#4899457
I've been running some more tests and I think the issue with the neopixels is simply voltage. I swapped the new IO board over to pairs of 24 gauge shielded speaker wire and the neopixels are doing the same thing. Testing the voltage at the first neopixel I can see it's at 3.3V when it should be near 5v. The only other power wires I have are 18 gauge so I'm going to swap just the power wire out for that to see if I can decrease the voltage drop and stabilize things. That's my next test. If that doesn't resolve it then I may need to send the 11.1v to the wand and use a buck converter to drop it back down to 5v. I've got a ton of those buck converters and can just stick it inline. I know that's brute forcing a solution but I don't have much more time to futz with this.
#4899460
Count;

I ran into this a lot building a bunch of my gear.

The problem with solid-core Cat5 is inductance. For sending high-impedance signals back and forth, it will spike and do all sorts of weirdness if you look at it on a scope.

Switch to stranded wire and it'll stop.

Edit: Also, a lot of sub-20ga wire can have lower-than-advertised core gauges (cheapo wire). I won't drop under 20ga (usually 18ga) for building things now.
xoff00 liked this
#4899476
ok, last update for the night. the 18 gauge wire did not resolve the flickering and dimness issue with the wand lights. More testing shows that I have, with the 18 gauge wire, almost the full voltage coming into the little board but one neopixel down the chain and it's down to 3v. I'm thinking either I messed up the connector some how or at some point I damaged one of the leds. Tomorrow I will create a new chain ( hey I have 100 of these guys ) and see if that resolves the issue. It's entirely possible I messed one of them up at some point with too much heat or something. The switches, button, and nose neopixel seem to be fine so it's kinda pointing to something in that chain.
#4899495
And now I feel like a huge idiot. I replaced the first neopixel in the existing chain and that didn't do anything to change the situation. I thought I might have fried the first one but I guess it's still good. So I made a completely new chain and as I was going to put the connector on it I decided to try swapping the nose pixel connector for the wand light one. Suddenly the neopixel jewel was showing the issue. I determined it was the connector on the board that was the problem after a series of tests. Took it back down and resoldered the connector on the board and the issue is gone. I must have had a bad solder connection causing my issue. Now I'm back up and running and everything is working like it should. The long cables are mucking with the voltage. It's 5.00 volts off the buck converter but it's 4.8v on the power bar. If it stays that way I can bump the buck converter up to 5.2 probably.

Now am I brave enough to try the cat 5 again or just leave well enough alone lol
#4899498
This post may contain an affiliate link that helps support GBFans.com when you make a purchase at no additional cost to you.

I've added some eagle board files to the github repo. These can be used to order from OshPark. I'm never hand soldering these boards again lol. There are 2 board files up there right now. One for the powercell, cyclotron, and vent lights in the pack. The other is the io board I'll be using in the wand for the switches, button, nose neopixel, and wand lights. Again I have not ordered these but will likely do so when I build my next pack.

The connectors I'm using are here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0734PS688

I have decided that I'll be putting the nano in the pack and not the wand. The latest test looks to be the most stable setup.

https://github.com/CountDeMonet/Arduino ... ster/EAGLE

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grogking liked this
#4899530
Really impressive work. I'm following this thread for sure. My arduino circuit and code is extremely basic. Just the powercell and cyclotron animations really but if I ever convince my wife to let me get a proper fibreglass and resin pack I'll be looking to upgrade my lighting to lights and sounds too.
#4899538
Thanks! it's coming along nicely I think. Mad rush now to finish but I hope all of the surprises are done and it's just "work" now.

Speaking of mad rush I applied the decals last night to the wand. I'm getting it ready for the matte clear coat. Only one decal left and that's the fake bargraph. First try at that didn't go as planned so will try again tonight. The screwed in parts are not screwed in. I just wanted a look at what it will be finished :) The glitter tube works perfectly. Highly recommend it for this build. Grogking recommended it and I found one locally at michaels

http://www.michaels.com/creatology-silv ... lor=Silver

A bit of a pain to get the decals off but got that done and cut it down to about 2 1/2 inches and it looks better than the test tube which was too big I think.

Because this is for a 7 year old I won't be putting the red tube on the front of the wand. That will just get ripped off in 2 seconds. That's the only thing I think I'm not doing cosmetically. My spirit pack will be here today so I can't wait to see how it compares size wise to this pack.

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#4899564
My spirit pack came in. It does look to be 85% or so on the main pack. It's just a bit bigger than my son's pack. I intentionally went with a thinner pack for my son's to save on weight. The wand for my son's pack would look really good with the Spirit pack. Almost perfect size. Maybe even scale the model in github up by 1 or 2 percent more . The spirit pack is quite a bit lighter but way more uncomfortable to wear right now. I'll need to rig something up like I did for my son's pack. Wish I had enough time to do another wand for the spirit pack. I will for next year for sure.

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B-Rad, Kingpin liked this
#4899611
The wand is now fully functional. I just need to finish putting some of the chrome pieces back on permanently and add the green tube. Unfortunately I did a dumb dumb and fried my audio amps so I had to order some new ones. It's really easy to make a mistake when you are excited and I accidentally put the full 12v battery power into the amps input instead of through the buck converter. I totally spaced and fried them both. A new stereo amp will be here sunday so I'll be back up and running and hopefully have a video of it by then.

