80 replies to this topic

[DDH69]

I am trying to figure out how to make my own boosters. So far, I think the tip120 transistors will work. 60v 5A and cheap. I saw a lot of 10 on ebay for $8.

 

I'm looking at going with MOSFETs. Should generate less heat and get better switching than a power transistor.  I haven't done much other than enough research to buy them off ebay so far.  Basically I've got some N type MOSFETs (IFR 540N) and some hex inverters (CD4069) and plan to use those to switch.

 

As I say, so far I have the parts and the LedWiz has come up stairs to the study, no further action yet.

[mjr]

 

I am trying to figure out how to make my own boosters. So far, I think the tip120 transistors will work. 60v 5A and cheap. I saw a lot of 10 on ebay for $8.

 

I'm looking at going with MOSFETs. Should generate less heat and get better switching than a power transistor.  I haven't done much other than enough research to buy them off ebay so far.  Basically I've got some N type MOSFETs (IFR 540N) and some hex inverters (CD4069) and plan to use those to switch.

 

In case this helps, there's a circuit shematic in the Pinscape Controller build guide for an output booster that should work fine as an LedWiz booster as well.  The LedWiz outputs are equivalent to the ULN2803A (Darlington) outputs in my circuit, and the IFR 540N should work fine as the MOSFET (you can substitute any MOSFET with similar characteristics for the one in my plans).

 

In any case, you're right about MOSFETs being more efficient for power switching than TIP120s, although either one will work.  I personally prefer the MOSFETs because it's easy to find cheap ones that will handle huge current loads.  You don't really need huge current loads for a pin cab, but I like specs that are way beyond what you actually need so that you don't have to worry about exceeding them.

[viktory2k1]

I thought the tip120 was MOSFET? OOPS. I am very interested in that build guide as I now have a $0 income and probably won't for some time. I just started working on my cab tonight very slowly. I was remounting a hinge and my right hand went numb I think, not really sure what happened, all I know is drill was on floor and battery was in 5 pieces. Got it sort of back together. I swear the drill was still in my hand. I see a pain mgt specialist Monday and maybe he can pinpoint which nerve(s) are shot and what to do about this, things are going down hill fast. Legs gave out 5 times last week and that was a first on right hand, left arm and hand has been doing that for years but know how to work it. I wanted new batterys anyway but not now. I saw they have 5Ah ones now for the Makita. Making almost all electronics at this point. Doesn't zebs bare bones booster have tip120s on it? cant tell by pic.

Thanks for that link, been struggling with what to use for a booster for some time now.

[mjr]

TIP120s are Darlington transistors, which are a different sort of transistor from MOSFETs.  They do more or less the same thing, but they require somewhat different circuitry.  You certainly can use Darlingtons for this kind of power switching - the 90s Williams machines used a type of Darlington for just this purpose - but they're different enough that you shouldn't substitute one into a circuit designed for a MOSFET.

[viktory2k1]

OK, I will stick with the MOSFETS and the CD4069 things. Let me recheck that link.. Thanks

I didn't see the schematic on there. I am pretty new at this also. Those mosfets are even cheaper then what I was thinking. I need 96+ outputs. I have 1 LEDWIZ and 1 PACLED64.

Edited by viktory2k1, 25 April 2015 - 11:32 PM.

[DDH69]

Previously I have used TIP120's for booster circuits (actually on my father's MIDI driven pipe organ!).  It may seem strange to some, but the MIDI driver board is principally the same as the LedWiz (PC controlled negative switching) - I suppose there are only so many ways to do this!

 

As mjr said the TIP120's will do a great job. I just saw the opportunity to use a couple less components and get more power with less heat for about the same price.  While MOSFET's are far from rare, there are more circuit diagrams with more traditional power transistors around the place.

OK, I will stick with the MOSFETS and the CD4069 things. Let me recheck that link.. Thanks

 

Hoping to build some of mine today 

 

I don't have enough mounting bits for 16 MOSFETs, but hopefully I can get one or two working, prove the principal, then get the other $3- $4 worth of parts during the week from the electronics store.

[DDH69]

No news on the booster circuit (sorry viktory2k1).  I got half way through the build and ran out of time for the day.  To be fair it wasn't a full day of pinball build today - spent some time with my lovely wife and had to do the general weekend clean up.  Also, I did need to clean up the "man cave" from previous pin ball building ....... as we all know it can be thirsty work!

