HMS Agincourt goes to Mayhem
Another key milestone in this long and complex project was achieved at Wicksteed Park on Saturday. The development of C-3PO’s TARGET bearing control system took a big step forwards on Wednesday when the electronics were fitted and initialised in the front half of the hull. Previously only the rear half had been fitted out. At the same time the software in the existing Arduino units was updated to match the latest versions.
A long but pleasant day near Kettering installing got as far as test firing the aft turrets in C-3PO’s garden. We didn’t quite have time to test fire the guns in the other hull or finish integrating it all together with Wicksteed Mayhem only three days away.
I knew I had a problem with some turrets mechanically “sticking”, but by then knew it was the pump servo lead connectors catching in the top of the barbette, where spare was very tight. Replacement servos with very long leads arrived, but not in time to fit them for Mayhem.
First run on the Mayhem lake had to be aborted when I realised I had forgotten to add fog fluid to the barbette reservoirs. A small “kick myself” moment. Guns will not fire without ammo !
After that we did had gun fire and a lot of smoke with flashing orange LED’s, but not from all guns. Still some work to do, although I am sure this is a minor electrical bug that will be resolved, not a major issue.
The real fun part was in C-3PO’s hidden high power sound system that exactly replicated the sequence of guns as they fired with a slight time delay to add realism. I am told you could clearly hear it the other end of the lake. As I am sure that anyone who has operated sound from a boat it becomes inaudible a couple of meters away. Very low frequency gun sounds only make that worse as it involves shifting a lot of air.
All in all quite a successful day, even with a few issues still to sort out. We at least were able to exchange gunfire with Geoff’s HMS Iron Duke. HMS Agincourt moves another key stage closer to combining Geoff’s gun fire design with C-3PO’s TARGET automatic target bearing control system.