By gpstar
#4976028
Mathew_impact1 wrote: December 31st, 2022, 4:29 pm
gpstar wrote: December 31st, 2022, 3:49 pm For the 200 second timeout, none of the other pack switches affect it. The only way to reset the timeout on the pack that I could find is from the U7 switch that feeds power to the hose to the wand . It provides 4.3 volts to the wand. (VDD43). I can trigger it to turn on the pack by sending a pulse to the VDD43 pad above the U7 switch and one of the circuits on the LM358 chip just underneath it or plugging in any device into the U7 switch that draws the 4.3V coming from it.
Gpstar, thank you for sharing your efforts an discoveries, this great. I can at least plan upgrades while waiting for my pack to arrive next year.
What do you mean by "pulse"? A momentary connection to a grounded resistor? Or a connection to VCC? Btw, what voltage do you measure between GROUND an VCC? I realise activating the wand does this as well.
Oops a pulse I mean momentary connection on that switch, just replicating what the switch itself is doing if you flip it to make the connection.
Mathew_impact1 liked this
By gpstar
#4976029
Haven’t had much time to mess around with it today but I found the following from the wand and the U7 connection on the pack.

It feeds 4.3 volts to the wand. I was measuring the draw of the wand in various states.

4.3 V wand on no lights
4.27 V with lights on
4.22 V activate switch on and no lights
4.19 V activate switch on with lights

I do know with the wand if you flick on or off the activate switch then it will reset the pack internal shutdown timer. Which leads me to believe when the voltage on the U7 drops to 4.22 or lower the pack shutdown timer resets and when the voltage rises back up above the 4.22 V then it resets itself again. So basically if you can get the draw to drop down to 4.22 periodically and back up above it, then you can keep the pack going on forever.
oidoglr, Mathew_impact1 liked this
By gpstar
#4976054
jonogunn wrote: January 2nd, 2023, 12:42 am Hi gpstar. Just to confirm there is no way to keep the wand active indefinitely while “activate” is on is that correct?
Aside from using the wand (pressing buttons etc) I’m not entirely sure yet. I will play with this some more.
By gpstar
#4976060
jonogunn wrote: January 2nd, 2023, 12:42 am Hi gpstar. Just to confirm there is no way to keep the wand active indefinitely while “activate” is on is that correct?
I found way by feeding some low voltage to the rotary switch which controls the vibration motor strength. I fed a low 3V to the 2 pins periodically and it kept the wand alive in all modes, activate mode and non-activate mode. It did not affect the vibration motor settings. This may be a better hack around the keep alive mode for the wand.
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By gpstar
#4976131
I managed to keep the pack on long as I wanted on my own. With some more testing of the wand, I found if I get the power draw to drop down to 4.19V or back up above it, then the pack auto shutdown timer resets. One issue on the wand, the VCC on the wand microcontroller will always have power going to it from the pack, so if you piggy back off the wand power there, it will fire the pack up and you loose the ability to shut the pack off and turn it on from the wand. I found if I draw power from the white led that is on the left of the clippard valve, then I can bypass that issue as the switch for turning the wand lights on will control power to my devices that need it.

Anybody that has one of those Spengler link kits on their wand will may run into issues with controlling the pack, since it is drawing power from the VCC pin, it may trigger the pack to turn on automatically and loose the ability to manually turn the pack off.

Anyhow basically in short, with the way I am going with things, the lights on the wand will need to be flipped on to keep both the pack and wand going without shutting down automatically.
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kahuna900, Nighty80, jonogunn and 2 others liked this
User avatar
By Libtechinit
#4976139
This is great work @gpstar!

Love seeing this stuff happening already!

I have a couple off topic questions for you, more related to just the tear down of the pack you did (might be an opportunity to start a Hasbro pack teardown thread too? Keep things like this separate form the awesome electronics mod stuff your working on.)

1. The booster frame, is that able to be removed from the booster tube?

2. The bellow/shock mount. Is that one or two pieces? Can the threaded rod be removed from the bellow itself?

Thanks again for going into such detail for those of us awaiting our deliveries!
By gpstar
#4976140
Libtechinit wrote: January 3rd, 2023, 12:40 pm This is great work @gpstar!

Love seeing this stuff happening already!

I have a couple off topic questions for you, more related to just the tear down of the pack you did (might be an opportunity to start a Hasbro pack teardown thread too? Keep things like this separate form the awesome electronics mod stuff your working on.)

