Topic: T.A.R.G.E.T - Rotating Seven gun turrets? (Read 288824 times)

Netleyned · « **Reply #225 on:** January 13, 2017, 04:19:56 pm »

Controlled Realistic Armament Positioning

Ned

Hellboy Paul · « **Reply #226 on:** January 13, 2017, 05:21:36 pm »

Battleship Universal Turret Trainer..

Turrets Are Really Traversing..

Colin Bishop · « **Reply #227 on:** January 13, 2017, 05:27:45 pm »

If anyone asks you what it is called just say 'Arduino?'

Colin

Netleyned · « **Reply #228 on:** January 13, 2017, 05:40:19 pm »

Colin,
That's a Cracker

Ned

dreadnought72 · « **Reply #229 on:** January 13, 2017, 06:57:33 pm »

Target Acquisition Controller Through Inertial Computation

or, maybe my favorite ...

Turret Training & Tracking Performed Onboard. (T3PO)

Andy

ballastanksian · « **Reply #230 on:** January 13, 2017, 08:22:08 pm »

Stepper Powered Automatic Direction Engine

I was trying to create 'POINTY' but could not get a sensible acronym.

C-3PO · « **Reply #231 on:** January 14, 2017, 09:19:07 am »

Great suggestions -

I thought again maybe TARGET - Turret Active Rotation Guns Enemy Targeting

However I have hit a technical brick wall right now so Ned's description may be more appropriate

Quote from: Netleyned on January 13, 2017, 04:19:56 pm

Controlled Realistic Armament Positioning

Ned

raflaunches · « **Reply #232 on:** January 14, 2017, 09:43:01 am »

Sorry lads but if you're going to get an acronym for something military it's got to be a TLA!!!

For this not in the know- Three Letter Acronym!!!!

Best five letter acronym I've seen in the military engineering world that I can repeat is SPILs

SPILS
Spin Prevention Incidence Limiting system

When asked why they decided on this the aircrew said 'well it spills my coffee when we go into a spin!'

C-3PO · « **Reply #233 on:** January 14, 2017, 09:54:28 am »

Nick - not sure the TLA Rules apply to models :)

But if we must - TTT - Turret Turning Technology

Or along the lines that Andy suggested - 3T or T3

C-3PO

warspite · « **Reply #234 on:** January 14, 2017, 11:01:05 am »

I liked the WARTS as it could be boasted, my boat has warts an all

C-3PO · « **Reply #235 on:** January 14, 2017, 03:29:16 pm »

My technical brick wall is that I seem to have run out of oommphh with the wee beastie.

This got me thinking about the practical installation in a model of stepper motors as each one needs 6 cables connected to it's little driver board (2 power and 4 motor signal connections)

Even if you mount the Arduino in the middle of a 6 foot model and supply power more locally to the stepper motor that still a lot of cable running inside the hull.

Arduino boards like the Uno ship with lots of goodies on them that most of the time you don't use but as they are often used for prototyping experiments/things it's good to have lots of whistles and bells available.

It's a bit like having a vehicle that's a fire engine, ambulance and police vehicle all in one and you only use it for transporting prisoners back to the nick - all the other stuff doesn't get used.

You can make your own functioning Arduino with just a chip, a resonator and a few simple other components - probably about £5 'ish.

My thoughts are to create an I2C ( simple comms network using 2 wires) network from one MASTER micro controller perhaps the Arduino Mega or Due and then several slaves. The slaves would simply receive instructions from & feedback to the Master and simply control their own stepper - the beauty of this is that an I2C network is made up of just 2 wires. - Sorry for all the waffle

So here is my proposal assuming it can be made to work - it will I think deliver a much easier solution. Picture it this way one controller, a 2 wire network daisy chained to each homemade Aduino controller/stepper motor.

PS an I2C network allows 127 connections or there abouts, you can plug and play in a live circuit etc etc

C-3PO

dreadnought72 · « **Reply #236 on:** January 14, 2017, 05:35:12 pm »

Neat solution. For the hull-split Agincourt it'll mean nothing more than a four pin connector at the break? (I2C and stepper power)

My approach with the Arduino Mega means that I'm using just about every I/O pin on the board for six steppers and the inputs, and can see ribbon cables running up and down the boat.

Andy

g6swj · « **Reply #237 on:** January 14, 2017, 06:54:17 pm »

Don't you just love the internet - simply Arduino I2C network

http://www.techbitar.com/how-to-network-many-arduinos-with-sensors-using-i2c.html

C-3PO · « **Reply #238 on:** January 15, 2017, 12:02:15 pm »

Alex (IKB)'s recent post "Arduino and relay control" prompted me to go back to an original thought re moving turrets and a ship of 2 parts.

The I2C network concept is yet to be trialled - I think there may be an issue with TX & RX buffers/ timing of messages - we will see.

If you use a small radio tranceiver per turret like nRF24L01 or RFM69CW there are potentially 2 major benefits - no cables between turrets ( each turret would simply need power) and the radio TX/RX handles communication traffic as it has it's own buffer all be it small - it does mean the Arduino doesn't have to service comms messages all the time as they are stored on it's own connected TX/RX buffer.

