91 replies to this topic

[rick1776]

Hoffy commissioned my to design a bullet proof optical timing system as every now and then his set up will record lap records that are seconds below the average lap time. I suspect that there is a secretly located switch that is used by Hoffy to "catch up" but have never been able to prove it.

OK the good news is Ive designed built and tested the circuit and it is indeed bullet proof. It has been designed to run on 12V power supply but will run well from 10-16V. It will probably still be OK down to 9V but who runs at 9V? It does not false trigger with changing ambient light conditions, in fact you could point a xenon strobe light at it and it woulnt skip a beat. Ive also incorporated a pulse stretcher in the circuit so that even the slowest PC is able to capture the pulse. At full speed a car could take as little as 20mS to go through the traps, Ive stretched this out to 300-500mS.

Cost for parts will be about $5 per lane. No more bouncing over dead strips!!

Cross fingers I might be able to make it up to Waynes tonight. Ill bring it along for a demo. I wont mention the secret Flavio Briatore option 13 that will enable me to trigger the lane Im running in so that I can lap faster than Steve and Jordan. In fact option 14 disables triggering on what ever lane Steve and Jordan are running on thus giving mere mortals a chance of winning.

cheers
rick1776

[Imkouwl]

Now you have all the good Ideas, I just spent the best part of Sunday trying to get my timing system to work
Im very interested in what you have done so please come tonight I promise it wont be cold

[kalbfellp]

I've never had any problem with my cheap Darlingtons and IR transmitters from DSE and jaycar! Similar cost per lane. All this just proves you don't need big money for agoos system.

"Dead strips" I though they went out back in the sixties!

phil

[hoffy]

kalbfellp, on Dec 10 2007, 12:40 PM, said:

I've never had any problem with my cheap Darlingtons and IR transmitters from DSE and jaycar! Similar cost per lane. All this just proves you don't need big money for agoos system.

"Dead strips" I though they went out back in the sixties!

phil

If only life was that easy..... Yes they do work, but we have been experiencing some issues with ambient light (& changes). Hopefully this will overcome these issues

[Gyprock]

Iam interested as well, I haven't found one that I like, or get to work anyway, I liked dingo timer but with dead strips have never had that running properly and have no idea how to get it to work with light sensors, I have lap 2000 but it doesn't have lane change, and I have startline I think and I was told it would work straight up with my light sensors the way they are, but guess what, so I think there is a opening for s good timing system where you don't have to be a computer technician or a electronics expert or both

cheeers gene

[BMR]

kalbfellp, on Dec 10 2007, 12:10 PM, said:

I've never had any problem with my cheap Darlingtons and IR transmitters from DSE and jaycar! Similar cost per lane. All this just proves you don't need big money for agoos system.

"Dead strips" I though they went out back in the sixties!

phil

Careful Phil the younger racers out there could take that comment to mean anything to do with slotcar racing in the 60's should be tossed out ......they may throw out us older racers

[rick1776]

Gyprock,

I'll give the circuit to Imkoul and Hoffy. They can make my hand drawn circuit PC friendly and post it if they want. It has a few components to it so you need to be able to solder and be able to follow a very basic circuit diagram to make the device. You should be able to make this on veroboard from Jaycar.

cheers
rick1776

[Gyprock]

yeah ok thanks mate, and yes I can solder well enough to do that, and I hope when you say very basic I hope you mean very basic , chimpaneze very basic

cheeers gene

[rick1776]

Hoffy & Wayne & Gyprock,

Hoffy did actually manage to make my prototype false trigger by placing a bright light about 15cm away from the phototransistor. The output would not go high (i.e. No 5V pulse generated). This had me worried but it should be OK as long as you mount the phototransistor into the track surface. The car going over the sensor should eliminate all direct light to the sensor and therefore a direct bright light should not affect the operation. This will make the sensor give an output pulse when the car goes over the sensor. Just make sure that you cover the sensor up from underneath the track so that no light can get to the sensor from under the table top and thus keep the sensor off even when a car blocks the light going over the sensor.

Are one of you able to scan my diagram and post it?

cheers
rick1776

[espsix]

I'd be very interested in this as well!!

[Gyprock]

I wreckon I could scan and post it ,

cheeers gene

[hoffy]

I'll have a look tonight when I get home

[chenglaw]

hoffy, on Dec 11 2007, 11:34 AM, said:

I'll have a look tonight when I get home

Hi Hoffy, would greatly appreciate it if you can post the schematics like yesterday! I would like to try and build one up (4 lanes, Scaley Sport) to use for our 1-hour team race this Sunday, if at all possible. I'm fed up with RMS missing laps. Hopefully, the system is as "basic" as Rick says since I'm no electronic wiz. In fact if it is possible to post a list of all the required parts now, it would be of great help to me as I can go about getting them in readiness to start as soon as the schema is available.

[grego]

Gyprock, on Dec 10 2007, 05:08 PM, said:

Iam interested as well, I haven't found one that I like, or get to work anyway, I liked dingo timer but with dead strips have never had that running properly and have no idea how to get it to work with light sensors, I have lap 2000 but it doesn't have lane change, and I have startline I think and I was told it would work straight up with my light sensors the way they are, but guess what, so I think there is a opening for s good timing system where you don't have to be a computer technician or a electronics expert or both

cheeers gene

I am wondering about the ""lane change""" part ???

Am i to understand that this simple new system can record lane changes ?? How, and Why ??
Please elaborate on this.

Come to think of it, just how do those new fancy digital system cope with recording laps of any specific car considering that they would cross a finish line on any of the 2 or 4 or even 6 tracks.
Is the actual chip doing this ?
regards
grego

[Gyprock]

The lane change thing is if you select a race with lane change option and so you want to race a 50 lapper the first car to do 25 laps it will tell I think from memory to stop and change lanes where the cars are at that point, like if the other car has only done 24 laps doesn't matter, you swap lanes anyway and it will clock up its 25th lap as it passes the sensor, and the computer changes you from say the red lane to the white lane, I hope this helps a bit Iam not to good at explaining things

Edited by Gyprock, 13 December 2007 - 11:37 AM.

[rick1776]

Hoffy,

Have you had a chance to scan the circuit diagram. Or better still make a proper diagram out of my hand drawn effort?

You are free to charge gyprock anything you like for the diagram

cheers
rick1776

[Gyprock]

Geeze thanks lol

[grego]

Gyprock, on Dec 13 2007, 02:36 PM, said:

The lane change thing is if you select a race with lane change option and so you want to race a 50 lapper the first car to do 25 laps it will tell I think from memory to stop and change lanes where the cars are at that point, like if the other car has only done 24 laps doesn't matter, you swap lanes anyway and it will clock up its 25th lap as it passes the sensor, and the computer changes you from say the red lane to the white lane, I hope this helps a bit Iam not to good at explaining things

Gotcha !
I might have the whole thing wrong but I think they are only talking about the """Mechanical/Electronic"" aspect of things.
The part that is doing the adding up and lane changing bit would be the software part, or the computer program part.

grego

[HiString]

Does anyone know what's happened to this project?

[rick1776]

Histring,

I gave my rough hand drawn copy to Imkoul and Hoffy. I was hoping they would tidy it up and draw it properly and then post it. I suspect Hoffy has been busy with "real life" rather than "slot life" and not had time.

The circuits been built and tested and works, just a matter of giving the abovementioned guys a hard time to post a nice pic of the circuit.

cheers
rick1776