User Panel
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Guns762...this build is AMAZING!! job well done to you sir and all those involved...1 request..more pics! awrsome stuff at every level! View Quote |
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ARFCOM, we have a problem.
We just blew motor #2 on the whistle, and we didn't even get to half power on it. The prop bent, then the blades ate into the housing and fractured. We need another option. The motor we've been trying to use is way too fragile. I'll post pictures later. |
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Update 4/6
Here is a bit of video of more of the details as they get finished up on our train. Panther Locomotive waiting for display |
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Did you remind them how many tiles were on the shuttle? View Quote I haven't heard anyone who did tiles complain too much about bark. ETA for those that don't know- Roughly 16,500 tiles applied one at a time with hot glue. |
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Quoted: And yes, my rust maker is still dinging up our poor tender. It is turning out very nicely and she does say she is almost done.
https://farm1.staticflickr.com/887/26412022527_39225b7489_h.jpg View Quote Someone needs to get repainting that tender! It's been years since it was painted last! Look @ it, it's almost a rusted hulk! Freshman, slap some fresh paint on there! FYI, you do not have a problem w/ the fan motor - you have a learning opportunity. You furnish more of those to your students than the rest of the faculty combined. |
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Man, it's going to look amazing when it's all done.
Like Disney World theming amazing. Can't wait! |
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Quoted: She is a genius, you know this. Someone needs to get repainting that tender! It's been years since it was painted last! Look @ it, it's almost a rusted hulk! Freshman, slap some fresh paint on there! FYI, you do not have a problem w/ the fan motor - you have a learning opportunity. You furnish more of those to your students than the rest of the faculty combined. View Quote Setting that piece of cardboard tubing down in front of them, as they gathered around the cab, and watching them start problem-solving was the best part of yesterday. Brainstorming up an oil fill funnel was genius. I forgot to tell you all about our other problem. The Arduino app editor currently won't allow my robotics student to upload the old program back onto the locomotive to get the wheels and light going again. We had taken it off to try to run the whistle. My son said he had the same problem last year with the space shuttle. He used the online website to accomplish it. Well, the app is blocked now by the Sonic firewall at school.. We had to get admin approval to unblock it, which was instant, but actually unlocking it seems to be beyond our tech departments ability. They we're still getting errors yesterday afternoon while the student tried in front of them. Ugg. It's frustrating. |
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Why not just use a Rasberry Pi with a speaker and a sound file?! It will sound much better, and make less air blower noises. check out #2 https://www.soundsnap.com/tags/steam_train or the last one on this page.... https://www.soundsnap.com/tags/steam_train?page=1 Obviously, we'll fund it View Quote |
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You need a BLDC motor designed for use in a ducted fan configuration, with a bit of free air on both sides of the duct, enough will blow into the tube.
Assuming the hairdryer blew the whistle properly. A squirrel cage fan as used in blow dryer may work, just put BLDC motor to spin that instead of the 110V motor. Typically, more blades allows for higher static pressure/back pressure, but it's probably going to move a lot more air than the duct can carry, hence the small gap between housing and whistle input so it doesn't shred itself. Adjust gap as necessary for amount of air and pressure needed.
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You need a BLDC motor designed for use in a ducted fan configuration, with a bit of free air on both sides of the duct, enough will blow into the tube. Assuming the hairdryer blew the whistle properly. A squirrel cage fan as used in blow dryer may work, just put BLDC motor to spin that instead of the 110V motor. Typically, more blades allows for higher static pressure/back pressure, but it's probably going to move a lot more air than the duct can carry, hence the small gap between housing and whistle input so it doesn't shred itself. Adjust gap as necessary for amount of air and pressure needed. www.amazon.com/dp/B01DONJXRA View Quote |
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Did I mention my robotics student is still locked out of uploading the old program to the arduino?
