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Post by nyarlathotep333 on Aug 21, 2017 3:21:30 GMT
...specifically, low RPM tiny-sized motors, micro LED supplies, etc.
Disclaimner: I don't really know what I'm doing with electronics so this is going to be a learning process for me. I've got a couple of ideas though for various future RPG and Warmahordes projects so I'm looking for a good place to start, both for shopping and figuring out what exactly I will need. Any suggestions or help from folks who have done this kind of thing is appreciated.
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Post by strobe on Aug 21, 2017 4:13:26 GMT
Sparkfun is geared towards hobby type electronics. www.sparkfun.com/There are probably a bunch of others but I've used Sparkfun in the past for things I can't be bothered making myself or sourcing from a big supplier. Best of all they actually with provide tech support if you're not totally sure what you're doing. They also support a lot of the microcomputer and microprocessor boards (Arduino, RaspberryPi and similar) so you can actually get the complicated parts of your project to have some smarts. Otherwise there are a few big online stores of general electronic stuff but they are really labyrinthine to try and navigate if you don't really know what you're looking for. Depending on what country you live in there may be local preferences for one or another. Some of the big names are Farnell (aka Element14), Digikey, Mouser and of course eBay/Alibaba. Now for some more general advice: The kind of motor you're looking for is probably a servo motor but it kinda depends on what you're actually trying to achieve. Downside, servo motors require a controller to work. If you just want something that slowly rotates you're better off with a regular motor and some gearing. If you're going to be putting LEDs in models something you really want to get familiar with is the enamelled wire used in headphone leads. It is basically a really thin copper wire with an even thinner coating of enamel which you can melt off to actually solder the ends to something. This means you can put really _really_ tiny delicate wires through small holes. Think like putting light up eyes on Nemo tiny. Inside his head. This is a terrible idea, you should do it. Lastly, if you aren't good at soldering already know what soldering to surface mount LEDs is difficult. Soldering to a magnet is really quite difficult. Soldering to a battery is really quite difficult and can explode if you do it wrong. Get practice in, watch tutorial videos and try to see a person do it in person. It is like any other hand skill in that it takes time to get good. Don't try to do delicate soldering with a $20 iron from your local hardware store. PS - I am an electronics technician by trade, feel free to PM me if you want some specific information.
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Post by nyarlathotep333 on Aug 21, 2017 20:53:08 GMT
Thanks for the link and advice, though I suspect that lighting up Nemo's eyes may be a bit ambitious even for me ;p To be honest, the first project I have in mind isn't a Warmahordes project per se, but one for my RPG table. I wanted to try and make a swirling portal using micro LED lights, two mirrored surfaces (Google 'infinity mirror'), with a spinning mirrored disc. The challenges here (aside from my lack of electrical knowledge) are going to be: - Making it small enough to fit comfortably on the battle mat. I would like the base to be no larger than 4" sqare if possible. - Creating a small mirrored surface that would be wavy or patterned in such a way that it would produce an effect when rotated - I am currently thinking I may try chromed spray paint, though my research into that so far hasn't been very positive that it would work well. - Doing all this affordably Additionally, I would love to light up some Warmahordes stuff with LED in the future. I have enough Cryx models to think about maybe something along the lines of Deathjack eventually.
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Post by strobe on Aug 21, 2017 22:37:37 GMT
Ok, now that I know what you're trying to achieve... hmm... There is a paint range from AK Interactive called Xtreme Metal which has a few colours that can be lightly polished to actually be reflective. It is an airbrush paint aimed at the scale model world. Be aware it is extremely bad to breath in so if you're going to use it wear protection. There shouldn't be any problem with making it small enough as long as the surface you want to rotate isn't very heavy. Painted wavy styrene sheet maybe? Possibly having a rotating Fresnel lens inside the infinity mirror sandwich might make a good effect for a swirling portal. You're going to have to disguise the motor somehow or have the shaft of the motor go through the rear glass mirror. Drilling glass is difficult and not something I have ever tried. You might be able to use a plastic backing with a mirrored sticker like toy mirrors are made from. That way it would be easy to drill through and have the motor shaft come out where you want it. If you're going to have something really light weight as the rotating object then you can use a regular DC motor with a simple voltage divider and potentiometer (like a volume knob on a sound system) to adjust the speed to whatever you like. The issue if you use something heavy is that as you lower the speed the motor might not be able to actually drive the thing. Anyway, if the frame can be a little thick it should be totally possible.
