My home built metal DDR pad (Part IV)

stickfigureman3 · Trick Member Joined: 24 Jan 2005 Location: Redmond, WA

I guess I wasn't too clear in what I was asking (if that line right there made me sound like a stuck-up snob, I'm very sorry).

The pieces that they sold are too small for what I need (the smallest piece is a 10"x10" square; an 8"x18" would leave some of it short). Do other Home Depot's (or Lowe's) sell larger pieces, or should I look to a fabricator?
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deM' · Trick Member Joined: 10 Apr 2005 Location: Southington CT

i bought a 34x24" peice of sheetmetal from homedepot, maybe you should call your local branch and ask there? they know alot better than we do. And lowes sells similar size metal.

geckoinc99 · Trick Member Joined: 11 Feb 2005 Location: Chattanooga, TN

Hey everyone,
I finally got some time to mess around on my breadboard on this transistor switch for LEDs. First of all, Tolookah, thanks for the help. Your design didn't work, but it did lead to a solution. After messing around on paper with other ideas after the first ones didn't work, I finally found one that seems to work great (at least on a breadboard). Here's the schematic:

Purpose:
First of all, this is for anyone that wants to add LED lighting to their pad, but doesn't want to worry about trying to borrow power off of the controller to do it. This will only light up when the arrow is pressed (it won't do the fancy show that marcan's will. I might look into doing that later also). It does use an external power supply and will operate with or without the lights on. It's fairly simple enough for most anyone to do, which is what I was after. Also note that this only shows two LEDs on a 9 volt battery, but it would be much better to have four per arrow (these were what I had handy at the time). It just requires different values (given below). Now on to the meaty stuff.

Explanation:
This design uses an NPN transistor with a beta (or hFE) of at least 10 (higher is fine) and can handle voltages of at least 30V. The LEDs are white LEDs with a 3.8 voltage drop each. The resistors are standard 1/4 watt carbon film resistors. The diagram of the controller is simplified. The + on the controller stands for the power connection for each arrow. The - is the common or ground. The 100 ohm resistor between the switch (arrow pad) and controller is there to help combat static electricity. I have a 1000 ohm resistor on my other pad and it works the same. I labeled the collector, emitter, and base for those not familiar with a transistor. The LEDs are connected off the emitter in series. The 100 ohm resistor in series with those is the LED resistor to take care of the extra voltage and keep the current around 18mA (it's usually not good to push them to the 20mA mark for longer life, but that's up to you). That resistor is then tied into the negative side of the power supply. I found that the transistor wasn't turning all the way off when the switch was up, so I added a high resistance (500k, or 500,000 ohm resistor) line that goes to the negative side of the battery. This is high enough to allow the controller to respond, but help turn the transistor all the way off. When the arrow is pressed, the controller's voltage turns the transistor on and allows the power supply to power the LEDs. When released, the transistor cuts off the current to the LEDs. That simple.
Now, if you wanted to add four LEDs, assuming 3.8 voltage drop (some are 3.5, just check), change the power supply to 24 Volts. Why 24? Well, you need at least 15.2 volts to power the leds. Second, you want your power supply to be high enough so that the load only uses 80% of the available (again, this is a longer life thing). Next, to take care of the extra voltage and to limit the current to 18 mA, you need a 500 ohm resistor in series with them (if you can't find 500, go with the next higher value. The lower values might fry your LEDs). Those are the only changes you really need.

The parts you need for this are:
NPN transistor, hFE at least 10, max voltage at least 30 V.
100 ohm resistors
500 ohm resistors (if doing four lights)
500k ohm resistors
White LEDs, 5000mcds, 3.8 voltage drop.
24 Volt DC wall transformer

All of these things can be purchased fairly inexpensively at www.jameco.com. They have white LEDs, 5000mcds, for about $1 each. If you have cheaper supply places, by all means go ahead. However, you can get everything I have listed here from that place. They do a very good job too.

Anyway, it will be some time before I can try this circuit in an actual pad (I'm going on vacation for awhile), but as soon as I do I'll let you know if it continues to work correctly. It should, but strange things sometimes happens. If anyone has questions about this, let me know, though answers may be delayed for awhile. Good luck with the building.

David
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FlyersPh9 · Trick Member Joined: 25 Jan 2004

I hate to ask a n00b question like this but I searched through multiple pages, emailed people, and PMed people.
I'm not making a pad, I'm repairing one. The one panel has a crack in it so I decided to replace all 4 arrow pannels. Getting the plexiglass won't be a problem and I already have the prints of the arrows. The only problem I'm facing is getting a metal contact.
On the broken panel's underside there is a tinfoil like material that once it touches the other metal, it registers with the PS2. What should I use to replace this tin foil? If I get a chance I will post pictures if you need.

Thanks and sorry again for the n00b question!

slvrshdw · Trick Member Joined: 05 Jan 2005

use sheet metal, but make sure it carries current!

i used NON-aluminum flashing, so that should work too

have fun repairing it...