Their issued laptops are so locked down they are little more than a word processor. Supposedly, the tech dept was going to try again this afternoon to make it possible to use the online editor. Uggggg. That is very frustrating. |
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Quoted:
That looks much like(just bigger) whats we already tried and destroyed.......twice. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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You need a BLDC motor designed for use in a ducted fan configuration, with a bit of free air on both sides of the duct, enough will blow into the tube. Assuming the hairdryer blew the whistle properly. A squirrel cage fan as used in blow dryer may work, just put BLDC motor to spin that instead of the 110V motor. Typically, more blades allows for higher static pressure/back pressure, but it's probably going to move a lot more air than the duct can carry, hence the small gap between housing and whistle input so it doesn't shred itself. Adjust gap as necessary for amount of air and pressure needed. www.amazon.com/dp/B01DONJXRA If not, they are powerful enough to actually compress air in the whistle pipe, which then pushes back on the blades pretty firmly and they aren't designed for force from that direction, hence the gap between outlet and pipe to lower/reduce back pressure to prevent shredding. A squirrel cage blower, like what's in the hair dryer is much better suited for pushing through ducts, like your home furnace blower, it would be better suited. If you can rig up the hair dryer's fan cage to be driven with a bare BLDC motor, should have you all good to go then. Depends on what parts you have left. Should be able to mate together the hair dryer housing and a small BLDC motor to that and it'll be quieter and push air without heat. Keeps 110V out of the train wiring as well for safety. |
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Did I mention my robotics student is still locked out of uploading the old program to the arduino? Their issued laptops are so locked down they are little more than a word processor. Supposedly, the tech dept was going to try again this afternoon to make it possible to use the online editor. Uggggg. That is very frustrating. View Quote Not saying you should start hacking or anything like that. Just options to look at. Otherwise, is this robot dude different than Top Men? I thought he had a nice non-school notebook. |
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Quoted: So the notebooks are locked down so they can't install software? How do they program the boards in the robotics lab? If they run chrome browser, there's a "shell" addon they can run, which gives them a shell at the privledges of the browser (admin sometimes even) which can be used to install software. Not saying you should start hacking or anything like that. Just options to look at. Otherwise, is this robot dude different than Top Men? I thought he had a nice non-school notebook. View Quote Top_Men had his own Mac Top_Men is now down at UW majoring in Computer Engineering. He used my issued laptop when he needed windows, but even the teacher laptops are locked down. New Robotics student has issued laptop. We are going to try a teacher laptop tomorrow and see if it makes a difference. |
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They can't download from their phone to the little computer? Doesn't that thing have Bluetooth?
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https://www.ar15.com/images/smilies/icon_smile_wink.gif They can't download from their phone to the little computer? Doesn't that thing have Bluetooth? View Quote |
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I asked if the arduino can talk android or OS, and I'm pretty sure I was told no. Wont work. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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https://www.ar15.com/images/smilies/icon_smile_wink.gif They can't download from their phone to the little computer? Doesn't that thing have Bluetooth? Easy to add wi-fi debugging and programming to it for $10 and knowing what to add if they want to look into the ESP8266 chips and all that is entailed to set up (NOT not not plug and play). |
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Quoted: Well, not exactly true, but with your resources, correct.
Easy to add wi-fi debugging and programming to it for $10 and knowing what to add if they want to look into the ESP8266 chips and all that is entailed to set up (NOT not not plug and play). View Quote |
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They can't get into it w/ a terminal app? View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
Quoted: Well, not exactly true, but with your resources, correct.
Easy to add wi-fi debugging and programming to it for $10 and knowing what to add if they want to look into the ESP8266 chips and all that is entailed to set up (NOT not not plug and play). |
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Update 4/10
We got it working again and then it locked up again. I hate arduino. At least the whistle is nice and loud. you can hear it down the hall. The new hair dryer is pretty quiet but powerful. Panther Locomotive whistle reloaded program |
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Wow that cool when working! Hope you find a good solution and be trouble free.
