help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

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gator81
 
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help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by gator81 »

first "lol" is for Labor of Love. Please note i do not love this person but I respect what he is doing and wanted to help.

I have a friend that has a iron man suit, he uses it a lot for charity and childrens hospital. The only thing special is that he eyes light up and the arc reactor and hand pulsars light up. To see the children "light up" when he does this just makes me want to do this just that much more :)
I wanted to do a lot from some of the projects i have researched but i jumped in way over my head for the time and money I have to spend. I have a raspberry pi 2 b and installed the software and booted it up and that is as far as I have gone.

In final i have cut back on the project and this is what I want to try to finish:

give him the chance to speak (microphone and some way to speak through speakers so people can hear him.

have audio recordings that can use the same speakers

I have looked at this https://www.adafruit.com/product/2133 where you can setup buttons for triggering audio, I am not sure it would have to be tact buttons or if i would have to look into a conductive board for more options on triggering. I see there is a rx/tx and even with the headphone jack i dont know if a mic could be used with this board. If so it may be easer just working with the one board then using the pi for anything right now.

mic with the ability to talk, and thinking of button to turn on the mic and turn it off

buttons for audio - to say "I am Iron Man" or something Jarvis may say, and maybe the acdc track that he used in one of the movies. there would be enough to use 16megs easy.

and maybe later adding the ability to do robot walking sounds :)

what hardware would you recomend? or suggestions for this project?

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adafruit_support_bill
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

I would take on one feature at a time so you don't get bogged down in the complexity. The Fx board is a good place to start. We have several versions - some of which have built-in amplifiers so you can drive speakers directly. https://www.adafruit.com/search?q=sound+board&b=1

Although, it might be better to work with a separate amplifier to simplify adding a microphone to the mix:
https://www.adafruit.com/search?q=CLASS%20D

There are many ways to go about triggering sounds from the FX board. You might want to start with some simple switch activated triggers. Later you can add in a processor to do more sophisticated triggering via the serial port.

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gator81
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by gator81 »

I have been looking at the boards with the amps already on them, I believe the link i added showed the 2meg version. So my question with this board I have seen additional options to control things like volume and there was also a label for rx and tx. I could not find any information on the use of those features, would there be a pdf or anyplace that i could find out their use?

as for playing back recordings it would be the best i have found so far. It would seem to be very simple, with amp onboard it keeps it small and yet strong enough to drive speakers. My curiosity is what type of switch's it will support for stock use? momentary spst switch? will it work with any switch? could the trigger be done by another device like raspberry pi? example would be: using a prox sensor on a boot, boot moves, meets conditions on program for pi, sends signal to audio board trigger and plays sound?

As for the process of using a mic to speak through speakers..... I have found no information anywhere to do this. I have seen audio boards that would do recordings, pass though as a radio or even a wireless speaker for another audio device. If you have seen anything that will let you have the ability to us a mic directly to the speakers with on/off or mute switch for mic i would be very interested as that would be one step :) I would also like to do this wired instead of wireless.

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adafruit_support_bill
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

You might want to start by reading through the Fx tutorial here: https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-aud ... ound-board

You can't connect a mic directly to a speaker. You would need an amplifier. We have a few different microphone modules that work well with our class-D amplifier modules linked above.

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gator81
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by gator81 »

thank you for the reading, I guess when I seen "tour" I was thinking of the small video that was made where the product was giving some basic information. I did not consider that it was to give detailed information about the product with examples and purpose of the connections. It did answer a lot of my questions.

As for using a mic with the class d amps I am still confused. I may be missing something as I have tried to read the information a few times and there was just not that "click" that made me say "I see". I was looking at the Max9744 as one of the pictures was showing an apple music player for an input, this would seem to say that a mic could be also used there for input. This would also give more more options on mics to use.
I have also been looking at the Max4466 but i am not sure this would work for my application.

Another thing I did see while reviewing information was a window of information on hooking up a usb sound card to the raspberry pi. You should how to do the audio but stated that you did not have any examples on using a mic. This may be another option for me to try and research more.