 

 

This weekend I did get a lot of cabling done.  I stripped and rewired my coin door.  I added two micro switches to the coin return buttons.  Not sure what I'll use them for, but easier to do it now and has no adverse visual impact even if  don't use them.  I wired up all of my switches and plunger too.  Got some of the cabling ready for the lights in the switches, but ran out of wire.  I put the speakers into the main cabinet - not wired up yet, but those 8 bolts took a while!  Anyway, a couple of quick pictures.

 

 

Things are continuing to take shape.  What I really want at the moment is my display port to HDMI cable that ordered so that I can wire up the backbox correctly.  Hopefully the postman brings joy this week from eBay 

[DDH69]

Another productive weekend.  I decided to fix up a couple of small things on Saturday then find a way to connect things up and see it running for the first time on Sunday.

 

I found that the delay timer I set up to turn on the screens didn't have the adjustable range (was 1 - 4.5 sec) to turn on my playfield TV.  It seems it will not turn on until 5 - 6 seconds after power is applied.  So I changed the range with a larger timing capacitor to be more like 4 - 12 seconds.  Now when I apply power everything powers up OK.

 

Once I got everything turned on I then discovered that it takes longer for the playfield TV to boot up then the computer!  That's what I get for building a fast pc!  Anyway, this is a bit of a problem as the TV really needs to be running as the computer boots to make the HDMI detect properly.  What I will do over the next few weeks is boot the PC off the timer too (rather than using the PC BIOS boot on power on) to slow the PC boot down until after the playfield TV has booted up.

 

Next I had to insert the playfield TV.  So it was time to build the prop to hold up the playfield for service.  Here are a few photos.

 

 

Now to the most interesting bit - with a couple of temporary cables I fired it all up on Sunday.  Once fired up I got stuck on software tinkering and nothing else got built.  The good news is that I got play a game!  I loaded Rocky and Bullwinkle plus Indiana Jones The Pinball Adventure - just because I like them, not for any particular testing purpose.  I did get to see that with on-board Intel graphics six ball multi-ball has not lag - a great start.

 

So here are a few photos.  Pick the real IJ machines (its easy really)

 

 

 

 

[DDH69]

Well its been a couple of weeks since I've posted on the build thread.  I've got a bit sidelined by the software setup as I tried loading my first tables.  That has gone OK - by that I mean I have PinballX setup with playfield, backglass and wheel images, I've loaded B2S for active backglasses, I loaded the DOF framework for my LedWiz and I've even edited a few tables for such things as the exit button to avoid the popup.  All-in-all a lot of reading and couple of very helpful folk around here.

 

Last weekend I did a bit of soldering and building of my solenoid devices.  I've built 10 in all.  I've mounted my cheap 12v push soleniods on some more of that 6mm plastic I bought for $6.  I got some M3 short countersunk screws and mounted the solenoids.  I also setup two holes on the plastic plate to screw the noise-maker to the cabinet.  Last but not least I added another couple of countersunk 1/8 holes to hold whatever material I wanted the solenoid to hit.

 

A few photos of the solenoids below as they were built.

 

 

This weekend I've mounted 7 out of 10 solenoids.  Why 7, well I need some different noise makers for the the top 3, based on what I've seen around here I'm going to try some cheap bike bells.  Currently on the way via eBay!  Here are a couple that I've mounted.

 

 

Oh yeah, and part of setting all of this up of course is that I've now built my MOSFET boosters for the LedWiz.  I've boosted 16 out of 32 channels.  They can now handle a peak load of 32A - stupidly high really given that the power supply on this rail can only deliver 3A.  Anyway, cheap MOSFETs, nice result result.  A couple of images of the LedWiz and boosters, again all on some of that $6 plastic.  I love making the gear this way, two screws to hold a unit module in place, yet O can build and service the module so easily.

 

 

Being the impatient person I am, I wired up the left hand side solenoids and some button lights then decided to test them out.  Well an hour or so later once I'd generated a configuration file, etc - I played a game and my left hand flipper, slingshot and bumper made noise - that was nice.     What I really need to do now is find a good test program for the LedWiz so that I can turn on one item at a time and test them out.  Just didn't get to looking for this and doing it this week.

