Radio Control

[gtmspyder]

Thank you Hugh, I have replied at length, but not sure I did it right, let me know if you have not received the proposed arrangements to your kind offer of help.

Here is the circuit diagram as I have wired it.



And below, the circuit diagram as drawn by Deltang, the supplier.



Kind regards,

BrianT.

[Frank]

Brian,

Thanks for posting this, it must have taken a while to draw out!

I have had a look at your diagrams and a few things occur to me.

It looks to me as if you have connected pin 5 to the 0v line.   Tracing through from pin 5 down to the bind switch, you have connected it to the side of the bind button that is connected to the 0v line.   This would cause the LED to flash when first switched on, whatever else you do with the controls.

Also you have the LED connected to the contact on the bind button instead of the 0v line.

I think you have these two connections the wrong way round.  Perhaps you could check this on the transmitter.

Also the 1k resistor on the direction switch 3 should go to 0v not the 1k resistor on speed pot 2.

All three of the motor speed pots should have one end connected to 0v.   You have pot 1 not connected and pot 3 connected to the direction switch.


Hope this helps

Frank

[Hugh Norwood]

Brian came over this afternoon with his receiver and transmitter.
No, we didn't get them working together.
I do think, however, that I'm closer to understanding how they work.
I'll post some thoughts later after I've contacted Brian and Frank off-line.

[gtmspyder]

Here's a little update on my electronics adventure.


As well as Frank trying to help me from a distance, I had a kind offer from Hugh of Angst fame, who lives reasonably near me in Leeds.


He kindly offered to meet me  and look over my spaghetti for mistakes, so today, I travelled upto, Leeds and took the circuit board with me for him to peruse, along with all the information I had.


I had completely rewired the circuit a few days ago, which still did not operate the loco chassis I had bought, I had also tested the chassis with a direct supply from the Lipo cell to make sure I had not been unlucky enough to purchase a duff chassis, and the wheels spun happily, so the problem definitely lay with my assembly of the 3 pot control assembly, the pre assembled transmitter module that forms the heart of the treble controller, or the loco receiver itself.


After much careful circuit testing, component checking and reading of the supplied circuit diagram, Hugh concluded that I had assembled the circuit with a dry joint where several of the black 0v wires congregate.


That looked promising from my point of view, at least there was something I had done wrong, and Hugh had located and rectified it, but further investigation by Hugh, also pointed a finger at other problems, which were not of my making.


Basically, the transmitter board has two tiny terminals marked 8 and 3.1v where the 2 wires, one feeding the box LED, and one the 3.1 volt feed to the circuit, are to be soldered to.


I had soldered an additional socket to these two terminals, but Hugh concluded that there was no 3.1v at the 3.1 terminal, so he removed the plug I had fitted, and used another 3.1v terminal a little distance away in the centre of the board, and soldered the wire to this, and soldered the LED connector wire to terminal 8 ..


So, that's two problems sorted, things were looking good.


Further circuit testing was then undertaken, and Hugh concluded that he was not getting the results he would have expected at his various test points, and began to suspect two of the pot's.


He then fitted the Lipo  battery to the receiver board, temporarily fitted to the Kato chassis, and the 9v PP3 battery to the transmitter, and started to test for some results, and here, we were back to the results I had been experiencing, no movement from the Kato chassis.


This was not helped by the lack of supplied instructions on how to select which set of the three options available to be bound to the single receiver I was using, and how to select the further two I will have to purchase if ever this equipment works.


So, we admitted defeat, and I returned home.


Thank you very much Hugh for your time and patience.


I will again contact the maker and supplier of the transmitter and receiver boards, hopefully this time I will get a reply,  and maybe I will return the parts for examination.


This may not happen until I come out of hospital now, so my apologies for the delay.


Regards to all,


BrianT,

[gtmspyder]

Well as you can see, I am back from my hip operation.

I went into hospital Wednesday 30th October at 7 am, 9.30 am saw me in the operating theatre, 12.30 I was back on the ward, with a new hip joint, Friday 3.30 pm, 1st November, and I am back home, not bad going eh?

Regards,

Brian T.

[tat2drod]

Well as you can see, I am back from my hip operation.

I went into hospital Wednesday 30th October at 7 am, 9.30 am saw me in the operating theatre, 12.30 I was back on the ward, with a new hip joint, Friday 3.30 pm, 1st November, and I am back home, not bad going eh?

Hi Brian,

I hope that there are no complications and that everything's nicely under control. Having had part of my left knee cut out this year (part of the right knee was cut out 13 years ago), I know that it can take a while to get back to normal. I wish you a gentle and speedy recovery.

Best wishes from this side of the channel.

[tedp]

That's quite a quick repair job, isn't it? Hope you're back on your legs soon!

[gtmspyder]

Thank you gentlemen, the only problems are getting into and out of a chair, and into and out of bed, It's quite comical I should imagine watching me manoeuvre :laugh:

Kind regards,

BrianT.

[gtmspyder]

Hello once again, I'm wounded but moving, just. ;D

I have been doing a bit with the radio control for the loco's destined for Glen Ogle.