Some testing required to see the best way forward.

C-3PO

Bob K · « **Reply #239 on:** January 15, 2017, 03:38:17 pm »

This gets ever more interesting. Anything that reduces an almost Bletchley Park forest of wiring will make it easier (for a non scientist) to build and more reliable. Not sure how these 2.4 GHz Rx/Tx boards operate in practice. Do not appear to require "binding". How does a regular Planet Rx integrate with the system? Maybe only one Planet Rx per system? If so, even better for a split hull configuration. No inter-hull wiring at all? (Optimum solution).

Each individual turret would be almost a self contained sub system, with just power leads, using a common 2.4GHz local coms network. Have I got that right?

C-3PO · « **Reply #240 on:** January 15, 2017, 03:57:57 pm »

Bob,

The route I suggest uses RFM69CW 433mhz units. They are separate from any of the radio control TX/RX - The Arduino configures the RFM69CW ( network ID etc) each time power applied - binding does not apply as such.

So your Planet TX/RX works as normal driving servo's etc - the Master Arduino Controller connects to your Planet RC RX - 2 channels to receive mode(park etc) and direction information, the Master connects wirelessly (433mhz) to slaves.

Pics below show items involved - Pic1 Slave components and size compared to AA battery

In principle this should work well - however until it fires - hold you breath.....

C-3PO

C-3PO · « **Reply #241 on:** January 15, 2017, 10:37:22 pm »

Arduino Master and wireless slave

Initial tests are very encouraging - need to scale the slave network from one device to 7 and see if the wheels fall off.

C-3PO

Bob K · « **Reply #242 on:** January 15, 2017, 10:51:30 pm »

C-3PO: This is looking potentially a realistic A.S.A.D. solution. Exciting. If you can build a prototype for, say 4, turrets it will work for seven. Can I help with donating additional units - in exchange for debugged programs?

PS: ASAD = All Singing All Dancing.

C-3PO · « **Reply #243 on:** January 15, 2017, 11:28:55 pm »

Bob - thanks for the kind offer - I am like a kid in a sweet shop with electronics/Arduino bits. I have enough rfm69's for 1 master and 3 slaves - and I have a few more things in my goody box that I can probably hook up so I think for now I can cobble a system together from what I have. The RFM69CW is my preferred route as it's 433 MHz and not 2.4ghz so should not cause any issues with main RC TX/RX. Without wanting to bore people to death, the bare RFM69 costs something like £4.20 but work using logic pins at 3.3volts - so once it's been mounted on a breakout board with some logic level converters to get it to talk to the outside world at 5volts logic level it costs about £9.60. There may be an option to use an Arduino that works at 3.3volts - I just need to get my head around specs

This concept has now opened up another possibility - the handset control to talk to,the turrets could also be based around a RFM69 TX/RX - so it would be a separate unit perhaps mounted on your Planet TX - this would allow some sexy controls to switch functions control rotation even see real time position of the guns on your control box, fire individual guns - the options / functions only limited by your imagination and of course the technology to make it happen
The mind boggles as to the possibilities - could even be a touchscreen based control unit.......

I will make my code freely available to anybody that wants it when it's finished all I would ask is anybody that uses it makes a donation to the RNLI

C-3PO

C-3PO · « **Reply #244 on:** January 16, 2017, 07:59:57 am »

Bob, Have a look at this video - it shows an alternative concept of radio control.

Not suggesting this is used to control the turrets but maybe an idea or 2 could be lifted from the concept

https://youtu.be/4gAW0vQ24z8

C-3PO

Bob K · « **Reply #245 on:** January 16, 2017, 08:39:23 am »

Impressive.

Ian K · « **Reply #246 on:** January 16, 2017, 05:43:43 pm »

Like it, or loath it

M-main
A-armamnent
R-rotation
M-might
I-irritate
T-the
E-enemy

Progress on this, is looking very promising!

Ian

C-3PO · « **Reply #247 on:** January 17, 2017, 10:47:50 pm »

A quick update - I will post a video tomorrow of a turret tracking it's target automatically.

It really is quite cool to watch!

Here is a snapshot of one of the many test beds

C-3PO

g6swj · « **Reply #248 on:** January 19, 2017, 06:54:11 pm »

Arduino turret turner spotted....

http://www.modelboatmayhem.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,57051.msg593260.html#msg593260

Regards
Jonathan

C-3PO · « **Reply #249 on:** January 19, 2017, 08:49:06 pm »

The video below shows live turret tracking - the target is 321 degrees.

https://youtu.be/FFJTJn-q-e4

Hopefully this gives you an idea of it working - the proximity of the iPhone to my sensor is interfering with things a little - indeed for some reason tonight my iPhone compass is quite jumpy

I made a previous video that was perfect except for one thing - it showed the longitude/latitude on my iPhone screen for the Outer Rim world of Tatooine now covered with the Post It
C-3PO

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Author Topic: T.A.R.G.E.T - Rotating Seven gun turrets? (Read 288824 times)