I still plan on getting this Adafruit Audio FX Sound Board - WAV/OGG Trigger with 16MB Flash
PRODUCT ID: 2220 as it will save me in part of my project :)

thank you for the insight and patients with my questions. If there is any additional information you may suggest I look forward to your advice.

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adafruit_support_bill
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

The microphone pre-amp modules like the MAX4466 have a 'line level' output - the same as an MP3 or similar music player. They are both suitable sources for the amplifier modules.

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gator81
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by gator81 »

in addition to this project which i am making progress with your help is this:

I am trying to add a webcam to the chin of the suit and want to send the info directly to a display inside the eye piece area to give better view. Looking through slits makes it awkward and hazardous at times. can the small spi display "2'' or less" view video from a web cam using a raspberry pi 2 b? Or would it be better to consider personal video glasses since they also have inputs and you might have less eye strain?

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adafruit_support_bill
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

To see a screen that close to your eye, you will need some extra optics so your eye can focus. The simplest thing is to start with a set of VR glasses that have the right optics for the display.

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gator81
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by gator81 »

Can you use a magnet to touch a vibration sensor to trigger it? and would an the earth magnet you sell trigger a heavy vibration sensor?
example i have a earth magnet in a glove and i have a heavy vibration sensor hidden under a segment of a iron man suit if i put the touch the arm with the glove would it trigger the sensor?
I want to use heavy to avoid unwanted triggers.

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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

I don't believe that the vibration sensors are sensitive to magnets. But you could use a hall-effect sensor for that: https://www.adafruit.com/product/158

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gator81
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by gator81 »

i was going by the little video showing a cut open vibration sensor. https://www.adafruit.com/products/1766 after looking again it could be that he spring is copper but the middle pin looks to be something else I am not sure.
the other reason i was considering the vibration is that fewer connections.

I looked into the hall-effect sensor and it would be smaller, i may have to just order some to see if that will be what works. As it says to hook this up I may be over thinking but if it requires power on both pin 1 and 3 can you just take the resistor and connect it to pin 1 and 3 and add power to 1? this would supply one power that would work for pin1 and still power through the resister to pin 3?

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adafruit_support_bill
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

You connect power to pin 1 (left) and ground to pin 2 (middle)

Then connect a 10K pull up resistor from pin 3 to pin 1. Pin 3 will go LOW when the south pole of a magnet is nearby.

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abowenkamp2009
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by abowenkamp2009 »

Can someone help me on Powering and connecting a MAX4466?

I have the MAX4466 electret mic and I am trying to figure how to connect it to my Meanwell EPS-15-15 PSU. ( I have 2 of these PSU's in an enclosure because the AD797 requires 15 +/- dc.) I am using a dropping resistor to get the power down from 15 vdc to 3 vdc on just the positve output. I am trying to connect the output of the MAX4466 to a 10K ohm potentiometer so I can attenuate the signal out of the MAX4466. After the 10K potentiometer I connect it to a DIY mic pre ( AD797 Mic pre). I'm not sure how to connect the MAX4466 to the PSU.

Does the + on the Meanwell go straight to the dropping resistor then to the MAX4466?

Does the MAX4466 's GND pin connect directly to the audio GND on the Mic pre or the negative on the Meanwell PSU, and or the ground coming from the AC 120 source ( not sure how to implement this.

How would I PAD the signal off the MAX4466 before the AD797 mic pre?

How do I wire up the MAX4466 to the Potentiometer then to the mic pre?


Heres the signal flow I have right now ( with lots of crazy noise and oscillation

MAX4466 VCC ------ 300ohm resistor------- (+ on PSU - Meanwell EPS-15-15)
GND---------- to Chassis of enclosure and to GND on AD797 mic pre input ( no luck here, oscilatting and screeching noises)
also tried- to GND pin on Potentiometer and to chassis ) no luck
OUT------- to Potentiometer iNPUT then OUT ( middle pin of potentiometer to AD797Mic pre in put + ) lots of screeching noise

What am I doing wrong? DO I need any bypass caps anywhere? can someone draw me out a diagram how to connect this?


Any advice / guidance would be Much appreciated!

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adafruit_support_bill
 
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Re: help and suggestions of hardware for lol project

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

@abowenkamp2009 - This is off-topic. please start a new thread for your question.

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