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Post by Soul Samurai on Aug 22, 2017 6:20:13 GMT
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Post by Soul Samurai on Aug 22, 2017 11:12:17 GMT
So the more I think about how great your idea is the more desperately I want to steal it. It's going to be on a much smaller scale, without any spinning or colour changing LEDs or anything, but I think I'm going to try to something similar to what you described. I hope you don't mind? I'll keep you posted on how it goes, maybe you can benefit by learning from my mistakes that way.
By the way, instead of having the mirror itself spin or something like that, I'm wondering if it might be possible to get a strip of LEDs or something where they power up and down in such a way that it looks like a pulse travelling along the strip? That should give the illusion of spinning if you're going for a circular frame. I don't know if anything like that exists on a small scale, but it might be something to look into; if you can find something like that it should be a hell of a lot easier to use than mucking about with motors and stuff.
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Post by strobe on Aug 22, 2017 22:21:01 GMT
The kind of circuit Soul Samurai is talking about is called a chaser. I know Sparkfun have a controller to do a chaser with EL Wire. They probably have an LED one as well.
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Post by nyarlathotep333 on Aug 23, 2017 2:19:57 GMT
@soul Samurai not at all, please feel free to work with this idea as well!
Yeah, I've thought about chaser LED strings. I was actually going to initially try using one of those strings in addition to the spinning mirror. My idea was that if I can get a super low RPM motor (like 8-12 RPM slow) plus the chaser lights it might look pretty cool.
I've got some two-way mirror film on the way (super cheap on eBay), and some LED chaser lights courtesy of Amazon. I'm working on how I want to create the spinning mirror disc...still not entirely sure, but I'm going to head to my local JoAnn's store this weekend and see if I can find some inspiration there. It sounds like Sparkfun is open to me sending them a help request with the details. Hopefully they can recommend the motor/circuitry I need.
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Post by strobe on Aug 23, 2017 3:03:12 GMT
Another way to get a spinning mechanism is buying a cheap clock mech and then potentially overvolting it to spin a little faster.
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Post by Soul Samurai on Aug 23, 2017 4:31:52 GMT
Thanks Nyarl! I was looking on ebay and picked up an acrylic mirror sheet and some reflective window tint, I'm going to try to cut a disc out of the acrylic mirror and just stick the tint on the acrylic side, then some LEDs along the rim. I have no idea if it will work or not, but I'll let you know if it does.
Of course I ordered from China because I'm a cheapskate, so it'll probably be around a month or so before the stuff gets here. Well, that's OK, I have enough active projects to keep me busy until then.
One thing I've been wondering about is whether it will look better if the front semi-reflective film reflects a high percentage of the light or a low percentage. Any idea? I think the one I ordered claimed to reflect 80% of incoming light; my vague thought process is that higher reflectivity means the "tunnel" would seem to go on for longer because there is less dimming in each reflection. But on the other hand everything would look dimmer because there's less light reaching the viewer to begin with, so... I dunno. Any idea?
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Post by Soul Samurai on Aug 24, 2017 6:21:27 GMT
@soul Samurai not at all, please feel free to work with this idea as well! Yeah, I've thought about chaser LED strings. I was actually going to initially try using one of those strings in addition to the spinning mirror. My idea was that if I can get a super low RPM motor (like 8-12 RPM slow) plus the chaser lights it might look pretty cool. I've got some two-way mirror film on the way (super cheap on eBay), and some LED chaser lights courtesy of Amazon. I'm working on how I want to create the spinning mirror disc...still not entirely sure, but I'm going to head to my local JoAnn's store this weekend and see if I can find some inspiration there. It sounds like Sparkfun is open to me sending them a help request with the details. Hopefully they can recommend the motor/circuitry I need. Just wanted to throw out another idea that occured to me: if you're using two mirrors and you fix them so they are not completely parallel, then I assume that the "tunnel" would appear to curve rather than being straight. If you then spun that around with a motor you would probably get the "winding wormhole" effect, sort of like what you see in the Doctor Who intro.