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HitokiriX · Trick Member Joined: 27 Mar 2004 Location: Berwyn, PA

Deuce · Trick Member Joined: 23 Jun 2005

ok my pad will just stop registering or say that the controller is unplugged, when i unplug it and put it back in it works again. i heard it might be a static problem, does anyone know if it is, and if it is what do i do about it
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deM' · Trick Member Joined: 10 Apr 2005 Location: Southington CT

how can you get away with connecting the controllers - to the + of the battery...?

mikieson · Trick Member Joined: 14 Nov 2003

Galvanized sheet metal is what yo need. The metal looks speckled because it's a mixture of metals. Anyway just cut a good sized piece and tape it to the bottom of your arrow panels with aluminum tape. You can find aluminum tape at any hardware store I think. Then solder your wires to any part of the contact and you're set.[/quote]

I dont know why people try and solder? I always drill a small hole towards the side where the wire is and just wrap the the wire throught the hole, twist it real good and put some black tape over it...Much easier than soldering and much better to last longer. Will never come off...JMHO

geckoinc99 · Trick Member Joined: 11 Feb 2005 Location: Chattanooga, TN

Mikieson,
The reason a lot of us solder is because it's the best way to make an electrical connection. While your method may work very well, it's still a loose connection (not bonded). This also refers not only to physically but electrically (much more important). A good solder joint is actually very strong (the wire will break somewhere on itself rather than at the solder joint). It also ensures that proper conduction is taking place and won't allow any corrosion to occur between the two materials.
Having said that, if your method has worked this long so far, great! Those that don't want to mess with solder now have an option, and options are always great. I just wanted to let people know why there are reasons for soldering. Happy building!

Oh, and for a side note, I edited my previous post to clear up the controller thing that Demonic pointed out for me. That should clear it up. Also, be careful when soldering transistors. They get damaged by heat easily, so use some type of heat sink on the lead when soldering (an aligator clip works great).
David
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Life is very different 3000 feet above the earth with only a wing to hold you up....
Can't wait to be there again. Wanna join me? Visit http://www.hanglide.com

Aflac · Trick Member Joined: 28 Mar 2005

Mikeson -

About your pad - how did you attach the aluminum border? You said you used a piece of XxX aluminum, but how did you attach the wood (or whatever material you used for the border) to the main pad? Also, does your pad feel somewhat like the arcade? I recently played at an arcade for the first time and realized that the pads there were completely different than mine (I have a stoli-designed pad). Thanks!

marcan · Trick Member Joined: 28 Jul 2005

Heffenfeffer · Trick Member Joined: 22 Apr 2002 Location: Las Cruces, NM

mikieson · Trick Member Joined: 14 Nov 2003

geckoinc99 · Trick Member Joined: 11 Feb 2005 Location: Chattanooga, TN

Marcan,
Nice job. As I said before, I didn't claim to be a genius at this stuff. I just worked with what I knew and came up with a circuit that worked. I know it was weird, but up to this point no one had posted something that worked. At least a working diagram has been created. I really like yours. It better limits the involvement of the battery with the controller. Sorry for the weird design, but at least it fueled the creation of a better one. This forum rocks! Happy building.

David
_________________

Life is very different 3000 feet above the earth with only a wing to hold you up....
Can't wait to be there again. Wanna join me? Visit http://www.hanglide.com

Deuce · Trick Member Joined: 23 Jun 2005

marcan · Trick Member Joined: 28 Jul 2005

[quote=geckoinc99]Sorry for the weird design, but at least it fueled the creation of a better one. This forum rocks! Happy building.[/quote]

Actually I think I mentioned my method some time before, but I didn't post it graphically enough for anyone to notice

WRT the weird design, it's fun actually. It took me a longish while to understand it and I had to rethink my transistor stuff

(and I still don't know if I got it 100% right)

About the blinky "screensaver" stuff, well, my method is a microcontroller which handles all the stuff. You may as well do fine with just about any basic microcontroller if you don't need it to act as a controller, any PIC16F84 or similar will do, and just having it play the pattern will be fine (use MOSFETs to act as switches for example, and drive the lamps with that. Let the physical switches drive the controller, and fork off the signal into the PIC for press detection). Alternatively it could be implemented with a ROM for holding the screensaver pattern, and an address counter to run through it. Or *gasp* make 4 analog bandpass filters, wire it to a detection circuit, and use a tape recorder to record the pattern as a set of frequencies! I'm sure it would at least amuse some of us

deM' · Trick Member Joined: 10 Apr 2005 Location: Southington CT

marcan that circuit works perfectly, just set it up with my pad about 20 min ago... first try works perfect

thanks alot for your help guys

marcan · Trick Member Joined: 28 Jul 2005

Hmm... I have an idea. What if we made the lights light up to the correct pattern (the one of the song) as oposed to lighting up to what we play? Would surely help people get the hang of the game, and it might be a good aid for learning a song. Plus, if you misstep, it's obvious and everyone around can make fun at you

Of course with a console game this is next to impossible, but with stepmania I think it would be trivial to modify it to spit out the through some interface the arrows pressed (e.g. through the parallel port). For my controller I could modify the Linux PS2 pad driver and have it use some command as set-outputs, so that no extra cables would be needed. For other simpler interfaces it could be done through the parallel port (which would make it impossible to use it for a pad of course, but people can still use a PS2->USB converter for input). Whaddya think about that?

deM' · Trick Member Joined: 10 Apr 2005 Location: Southington CT

Already done marcan, there was a game that did that, i dont remember which thou