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Update 4/10 We got it working again and then it locked up again. I hate arduino. At least the whistle is nice and loud. you can hear it down the hall. The new hair dryer is pretty quiet but powerful. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PJnm8rkDKs View Quote Add Serial.Print(Message); Each time you are in a loop or before and after testing for something, leave the PC plugged into the USB with serial console monitoring. It'll be pretty obvious where you are locking up at. Arduino sucks to debug like that, but it's the easiest way without extra hardware. Could be something as simple as = instead of == or < instead of <= and other little oversights that will make it work for the first few cycles, then fail the test, so the serial console will be printing what it's doing, just ignore it, except for the last few unique lines and you'll know exactly where the problem is. To make that process easier, Notepad++ editor can be used to Remove duplicate lines once you copy/paste the terminal buffer into it, but then you run back into the problem of installing software (Notepad++ and TextFX plugin ) If possible, let it run over a weekend with the console running (not going to sleep mode) for a longer duration and check back into the functionality (or stopping point) on a Monday before mounting the train and trying to debug it up there. That could be done with the board disconnected from outputs (not inputs, those need to be brought with), to see if it loops properly, so a take home thingy that uses a spare notebook for 72 hours at home of Head Geek. |
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Quoted: Like space shuttle: Add Serial.Print(Message); Each time you are in a loop or before and after testing for something, leave the PC plugged into the USB with serial console monitoring. It'll be pretty obvious where you are locking up at. Arduino sucks to debug like that, but it's the easiest way without extra hardware. Could be something as simple as = instead of == or < instead of <= and other little oversights that will make it work for the first few cycles, then fail the test, so the serial console will be printing what it's doing, just ignore it, except for the last few unique lines and you'll know exactly where the problem is. To make that process easier, Notepad++ editor can be used to Remove duplicate lines once you copy/paste the terminal buffer into it, but then you run back into the problem of installing software (Notepad++ and TextFX plugin ) If possible, let it run over a weekend with the console running (not going to sleep mode) for a longer duration and check back into the functionality (or stopping point) on a Monday before mounting the train and trying to debug it up there. That could be done with the board disconnected from outputs (not inputs, those need to be brought with), to see if it loops properly, so a take home thingy that uses a spare notebook for 72 hours at home of Head Geek. View Quote This sounds similar to what I'm hearing from Top_Men. He is trying to talk our new robotics student through the problem. He's just 6hrs away in Laramie. |
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Wonderful!
I'd bet that your class is their favorite. Thanks for having such a good influence on kids and affecting their lives in such a positive and rewarding way. |
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@guns762 You guys are getting famous! Your story is featured on the UP employees website Hallway or Museum? Powell High School Says Both "Jim Gilman’s high school art class in Powell, Wyoming, is taking its learning outside the classroom by transforming academic hallways and alcoves into lifelike interactive museum exhibits." Over the last six years, Gilman’s students created permanent displays featuring space exploration, a unicorn family and numerous other murals and big installations. The Powell High School Panthers’ latest exhibit honors Union Pacific’s role in their community. Large | Powell HS Mine The student exhibit features a taxidermy bear, train tunnel and mural background. “UP was a driving force in creating the transcontinental railroad, and fundamental in creating Wyoming and its industries,” Gilman said. “Wyoming’s history, population layout, towns, industry and even today’s politics are all due to UP’s influence.” In August 2017, the students started construction on an 18-foot, 1/3 scale powered Baldwin 4-4-0 locomotive with a UP tender. The motion-activated train will hover above wall-mounted tracks emerging from a tunnel with moving wheels, lights, bell chimes and a whistle. “This is all student-created work in my art classroom, working with robotics, welding, woodworking, math, science, English and, of course, history,” Gilman said. “The kids love it.” The students plan to hang a display box containing a Golden Spike ceremony photograph and small memorabilia, as well as track and Golden Spike re-creation items. Large | Students Holding Up Rail Students connecting the rail that will lie beneath the locomotive. “We are in the final stages of getting ready to hang our ‘Panther’ locomotive,” Gilman said. The incorporated taxidermy mounts, murals and tunnel are all pieces of student work, taking thousands of hours to complete. “We wanted this display to include a Wyoming theme, so of course, our train had to be a tribute to UP’s role developing our great state,” Gilman said. “Our ‘Panther’ could only be from one railroad, and that’s UP.” The train will be on permanent display in the school. https://employees.www.uprr.com/cs/groups/public/@uprr/@corprel/documents/employees_images/img_e_upo_180411_engtender_l.jpg Very cool View Quote She said it would hit their social media page soon as well. |
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One thing about your air hose. A smooth hose is easier to push air through. Something like thishttp://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/appages/sceet.php?clickkey=2663025
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One thing about your air hose. A smooth hose is easier to push air through. Something like thishttp://www.aircraftspruce.com/cache/370-320-/catalog/graphics/SCEET.jpghttp://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/appages/sceet.php?clickkey=2663025 View Quote Even on the low setting of the dryer, we get decent tone and volume, so what we have is going to work, but its good to acknowledge there could be improvements to the design with something as simple as a smooth tube. |
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You are probably right. I talked to the kids about that when I brought in our cheap hose. It was the right fit, cheap, and available locally.. Even on the low setting of the dryer, we get decent tone and volume, so what we have is going to work, but its good to acknowledge there could be improvements to the design with something as simple as a smooth tube. View Quote |
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