7 2016, 06:16 PM Post #3 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
A quick video of what I am trying to do A shot of the setup used to create it. 3 LEDS and associated resistors packed in the bulb from an old pipette
|
![]() |
|
| Harriet | Feb 7 2016, 06:28 PM Post #4 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Love the fact that with all this technology you have improvised with the pipette bulb! |
![]() |
|
| IanW | Feb 7 2016, 06:55 PM Post #5 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
It was just an easy way to hold them together and give a bit of a diffuser to see how they would perform when placed together.
Edited by IanW, Feb 7 2016, 06:55 PM.
|
![]() |
|
| AndyT | Feb 7 2016, 07:51 PM Post #6 |
![]()
Sound the klaxon twice and dive the Submarine!
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Hi IanW, As you may have seen from some earlier posts in this section, I too considered the Raspberry Pie and Arduino however I came to the conclusion that cost and simplicity were perhaps more important to modelmakers. As such I decided to pursue the Picaxe - Picaxe is widely used in education and is part of syllabus. Education specialists also considered Raspberry Pie and Arduino and came down on the side of the Picaxe for the same reasons being able to ask parents to subsidise the costs when they are pocket money size. Please don't get me wrong Raspberry Pie and Arduino are great products and I am not knocking them and clearly if model makers want to move on to them they can. For £13.57 from China rather than getting one micro controller a school or modelmaker can get 08M2 chips for £1.50 and a project board for £1.99 so is able to automate at least 3 models for the same cost. If you need more information on Picaxe do please have a look at the http://www.picaxe.com/ website and the free flowchart autocode writing Picaxe Editor 6.0 software at http://www.picaxe.com/Software/PICAXE/PICAXE-Editor-6/ - this saves modelmakers having to learn a code language and the folowchart format makes it very simple. Kind regards AndyT. |
![]() |
|
| IanW | Feb 7 2016, 08:39 PM Post #7 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
The reason I went for the £13.57 development kit is that it had a lot of associated components that would cost a great deal more bought at Maplins so it seemed a win-win situation. That supplier currently has the 'ready to go' Arduino Uno board for £3.40, so I guess there is not really a great deal of difference in price. Not really bothered about the flowcharting software as they only appear to support a simple loop of do Execute process Wait for a given time while format - which is OK for simple processes but not really capable of supporting the things I am trying to do. I agree that with that sort of help you do not need to know any programming, but I guess it is a case of 'Horses for Courses'. |
![]() |
|
| AndyT | Feb 7 2016, 08:57 PM Post #8 |
![]()
Sound the klaxon twice and dive the Submarine!
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
As you say IanW, you pays your money and takes your choice. Each has its own benefits - and modellers need to decide for themselves which is best for them. I just use a K.I.S. principle (Keep It Simple) which over my 60+ years have served me well. Kind regards AndyT |
![]() |
|
| IanW | Feb 7 2016, 10:06 PM Post #9 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Wouldn't disagree, except that it should really be KISS - 'Keep It Simple, Stupid' - in true computer 'nerd' speak. Only really putting this out to see if anyone else has tried using the Arduino - or am I' going boldly where no man has been before , boldly'? Edited by IanW, Feb 7 2016, 10:09 PM.
|
![]() |
|
| Grant | Feb 8 2016, 07:52 PM Post #10 |
|
Italian correspondent
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
I think the trick here is to boldly crack on and share, 'cos I am sure I am not the only one here who thinks it is a good idea but would rather some else did the spade work. Grant (shamlessly picking up tips - until I can no longer put off the inevitable) Edited by Grant, Feb 8 2016, 07:52 PM.
|
![]() |
|
| IanW | Feb 9 2016, 11:06 AM Post #11 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Quite happy to share any information I might find - even willing to share any code I write as the Arduino project is predicated on being open source. As a result of my programming background I tend to write code according to the following principals "Write for re-use". "Include comments in the code" - so you can remember what it is meant to be doing in 3 years time "The Swan Effect" - i.e. keep it simple up-front - even if the code is paddling like buggery underneath... |
![]() |
|
| AndyT | Feb 9 2016, 05:30 PM Post #12 |
![]()
Sound the klaxon twice and dive the Submarine!
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
I am in complete agreement with Grant and love the analogy of picking tips. Its like learning something new everyday being a positive. KR to all AndyT. |
![]() |
|
| « Previous Topic · The Electronics Pages · Next Topic » |




![]](http://z1.ifrm.com/static/1/pip_r.png)





7:26 PM Jul 11