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Post by nyarlathotep333 on Aug 24, 2017 6:38:34 GMT
I hadn't thought to check to see what the % of reflection mine had. When I went back, the eBay description wasn't very clear on that either...I think I paid about $4 shipped for 1'x5' sheet of film though so I'll see what it looks like when it arrives. I can always pick up something more reflective again if this stuff doesn't work well - it's pretty cheap stuff. I do suspect that the more light it would reflect would make the 'tunnel' appear longer and brighter as it recedes into the distance. I hadn't thought about making them no completely parallel either. That's an intriguing thought for sure! I suspect that it would work pretty well though and I'll likely play around with that idea a bit. I've thought about trying a couple different versions if I can make the first one work as well...we'll see though. Just getting the first one built is my goal now *EDIT* It also occurs to me that I should start figuring out the base and frame of the portal as well. My initial thought is to try and find an existing wood (or even hard cardboard) box I can work with and sculpt the details of the portal 'frame' with greenstuff. I'm not 100% sure I've got a direction for that at the moment though. I've not found anything in my home that would work well for this at the moment. This weekend when I visit the JoAnn's craft store here I'll be keeping an eye out for a suitable frame object I can work with as well. I'm hoping to find something about 1"x3"x4.5" or so. I may need to go more than 1" thick though as most of the motors I've researched are slightly larger than that. I could create a larger base (think stairway up to the portal) which would give me some more room to include the various electronics as well...I'm kinda spitballing here and I'll likely figure that part out as I start to accumulate the parts needed to make it with. Also, (@soul Samurai) I read through your LED tutorial. That's pretty slick! I may try my hand at something like that as well at some future date. There are a number of clear plastic base inserts out there that might work well with that technique. Man, those LED lights are small though!
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Post by Soul Samurai on Aug 24, 2017 7:53:38 GMT
Glad I was able to contribute something! It also occurs to me that I should start figuring out the base and frame of the portal as well. My initial thought is to try and find an existing wood (or even hard cardboard) box I can work with and sculpt the details of the portal 'frame' with greenstuff. I'm not 100% sure I've got a direction for that at the moment though. I've not found anything in my home that would work well for this at the moment. This weekend when I visit the JoAnn's craft store here I'll be keeping an eye out for a suitable frame object I can work with as well. I'm hoping to find something about 1"x3"x4.5" or so. I may need to go more than 1" thick though as most of the motors I've researched are slightly larger than that. I could create a larger base (think stairway up to the portal) which would give me some more room to include the various electronics as well...I'm kinda spitballing here and I'll likely figure that part out as I start to accumulate the parts needed to make it with. It probably wouldn't be too hard to construct a box of the appropriate size with plasticard. Personally I am totally planning to sculpt the portal to look like the stargate from that old movie... what was it called again? The one with Kurt Russel? Name's on the tip of my tongue... Also, (@soul Samurai) I read through your LED tutorial. That's pretty slick! I may try my hand at something like that as well at some future date. There are a number of clear plastic base inserts out there that might work well with that technique. Man, those LED lights are small though! Cool, thanks for the kind words. I have a few different types of clear resin bases (all from Dark Age I think) and models that I want to put on them, I just don't have time for all the projects I have planned. My Nemo 1 with light-up coils has been sitting around primed but unpainted for like two years now...
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Post by nyarlathotep333 on Aug 25, 2017 8:20:22 GMT
Well, the LED string from Amazon arrived today. I don't know how useful it will be. I picked it up because it has some nice features...multiple colors, fade in/out, bright/dim settings, etc. However, it is quite large and the length of wire from the battery box to the actual lights is pretty long as well. I am wondering if this will be something I can work with.
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Post by Soul Samurai on Aug 25, 2017 8:40:18 GMT
It probably wouldn't be too hard to shorten the length of the wires if needed, you just need a wire stripper and some form of connector (or solder them together if you're up to it). I guess the big issue is LED size. I've never dealt with this kind of LED string, can you cut off excess cable & LEDs from the end if it's longer than you need?
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