 

Next weekend I'll have to wire up the right hand side and get some good noise happening.

 

On another front, I've also discovered that I only want to hit the [END] key once to open the coin door and once more to close it in games.  This was a small problem as I setup and wired a switch for the coin door.  This meant that the [END] key was effectively pushed down all the time the door was open.  Not surprisingly this stuffed things up.  So now I have a plan for a 4093 quad 2 input NAND gate, a couple of resisters and capacitors to make it so I get one pulse on open and another on close.  I'm sure I could do the same mechanically, but where is the fun in that - for about $7 I'll do it the electronic way!

 

This week in between that pesky thing called work I really should get my glass ordered (now that I've found out exactly what I need and got a good price quoted), plus I must order my stickers.  Stuzza has done the custom are work and I haven't ordered yet as I've been chasing a decent price - which I now think I've got.  Anyway, sadly, pinball weekend over - but grewat news I played Rocky and Bullwinkle, The Addams Family and Indiana Jones with half of my sounds - what progress!

[freneticamnesic]

I think there's already a solution for your coin door issue! Download the core.vbs and VPMkeys.vbs from the VP10 beta thread

 

in the vpmkeys.vbs file there is this

'

toggleKeyCoinDoor = True '     If true then a key press/switch change will flip the state from on/off, if false then one will have the real coindoor behaviour (for cabinet setups with real coindoors)

voila!

[gtxjoe]

For ledwiz testing, go to ledblinky.net, download it and use the simpleledtest.exe tool

[DDH69]

I think there's already a solution for your coin door issue! Download the core.vbs and VPMkeys.vbs from the VP10 beta thread

 

in the vpmkeys.vbs file there is this

'

toggleKeyCoinDoor = True '     If true then a key press/switch change will flip the state from on/off, if false then one will have the real coindoor behaviour (for cabinet setups with real coindoors)

voila!

 

Thanks for this.  Just wondering though, while this might be a great software solution, I presume because the "key", via the coin door being open, is still pressed, that the PC is receiving and processing interrupts at a million miles an hour.  The very reason I discovered this issue is because I had the door open while just having Windows running and I was struggling to be able to right click on the Windows start icon to get the control panel because the PC was so busy processing the keyboard.

 

The above makes me wonder if I'm still better off with $7 of electronics to only get a key press when required?

For ledwiz testing, go to ledblinky.net, download it and use the simpleledtest.exe tool

 

Thank you.  I think I may have even used this on my test PC months ago before I got serious about building.  I will go and find it now.

[Talantyyr]

Great build! Looks amazing!

 

I was thinking about using a 555 monostable multivibrator for the coin door to achieve the "single button press" event, but then i asked toxie to implement the software solution. I think i won't ever boot the cab with the coin door opened once it's done, so that solution is easier and i'll go with that.

[Talantyyr]

While the building of the frame for the 46" TV continues I've been concentrating on my power supply / power on delay.  I decided to build my own power supply for a couple of reasons, firstly, I enjoy it, and secondly I could get all the flexibility that I want.

 

So what did I build;

- 90W output across all rails (ability to easily expand with a larger transformer should I need to later)

- 4 adjustable power outputs for cabinet fans.  I want to control fans driving air in through the base, fans on the PC, fans extracting from the back of the cabinet and fans extracting from the top of the back box.

- 4 adjustable power rails, 2 x 1.5A max and the other two at 3A maximum

- All adjustable outputs driven by LM317T voltage regulators

- A delay circuit that drives 3 reed relays to allow all 3 screens to powered on automatically a few seconds after the cabinet is powered up

 

A few images ....

 

 

One of the 1.5A power rails is set at 12v and will run the delay timer and other 12v items like the lights in my cabinet buttons via the LEDWiz.  One of the 3A rails will be set at about 15v to drive solenoids via the LedWiz. The other 3A rail will drive my two stereo amplifiers for back box and cabinet sound.  The other rail is really there for things I haven't fully thought of yet, who knows maybe some Wii remotes to give me 3D at some stage, etc.

 

I have built all of this on a small piece of 12mm MDF to allow for easy mounting and moving if required.

 

Anyway, back to more laying out and drilling of all possible holes before I start assembling the cabinet.

