Cool, I just got a Spiderman and was wondering if anything was available.

Good morning,

Has anyone played around with diffusing fiber optics tubes along with Pinduino ?

Specifically, I recently acquired a Tron Pro, and it has been fitted with a RF remote control fiber optics tubes on the ramps, which cycle but do not react to gameplay. This uses a RGB fiber light source such as this: http://www.ledlightingfiberoptic.com/en/product/12VDC-24GHz-5W-RGB-LED-Fiber-Optic-Illuminator-for-fiber-optic-lighting.html (well not quite identical, but principle is the same).

I've been trying to find a control unit that would have a standardized protocol, as it would allow to control it through a pinduino, but could not find anything.

My alternative would be to use a single adressable led and define it as single led output in Pinduino, but checking first if anything had been done already.

Now you could ask why don't i use complete ledstrip in the ramps, it's just that I prefer the look of fiber optics, better integrated and more in line with the theme for my taste.

Regards

That was my conclusion indeed, I went the PinLightShield route which has two 12V RGB output and a few adressable led output depending on how I use the input.

Still need to assemble it though...

Just picked up a pinduino for my getaway..Lyonsden is amazing!! What a professional.Super fast shipping,and checked 2 c if everything was good..Have a new favorite on pinside!! Thanks !! Keep flipping..

I'm going to order a couple Pinduino so I can have a play.

Can the Pinduino be programmed to have the same effect as OCDLED and Afterglow boards? Where the bulbs are controlled up and down to look like incandesant bulb "glow"

Just curious

Pinduino does not control the original inserts. It's designed to control WS2812 ledstrip, so you would need to replace your inserts by a WS2812 "chain" (I believe there is an example of this on Pinduino github), and you would need to program it to control it. So it's not at all like ledocd or afterglow which essentially acts as voltage-to-PWM bridges

Other than playing the game, is there a way to test the Pinduino for CFTBL? Thanks.

Has there been any updates to the Tron code for these?

Yup, all understood now. Pinduinos are here and built, so I will get them working in BoP first, and then get to work on ideas for Hurricane. Such a massive ramp!

The latest code is on the github page (https://github.com/elyons/professor_pinball_pinduino_sketches/). The hardware and software is open source so you're free to modify as you see fit.

Yes.

You need a 5V/12V power source to power the Pinduino board - You can make a JST XH plug to power the board. The board is marked at the power header for the 12V/5V/GND pins.

You can then individually take each pin of the pass-through plug/header (where the Pinduino plugs into the pinball machine ) to Ground (touch the power source GND to each pin) to see the effect on the LED strips of the kit. This mimics the game's signals read by the Pinduino.

FYI, here's something I found, very useful:

https://www.led-genial.de/Power-Dot-3W-WS2811-kompatibel

Can be used to light fiber optics cables

On another note, has anyone worked on Monster Bash with Pinduino ? I'm assisting a friend (in France), and he's not very well versed in SW, so it would be best if a ready to use INO was available (I checked the github, did not see one)

Wow that would be super nice of you. Let me propose him.
Only concern though... I'm not sure he speaks english, and his Arduino skills are limited. And I don't have a MB either. Ok, that's a little bit more than one concern though.

But let me try to see how to work this out

I can also assist him in any case, just need to spend some time on the API

(sidenote .... there are a few undocumented calls still unless I'm mistaken )
(sidenote 2 ... unless I missed it, I did not see for a way to define segments in your code, just like WS2812FX library operates ? That would allow some very nice ledstrip management scheme, allowing to drive multiple daisy chained ledstrip from a single output)

i have played around with lighting a fiber optic fiber ( side glow) using a single addressable led, controlled by the pinduino, it works ok as you can select different colors and effects such as flashing, what i found is it is hard to maintain the optic fiber super bright as you extend the length of the fiber without adding more leds along the length . in the dark the single led looks good but in the pinball with multiple other lights it look dim

do you think the " power dot" you linked would be a brighter source ?

As noted, WS2812FX library is perfect in that respect. Essentially you can define any section of a given ledstrip to be a segment, and you can assign a separate animation, turn it on or off. You can even define several segment, each with it's own animation, on the same section of the ledstrip, and enable depending on usage.

So that would allow for ex to daisy chain apron, GI, special effects, and drive them from a single output easily (you would simply assign each segment)

A single WS2812 led is 0.3W, so yes this power dot is 10x brighter...

I suspect you have a Tron, just like I do If so, since TimeBandit left the scene, I have a cool idea to drive the fiber optics depending on gameplay, PM me if you want to discuss this

Long Post.... zene10 and lyonsden or anyone who has done this.

My understanding of how pinduino's (mine are WPC-Ext's) work on the electrical level in laymen terms is this.
The connectors, J126 for example are plugged into the pinduino and the pinduino among other thigs is plugged into J126 on the driver board.
The electronics (optoisolators) are looking for a pin on J126 to go high or low. The reason for the optos is it isolates the high voltage on the driver side and on the pinduino side of things through the arduino code get notified a pin is active or not. If this is correct then I ask the following....

If I run wiring from J126 or J127 or J130 as a pigtail off the main connector on the driver board and don't have to sandwich the adapter board, etc, I will still be getting the PIN state of the pigtailed connection if I terminate it to the connector on the pinduino.

In my example below I would run a pigtail from J130(7) (plunger on STTNG) to the connector on the arduino J126(3) as J126(3) is not used on STTNG, why loose the ability to monitor "something" else??

There are a few caveats... I still must code the nano sketch as if I am interrogating the state of a particular pin line on J126.
Like so....

if (pd.pinState()->J126(3)) // Pin 3 is active //Plunger coil from J130(7) is active because I ran that wire.
Then do something

I don't see why this isn't possible especially since the 4 pin EXT aspect of the WPC ext uses addressing J126(14-17) which isn't real just an extension of the code to make things easier.

This way, by not moving the REAL J126 connector to the WPC-ext I can really run what I want to the the Pinduino and interrogate as I see fit....

If this is wrong please explain why it is. I don't want to blow up a pinduino if doing this will cause that to happen. I think I have read where these optos can handle even the high power coils at 50V.

The other reason I see this as a viable solution to maximize connections (STTNG only uses 7 of the 12 on that connector BTW) is that the connector doesn't have ground reference in the connector, that is handle by the driverboard completing the circuit which makes the coils fire.

Thanks for the long read. Does this make sense?

-Nacman

I went ahead and risked it! It worked!

Sorry for the late reply, lyonsden is out of the country with limited connectivity for another week. He's been gone since the end of December and I only look at this thread infrequently.

It looks like you answered you're own question. Yes, you can monitor other signals as you've discovered.

You're launch effect prototype is really cool and I look forward to seeing the fully developed lightshow on launch.

Is what you’re saying that the current resistor pack is not a 10 K resistor pack? If if I replace the one that’s in there with a 10k sit package will the low power coil drivers no longer register with the optos?

Just installed the borg ship in my STTNG, after the TOM ramps and the LOTR overall lighting. This is just great. If you haven’t done it yet those are great mods. Highly recommended