I have purchased three receivers and had them linked (bound) to my transmitter by David Theunissen who trades under the name "Dell Tang".  

I sent my receiver kit to David when I was having problems with it, and he sorted out my wiring cock-ups, and discovered the receiver supplied was faulty, so even had I wired the transmitter correctly, it still would not have worked.  Any way, all is sorted now, two more receivers purchased, and David kindly bound the three receivers to my three pot transmitter, ready for me to install each receiver into a separate loco.

I do not anticipate having more than three loco's in steam at any one time on Glen Ogle.

It is principally supposed that this is a Scottish Tourist  leisure railway, and only travels between near the village of Lochearnhead on Loch Earn at the foot of Glen Ogle, and initially the head of Glen Ogle, with a possible link down to the village of Killin at the head of Loch Tay at some time in the future, but don't let the people of Killin here it described in that way, they are really passionate about have the wee railway back into there village. ;)

The first Loco I am working on is a Chris Ward 3D printed body of a generic tank tram loco.  This is designed to fit the Kato chassis, and to supply power to the loco.   Because I wanted to make sure I had enough running time for an exhibition day, should I ever be invited, I purchased a larger Lipo 3.7 volt cell than others have fitted, I have adapted one of the Lilliput coaches to accept the battery, and ths combination will form the basis of the Tourist train.

The basic ingredients of this combination are shown here below.



You can see that this is already part wired, but I will go through my construction and adaptations for anyone wishing to follow.


The receiver I decided to place in the coal bunker, as it has a tiny green LED that needs to be observed when setting up the control, and I hope, even with a load of coal in the bunker, this will still be possible.  If you look closely, you should see the red/black battery feed wires leaving the rear of the bunker, and vertically, across the footplate a dark line which is the two brown wires from receiver to motor.






Chris has cleverly left an out of sight hole under the firebox which goes through into the boiler, that can be used by the brown motor wires from the receiver, I assume because he expected anyone going down the radio control route, to put the receiver in the cab.   However, my decision to fit the receiver in the bunker required a further hole from the footplate into the bunker, and another hole from the footplate to the underside.
The bunker hole was formed by using a Swiss round file point as a drill, passed through the under-firebox hole into the footplate and twisted back and forth against the rear bunker wall, until it entered the bunker, at which point it reverted to it's filing properties to enlarge the small hole formed to pass all four wires through from bunker to footplate.  The two Brown wires to the motor passing through into the boiler, the red and black/red passing through the footplate floor to the under side, then through a guide formed from a small piece of un-shrunk heat-shrink glued to a half circle filed in the rear buffer beam immediately under the coupling hook.



And this is where we started with the wires ready to be attached to the following carriage.



Here is the Lilliput carriage with the top unclipped and the internal seating dropped out.
If you look at the right of the chassis, I have fitted a piece of 40th plasticard, vertically, up-to the underside of the windows, super-glued to base and low sides, then a similar piece to fit across the metal weight plate and butting up to the vertical piece.  This is to mount the battery plug onto, in such a way as it could withstand the tugging to and fro of plugging and unplugging the battery for charging purposes.   You might just make out the white plug with it's two solder tags vertical, and the assembly, araldite'd in place ready to accept the red/black battery wires.



I drilled two holes through the floor of the chassis to come through near the vertical bulkhead, so that the wires could rise up the bulkhead and be connected to the two pins on the socket at the top, and leave room to allow the wires to be loose enough to be lost in the space.  Another small piece of un-shrunk heat-shrink was glued in place to guide the wires from the holes towards the loco.



Turning the chassis over, shows the socket and battery ready to be mated.



And the battery fully inserted into the socket, and showing the araldite reinforcing.



And that's about it for today, oh apart for this:-



                                                 Click on the picture.

                                                        :D :D :D


Regards,

BrianT.

[WALLSHIRTS]

Glad to see you got this working. I have a Snailbeach Dennis that has room for extra stuff. Hmm, I wonder...

[gtmspyder]

Worth a try, the receiver will go anywhere that a DCC modue will fit, it's the battery that need thought and research for sizes, all the best.

BrianT.

[Hugh Norwood]

Well done; you must be greatly encouraged that it works!

BTW I think _that_ piece goes _there_    ;D

[gtmspyder]

I'll tell her Hugh. ;D

Regards,

BrianT.

[gtmspyder]

As I have got the electronics sorted, I think. ::)  I am going to transfer the rest of the loco build modelling to a new thread, or maybe back to the Glen Ogle thread, which do you all think would make more sense??

Regards,

BrianT.

[Mike Broom]

Hi BrianT. Could I ask which receivers you used as I was exploring the Deltang website and found some of the information confusing.
I applaud you loudly for you persistence and am truly glad it all now works. I have been following the development of the Wifi/Bluetooth system being developed but this is so much better.
One thing I do concur with is the charging of Lipo cells. Definitely not a good idea to use the track/wheels/pickups as false readings will cause havoc with the charging as it does with normal running of DC locos. One speck of dust and either over charge or no charge.
MikeB.