 

 

Really stupid question... how are these black connectors called (in german)? I need something like that for my cab and i can't find something like that -.-

Anyone from germany / austria who could send me a link to conrad / reichelt with some connectors like those? Or at least tell me how they are called in german  

[mpad]

Du meinst das Terminal board?
= anschlussklemme / klemmleiste
Hab mir den ar*** abgesucht und dann doch zwei Reihen der kleinsten Lüsterklemmen aus dem Baumarkt genommen. Funktioniert auch.
Die sehen bei uns glaub einfach nicht so aus wie in usa.

[Talantyyr]

Ohje, das hab ich auch schon befürchtet. Ja diese schwarze Anschlußklemme. Such mir auch schon seit tagen nen Wolf bei conrad und co und find nix ordentliches und die schwarzen Teile sehen einfach wesentlich besser aus als Lüsterklemmen

Danke auf jeden Fall, dann geb ich die Suche mal auf und nehm auch einfach Lüsterklemmen.

[mpad]

Lüsterklemmen gibt's auch in schwarz
Das Terminal hat noch den Vorteil dass man die Kabel besser sieht, da sie von oben durch eine Platte fixiert sind. Aber wenn erst mal alles blinkt und rattert und der Deckel vom Cab zu ist ist dir auch egal

[DDH69]

 

While the building of the frame for the 46" TV continues I've been concentrating on my power supply / power on delay.  I decided to build my own power supply for a couple of reasons, firstly, I enjoy it, and secondly I could get all the flexibility that I want.

 

So what did I build;

- 90W output across all rails (ability to easily expand with a larger transformer should I need to later)

- 4 adjustable power outputs for cabinet fans.  I want to control fans driving air in through the base, fans on the PC, fans extracting from the back of the cabinet and fans extracting from the top of the back box.

- 4 adjustable power rails, 2 x 1.5A max and the other two at 3A maximum

- All adjustable outputs driven by LM317T voltage regulators

- A delay circuit that drives 3 reed relays to allow all 3 screens to powered on automatically a few seconds after the cabinet is powered up

 

A few images ....

 

 

One of the 1.5A power rails is set at 12v and will run the delay timer and other 12v items like the lights in my cabinet buttons via the LEDWiz.  One of the 3A rails will be set at about 15v to drive solenoids via the LedWiz. The other 3A rail will drive my two stereo amplifiers for back box and cabinet sound.  The other rail is really there for things I haven't fully thought of yet, who knows maybe some Wii remotes to give me 3D at some stage, etc.

 

I have built all of this on a small piece of 12mm MDF to allow for easy mounting and moving if required.

 

Anyway, back to more laying out and drilling of all possible holes before I start assembling the cabinet.

 

 

Really stupid question... how are these black connectors called (in german)? I need something like that for my cab and i can't find something like that -.-

Anyone from germany / austria who could send me a link to conrad / reichelt with some connectors like those? Or at least tell me how they are called in german

 

 

Obtained from China via eBay.  The listing I purchased from is no longer valid, the title was "Dual Row 10P Screw Barrier Terminal Block Strip Connector 600V 15A".  Using that will give similar results.

[DDH69]

This weekend I mounted the remainder of my solenoids and wired them up.  I also moved the connection for the lights in my two coin slots to a couple of my booster circuits.  Being globes they draw about 350mA each.  So unless I split the globes across octects the total of 700mA would be above the recommended 500mA per octect, easier and safer to use a booster.  I've mapped everything using the DOF config tool and tried each individual solenoid, globe and LED button using the LEDBlinky test tool.

 

I built my small circuit to control my coin door switch.  I mounted it all and found that it needs a bit more work, oh well - next weekend.

 

My play field glass came Friday, not ready to install it yet, still a couple of weeks away before I really want to put the side rails and plastic mounts in place.  One small issue with the glass, they put a logo 60 x 60mm in from one corner.  It seems to be etched in, its in an awkward place.  I've emailed my glass guy to see if it can be removed.  A task for next week.

 

Spent the rest of the time setting up and playing a few tables.  Some success, and some more questions to get posted here asking for help as I learn more and lurch from issue to issue, all the while making progress (which is the good news).

[Nemo]

I also got a logo etched in at the top left corner, it doesn't bother me at all, it's just not that visible.