1. The booster frame, is that able to be removed from the booster tube?

2. The bellow/shock mount. Is that one or two pieces? Can the threaded rod be removed from the bellow itself?

Thanks again for going into such detail for those of us awaiting our deliveries!
Yes to both. Booster frame is held onto the booster tube by 2 screws on the front of the booster frame.

The bellows shock mount is 2 piece and the threaded rod can be removed.
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kahuna900, oidoglr, One time liked this
#4976156
gpstar wrote: January 3rd, 2023, 1:03 pm Yes to both. Booster frame is held onto the booster tube by 2 screws on the front of the booster frame.

The bellows shock mount is 2 piece and the threaded rod can be removed.
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You sir are awesome, much appreciated!
By tobycj
#4976161
Another slightly off topic question, does the v-hook remove completely, including the black mounting block? From your tear down photos it looks like the whole assembly is held on by the two screws with nuts inside the pack, so I'm assuming so?
By gpstar
#4976184
atescetin wrote: January 4th, 2023, 4:33 am
atescetin wrote: January 1st, 2023, 6:15 am Not directly related to the subject of this thread, but were you able to make an improvement regarding the mooing sound of the rumble motor? Or do you think it is possible?
No idea?
Sorry no idea. When the pack shuts down, it spins up the motor to full speed which gives the mooing sound. Maybe swap out to a quieter motor or slow it down or dampening the mounting part of it....
atescetin, georgenovak liked this
User avatar
By gamera1968
#4976190
This post may contain an affiliate link that helps support GBFans.com when you make a purchase at no additional cost to you.

Thank you for the teardown and modding the speakers and batteries.

I'm also glad that there's a lot of empty space inside for further modding.
The first thing I'm doing, is changing out that ribbon cable - and luckily I found a GB 2 stlyle Spectra ribbon cable on eBay for $8 plus shipping (or best offer) here https://www.ebay.com/itm/275337442112?h ... R_rn79ivYQ
By gpstar
#4976197
jonogunn wrote: January 2nd, 2023, 12:42 am Hi gpstar. Just to confirm there is no way to keep the wand active indefinitely while “activate” is on is that correct?
Disregard my previous reply on this, you can keep it alive on activate mode but you will loose some features like the ability to change the rumble setting. The best way seems to feed some voltage to the mode firing select change, but only while the wand is not in activate mode.
#4976199
Success and finally got my hack working. As of typing this message, the pack and wand have been idling for over 17 minutes so far. I took liberties to change the white led to a purple one and added another speaker and small amp into the wand. Now I just need to finish up soldering and stuff everything back into the wand. Once I finish I will post up what I did.
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Prime 1986, kahuna900, tobycj and 6 others liked this
#4976264
Finally got everything back together and my pack and wand no longer auto shuts down anymore. I made some minor changes to how the wand operates.

Over the weekend I will provide instructions on how I did it, the short of it is, it is entirely from the wand, and the voltage draw levels to trick the pack to think the wand is doing something.

For now here is a video.
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kahuna900, Prime 1986, One time and 5 others liked this
#4976265
gpstar wrote: January 5th, 2023, 1:25 pm Finally got everything back together and my pack and wand no longer auto shuts down anymore. I made some minor changes to how the wand operates.

Over the weekend I will provide instructions on how I did it, the short of it is, it is entirely from the wand, and the voltage draw levels to trick the pack to think the wand is doing something.

...and the people will rejoice!!!
Eric R. Price liked this
#4976271
This is awesome!

Well done!

I wonder if there is a way to do it without taking the wand apart? Like maybe with a watch battery powered insert into the powerbar?

If it could work without activate being switched on it would even work without the rumble motor in the wand spinning for hours and wearing the motor out.
#4976274
One time wrote: January 5th, 2023, 2:58 pm This is awesome!

Well done!

I wonder if there is a way to do it without taking the wand apart? Like maybe with a watch battery powered insert into the powerbar?

If it could work without activate being switched on it would even work without the rumble motor in the wand spinning for hours and wearing the motor out.
It won’t work like that. You will need to open the wand.

A constant power draw will not keep the pack going, all a constant draw will do is restart the pack after the shutdown timer expires and you will lose the ability to operate the pack from the wand. Then there is the wand 30 second shutdown timer to deal with which also shuts the pack off when the wand shuts down.

For the pack to keep running:
You need to draw the voltage down from the pack U7 4.33 V connector (that goes to the wand) down below 4.20 V and or back above that to reset the pack reset timer. The pack will turn on when the voltage drops down below 4.30 V. When the voltage is back over 4.30 V then the pack shuts down.