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#4899690
CountDeMonet wrote:My spirit pack came in. It does look to be 85% or so on the main pack. It's just a bit bigger than my son's pack. I intentionally went with a thinner pack for my son's to save on weight. The wand for my son's pack would look really good with the Spirit pack. Almost perfect size. Maybe even scale the model in github up by 1 or 2 percent more . The spirit pack is quite a bit lighter but way more uncomfortable to wear right now. I'll need to rig something up like I did for my son's pack. Wish I had enough time to do another wand for the spirit pack. I will for next year for sure.

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Awesome! knowing that I'd definitely like to switch out the wand that came with it for the one you made if made available somewhere.
#4899699
B-Rad wrote: Awesome! knowing that I'd definitely like to switch out the wand that came with it for the one you made if made available somewhere.
I'm not going to be selling them but I have put the models up on github for the wand I created.

https://github.com/CountDeMonet/Arduino ... roton_Wand

This is the standard wand models not the left handed version I'm printing for my son. Once I am done with the pack I'll make the right handed version of that as well.
#4899703
Awesome! I've got mine pretty dialed in so if you have any questions pm me. I love mine as well. This site is a life saver

https://3dprinterwiki.info/wanhao/wanhao-duplicator-i3/

One thing the work on the spirit pack brought to light is that I way over did it on the cyclotron lights. I do not need the neopixel jewels for that lol. The single neopixel is more than enough light for the cyclotron. I've not decided if I'll make another chain yet or not. I may just use the jewels I already have but I'm afraid they will be overpowering. Might need to bring the brightness down a lot.
#4899710
CountDeMonet wrote:
B-Rad wrote: Awesome! knowing that I'd definitely like to switch out the wand that came with it for the one you made if made available somewhere.
I'm not going to be selling them but I have put the models up on github for the wand I created.

https://github.com/CountDeMonet/Arduino ... roton_Wand

This is the standard wand models not the left handed version I'm printing for my son. Once I am done with the pack I'll make the right handed version of that as well.
Thats more what I meant, when you had the files available and if you made them available.

When I'm ready to do it is there a place that you'd recommend looking for someone to print these? I'm no quite ready yet as I'm still piecing things together and I don't have the space nor the kinda money to throw around on a 3D printer unfortunately.
#4899729
If you google search 3d printing service you may be able to find one near you that could do it. Maker clubs generally have 3d printers as well. If you go in and talk to them you may be able to get them to let you use one of theirs for free if you supply the filament. Sites like shapeways are a ripoff and charge WAY too much for what they provide. Local is your best bet

the new audio amp came in and it works great. the adafruit amps have been first rate. The added benefit is that the small hum that I had is gone as well. Not sure if that is due to better connections from the new boards or what but that is a pleasant surprise :)
#4899739
This post may contain an affiliate link that helps support GBFans.com when you make a purchase at no additional cost to you.

a pair of 4 ohm 3W speakers. I need light for this pack. They are actually quite loud.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NQ0LHNA/

I'm using this amp for them now that the mono amps are fried.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00N42NP6W
#4899879
Tonight I finished up gluing all of the connectors on, finished the bumper, and installed some tubing. I need to find some non-transparent yellow tubing after halloween. The rest looks good to me tho. Saturday is the first event that we will show the pack off at so really pushing now. Very close. Next steps are to finish soldering up the permanent boards and install the pack lighting/sound system. Then mount everything to the backpack and test it out. I think we're gonna make it :)

A few more things to do on the pack like add the ribbon cable, gray knob, as well as the split loom and the loom ends on a few of the tubes but it's close.

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#4899946
All of the cosmetic work on the pack is complete!! I might just finish this tomorrow. That's the goal. Things left to do:
  • * mount the arduino, fx board, buck converters, and amp to protoboards and connect all wires
    * install all of the electronics
    * cut out speaker holes and battery access holes in the motherboard
    * mount motherboard to backpack frame
    * test all this out. Oh I hope it all goes smoothly :)
Real close tho...

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#4899982
The really hard part is done. The components have been transferred to their final location. Everything has been soldered up and the first test worked. I was a bit nervous given my track record but I went slow and made sure to have good solder connections everywhere.

it works!!!
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The amp board and the free floating buck converter. not enough space on the breadboard for it.
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The big cheese.
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Now to get all this installed in the pack tonight...
grogking liked this
#4900031
After battling with another bad connector late last night (I won't be using these connectors anymore) I managed to finish the majority of the pack around 2AM. Finished installing the speakers this morning. I need to move them as with the padding on the PVC it gets muffled a lot but still a lot of fun. We had the first event of the season. Air & Scare at Udvar and got to see the NOVA ghostbusters. My son was beyond thrilled and he got a ton of cool comments. So worth it. Only the ion arm broke off but the place was packed. Surprised nothing else got damaged.

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xoff00 liked this
#4900081
Hey, sorry to double post on you but I've got a query that came up while I should be sleeping.
It's looking like I might have just enough left over this month to stick some lights in the SH Pack... if what I'm hoping will work...will work.

Anywho, my hope is that I can just grab the 100 piece NeoPixel sheet and skip the Stick and Jewel.
There's nothing special about the stick right? Just the same LEDs on a PCB?
I don't see why I couldn't just use the sheet and break off a row. I would need to connect them with a small section of wire I'm sure but that's easy enough.

I might have to screw with the code a bit as well if I'm not using the jewels.
#4900085
check out my other thread

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=43763

I show how to do a minimal version of the code for just the cyclotron/powercell. I'm using the individual neopixels for the cyclotron. You could use them for the powercell but you would not be able to fit as many in the powercell window. The sticks are much closer together. Maybe 13 or 14 neopixels instead of the 16.
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