Status: June 20th

[kallahar]

How's everyone doing? Getting close to the deadline! I've got the arena done, with a few changes:

1) the lexan parts of the targets are now 14 guage copper wire, shouldn't change how hard they are to shoot down though.
2) There are a total of about 30 targets (10 of each size) spread out over six rows, randomly arranged. I'm 90% sure that there will not be any moving or blinking targets this year, I just couldn't get the mechanics down...

I'll try to get another video and more pictures up soon.

Any questions?

Kallahar

[Tacitus]

Re: Status: June 20th

The team I am working with has a working design that is able to ID and shoot down targets. We are just working on optimzation and making things work even faster now and until con. Good luck and happy building to everyone- looking forward to the competition

[wsbpress]

Re: Status: June 20th

My team also has a design which is ID'ing and knocking down targets. There was no way that we could recreate the real target arena so we improvised. I hope it will work on the real thing!

Currently I/we are having trouble forcing ourselves to sit in the basement and code when the weather is so damn good!

[M1DDL3BR0W]

What is the distance from the ground to the bottom of the 5'x5' target area?

What is the distance between the ground and the bottom of the 5' by 5' target? I want to get the throw of the weapon system right for our vehicle height.

Also, is there a way to get a large chasis through the door? Our base chasis for this project was originally a tracked ATV and won't fit through a standard door (7' wide by 8' long).

Also, what material are you using for the 5'x5' backdrop? Mainly is it reflective or glossy?

[LosT]

Re: Status: June 20th

Also, is there a way to get a large chasis through the door? Our base chasis for this project was originally a tracked ATV and won't fit through a standard door (7' wide by 8' long).

WTF- And here I was thinking that a non-tethered (read: sans PC) version would rock- Holy anti-minimalist batman...

LosT

[M1DDL3BR0W]

Re: Status: June 20th

WTF- And here I was thinking that a non-tethered (read: sans PC) version would rock- Holy anti-minimalist batman...

LosT

This:

Belkin Wireless USB

Would pretty much do the job if it was out there now. I wonder what the range is?

[kallahar]

Re: Status: June 20th

The target area is 5x5, it sits about 2' off the ground. You can put whatever you want behind the 10' line so if you need a table or cinder blocks or whatever then you can bring/buy those.

As I understand it, we're in the corner of the big convention space. The doors should be plenty wide, but you may want to check with the Riviera to see if they have any policies about ATV's inside.

[Tacitus]

Re: Status: June 20th

This:

Belkin Wireless USB

Would pretty much do the job if it was out there now. I wonder what the range is?

USB to serial converters have always scared me... especially on windows.
Turns out a good amount of those drivers are extra crappy and tend to BSOD your windows box when you are about to compete the next day- not that that exact sceneario has ever happened to us before...

[TheCotMan]

Re: Status: June 20th

USB to serial converters have always scared me... especially on windows.
Turns out a good amount of those drivers are extra crappy and tend to BSOD your windows box when you are about to compete the next day- not that that exact sceneario has ever happened to us before...

Last time I performed a MiM attack on a serial comm system using a laptop that has 2 of those USB to "old style serial" DB9, I built a simple app that could read from one port, write the the other, and read from the other and write to the one port.

They did kind of suck. They maxed out at 9600 bps, and I was lucky that the serial equipment being "sniffed" did not go any faster. They also did not work like conventional DB9 style serial ports on other linux boxes. I don't remember anything specific, but I seem to recall something to do with serial port control was broken and I did not have access to apply all of the stty options found in standard serial port configurations.

Added: This was in Linux.

[LosT]

Re: Status: June 20th

USB to serial converters have always scared me... especially on windows.
Turns out a good amount of those drivers are extra crappy and tend to BSOD your windows box when you are about to compete the next day- not that that exact sceneario has ever happened to us before...

Many of the USB to serial level shifters have crappy drivers written for them that don't properly implement RS232 timing- which almost takes EFFORT to do if you know how friggin' sloppy you can be with RS232- BELKIN is one of the worst offenders....FTDI based solutions tend to be ok-

The serial port isn't going away, you just won't see it anymore. But it will be there for a while. Circuit Cellar just did a great writeup on this very topic last month.

LosT

[Tacitus]

Re: Status: June 20th

Many of the USB to serial level shifters have crappy drivers written for them that don't properly implement RS232 timing- which almost takes EFFORT to do if you know how friggin' sloppy you can be with RS232- BELKIN is one of the worst offenders....FTDI based solutions tend to be ok-

Yeah, ours was a Belkin- I finally discovered it was screwing up in a blocking read and dying there.

[apg88]

Re: Status: June 20th

I'm working on the shooting mechanism, I'm trying to avoid the servo pushing the switch, but that might be the only way with the time I have left.