For the wand to keep running:
A simple fix of sending some low voltage to the firing mode selector pin on the wand board once every 30 seconds.

For my mods, I managed to use 2 arduino microcontrollers (a mini and a uno, it was all I had laying around at the moment) and some npn transistors to keep the wand and pack going indefinitely while maintaining control of the pack from the wand. I also stuffed another speaker plus a small amp to drive it into the wand.
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JamesB922, Prime 1986, gamera1968 and 2 others liked this
#4976279
gpstar wrote: January 5th, 2023, 3:36 pm
One time wrote: January 5th, 2023, 2:58 pm This is awesome!

Well done!

I wonder if there is a way to do it without taking the wand apart? Like maybe with a watch battery powered insert into the powerbar?

If it could work without activate being switched on it would even work without the rumble motor in the wand spinning for hours and wearing the motor out.
It won’t work like that. You will need to open the wand.

A constant power draw will not keep the pack going, all a constant draw will do is restart the pack after the shutdown timer expires and you will lose the ability to operate the pack from the wand. Then there is the wand 30 second shutdown timer to deal with which also shuts the pack off when the wand shuts down.

For the pack to keep running:
You need to draw the voltage down from the pack U7 4.33 V connector (that goes to the wand) down below 4.20 V and or back above that to reset the pack reset timer. The pack will turn on when the voltage drops down below 4.30 V. When the voltage is back over 4.30 V then the pack shuts down.

For the wand to keep running:
A simple fix of sending some low voltage to the firing mode selector pin on the wand board once every 30 seconds.

For my mods, I managed to use 2 arduino microcontrollers (a mini and a uno, it was all I had laying around at the moment) and some npn transistors to keep the wand and pack going indefinitely while maintaining control of the pack from the wand. I also stuffed another speaker plus a small amp to drive it into the wand.
Image
First of all I want to say that legit looks like Egon's work table in the firehouse!

Second, is there any chance of someone maybe selling pre modified wands for the less electronically inclined??
#4976287
gpstar wrote: January 5th, 2023, 3:36 pm
A constant power draw will not keep the pack going, all a constant draw will do is restart the pack after the shutdown timer expires and you will lose the ability to operate the pack from the wand.
Wow, I have so many questions.

1. What causes the wand to be inoperable if a constant draw from the powerbar restarts the pack? Would it not be possible to simply switch the wand on and off and regain control of the wand? (By twisting the powerbar off the wand if need be and disconnecting a hypothetical custom watch battery insert in the powerbar)

I can imagine that walking around a con with the pack volume off won’t be so bad if the pack restarts every 3 minutes. If we want to use the wand we could simply unholster it and switch it off and on, or even unscrew the powerbar with the (hypothetical) built in custom watch battery insert.

Not an ideal solution but would prevent needing to drill open the wand and solder.

2. What about if we keep the wand on indefinitely using an insert into the power bar.

Could we then unholster the wand to restart the pack after it has shut off?

Maybe I’m missing the point entirely, apologies if that is the case.

PS: great question also in the post just above mine
#4976303
gpstar wrote: January 5th, 2023, 3:36 pm
One time wrote: January 5th, 2023, 2:58 pm This is awesome!

Well done!

I wonder if there is a way to do it without taking the wand apart? Like maybe with a watch battery powered insert into the powerbar?

If it could work without activate being switched on it would even work without the rumble motor in the wand spinning for hours and wearing the motor out.
It won’t work like that. You will need to open the wand.

A constant power draw will not keep the pack going, all a constant draw will do is restart the pack after the shutdown timer expires and you will lose the ability to operate the pack from the wand. Then there is the wand 30 second shutdown timer to deal with which also shuts the pack off when the wand shuts down.

For the pack to keep running:
You need to draw the voltage down from the pack U7 4.33 V connector (that goes to the wand) down below 4.20 V and or back above that to reset the pack reset timer. The pack will turn on when the voltage drops down below 4.30 V. When the voltage is back over 4.30 V then the pack shuts down.

For the wand to keep running:
A simple fix of sending some low voltage to the firing mode selector pin on the wand board once every 30 seconds.

For my mods, I managed to use 2 arduino microcontrollers (a mini and a uno, it was all I had laying around at the moment) and some npn transistors to keep the wand and pack going indefinitely while maintaining control of the pack from the wand. I also stuffed another speaker plus a small amp to drive it into the wand.
Image
I would definitely love to know what transistors you used for this so I can start prepping for when my pack arrives.

Also, with the talent cell modification, do you still need to have d cells in the pack? Would rather not have to pick any up if I don't have to.
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