frob Posted January 28, 2019 Report Share Posted January 28, 2019 I got a gift card for Christmas for some geek stuff, and thought I could turn it into a more advanced rev lighting. I figured this could be a fun project with my skill set. I've a strip of fully programmable lights (5 meters, 300 lights), an acceleration + gyro chip, a bluetooth chip so I can control it by my tablet, and a 9v battery attachment, all plugged into an Arduino board. I've spent a few hours the past two weekends getting the parts figured out and a mockup made, and I've got some simple patterns identified and programmed. As typical, videos of light shows aren't nearly as pretty as the actual light shows. I also have a "sudden stop" that flashes red for a quarter second, not shown in the video. Those are the patterns on the slowest speed, moving one pixel at a time. They can be made MUCH faster. I'm planning on attaching the patterns to acceleration forward/back and left/right to pull the lights to the side as long as the speed is increasing, then return to neutral. That should give long arc-wise turns throwing the lights to one edge, and launch/landings to have the lights bounce around. I want the circles attached to bicycle spins. And sudden stops on ground or midair will have the red flash. Any other ideas to program in to the thing before I start attaching it to a real kite? 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
riffclown Posted January 28, 2019 Report Share Posted January 28, 2019 Very Cool!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frob Posted January 28, 2019 Author Report Share Posted January 28, 2019 I've done a little with lights, and back then I thought fully programmable lights would be MUCh better. Even static lights look amazing, and color-cycling lights look cool, so responsive lights would be that much more fun. I've got some acceleration data, but the math for acceleration at an angle is tricky. There is a chance I'll make the 6-hour drive to SPI and maybe show them off. Unfortunately I'm guessing my work schedule won't turn out well, but there is a chance... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Breezin Posted January 28, 2019 Report Share Posted January 28, 2019 This will be one of the coolest kite things I've seen. Maybe a green flash when kite starts either from ground or hover. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wayne Dowler Posted January 28, 2019 Report Share Posted January 28, 2019 A bunch of us are using lights developed by Mario di Lucca from Island Quad, a team from Canada. They are set on your verticals, form a sort of "magic stick" style stand off, and back light the kite. Plain white LED's so far and no sequencing, changing colors, etc, but pretty solid. Older models had everything electronic on an exposed breadboard. Over the last 2 years, they have improved it a bunch - all components snap on the vertical ( light standard, battery), and a fancy loop that goes out to the end of the LE. Remove the cap, place loop over rod, put cap back on. The older models pretty much made you dedicate a set of verticals just for them. About the batteries - he uses 3.7 Lithium Ion, same size as a double "AA", you need 2, one for each vertical. Think I got 4 batteries and a dedicated charger for $20, the lights around $75. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corey Bell Posted January 28, 2019 Report Share Posted January 28, 2019 awesome Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frob Posted January 29, 2019 Author Report Share Posted January 29, 2019 9 hours ago, Wayne Dowler said: Think I got 4 batteries and a dedicated charger for $20, the lights around $75. I've seen that type. They're neat. The whole collection of parts for me was $68, plus time for developing the code behind it. The lights were by far the most expensive part, at $36. I'm struggling with the best way to attach everything. Snapping onto spars is good. For this, I think I'm going to use some strong tape around the edge. It may leave a bit of sticky residue, but should be fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wayne Dowler Posted January 29, 2019 Report Share Posted January 29, 2019 Mario is having some parts of his - 3D printed.Not sure if the battery holder and light standard are, but parts for sure. I have his older style lights and he had a certain part printed as a replacement for what he had used originally. Made setup much easier. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frob Posted February 3, 2019 Author Report Share Posted February 3, 2019 Didn't get video, but the first flight attempt wasn't great. Let's just say I learned things. I talked with Mario a bit at SPI festival today, and he had some ideas. He said his lighting rig is around 30 grams, but it is much simpler. With the microcontroller and breadboard and backer and large battery and the long light strip, mine is over 300 grams and feels like a tank. I can probably drop 50-75 grams easily, but the battery will be my biggest issue. I need at least 700 milliamps on 5 volts so a USB battery works perfectly, but the things are heavy. I tried it again here at SPI, but light winds made it impossible to launch. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul LaMasters Posted February 4, 2019 Report Share Posted February 4, 2019 Weight and durably affixed are the 2 most important issues, Mario will have a east coast version for sticks after testing sessions at SPI pointed out our concerns clearly, excited too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frob Posted February 4, 2019 Author Report Share Posted February 4, 2019 I can get the light strip down to about 100 grams by removing the waterproofing, and I can get down to 74 grams for the microcontroller, gyroscope, and bluetooth by using soldering things together rather than plugging to a breadboard. To attach it I was using 2" clear packing tape around the border, which probably adds single-digit grams. With the battery that puts me about 260 g, but I need another weekend of progress to build it out. Still to heavy for a standard rev? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul LaMasters Posted February 4, 2019 Report Share Posted February 4, 2019 not too heavy, just severely limiting the opportunities to use the rig, unless it's windy & steadily blowing forget the lights, just apply the battery weight to the leading edge and see how it flies. Can you take an SUL single skinned Rev down to 5mph and still do your stuff? What happens if you moved the battery weight to the top of the down-spars (behind the leading edge and sail)? Does that matter to your flight dynamics? If it is super powerful visually, it is probably heavy too, can you circumvent the flaw and keep the glory? Lights force you to use a lighter weight frame and a sail with less venting, .... or NONE at all, even when you know you should! The lightest weight set-up for all conditions is your buddy with a 5 mil candle-watt powered spot-light following you across the sky on your holographic mylar sail Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wayne Dowler Posted February 4, 2019 Report Share Posted February 4, 2019 At 260 gr, you are almost doubling a stock quad's weight! Most come in at 9 - 12 oz. As Paul said - not a complete deal breaker, but severely hampers the performance. I would definitely try playing around with the balance and shed as much weight as possible. There was a fellow up here in Salem, OR that has done something similar to what you are doing. I only see him at WSIKF in August. Never seen his rig sitting on the ground, only flying. Pretty cool looking setup in the air, just not sure how he did it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Russ Wilson Posted February 7, 2019 Report Share Posted February 7, 2019 Does Mario di Lucca sell the lights himself or does he go thru a re-seller? Would enjoy getting a set to play with. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul LaMasters Posted February 7, 2019 Report Share Posted February 7, 2019 there's a web-site he has, but I can't remember the name of it. I'd rather support my favorite retailer/re-seller even if it means a higher cost overall to my family. Mario had some at SPI in Bill and Susie's kite shop, but not designed for application on magic sticks specifically. I'm "in" when those are ready though. 5 of us beat a kite unmercifully night flying for an hour, so Mario knows exactly what our expectations are for durability, slack lining and rolled-up into the lines on the sand face down (glowing crab's eyestalks?) as he was "crew" on his baby. Heck the next day he shared revised plans for 3D printing the parts! Not the lightest weight solution, but super bright, even thru a black sail backlit, and sissy-stick users don't need a second stick or his support structure 'cause that crap's there already excited, thanks Mario and your team! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim Doman Posted March 11, 2019 Report Share Posted March 11, 2019 Does anyone have any info about this light system from 3Wind Kite? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frob Posted June 21, 2019 Author Report Share Posted June 21, 2019 Third major iteration. It is about 1/3 the weight of my first attempt. This is still a work in progress. The motion-based patterns using the gyroscope and accelerometer aren't fine tuned for this new version of the hardware so I didn't want to show the motion patterns, only motion colors. The microcontroller bundle is 21 grams, the light strip is 71. The mid-vent Djinn started at 237 grams, and was 341 grams when fully assembled, so the tape adds about 12. The battery life depends on how bright the lights are, since they can each of the 300 lights draw anywhere from 0-60mA ranging from off to full bright. The 350 mAh battery lasted around 45 minutes, better than I expected and longer than some of my tests at home. The wind was variable and turbulent, the Djinn performed wonderfully. I chose the mid-vent because the forecast called for 8-10 with gusts to 15, with a low pressure system moving in. Winds were good when we set up, but then dropped to almost nothing shortly after setting up. I choose short lines and feared I'd be doing more training with light wind practice so I used 30 foot lines. With almost 50% of the weight added extra, and such variable wind, it flew wonderfully. I can only imagine how a group fly with the directional-based colors would look. As each kite followed along the line their colors would match each other as they flew through each position. I've programmed that color palette to be based both orientation and compass direction, so it would vary as they flew but be the same at each point in space. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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