Lapcounters

[Jørgen]

Hi

My friends and I have built a miniz-track in a friends basement. We have
been racing for fun for two-three months. Now we want to step it up, and buy
a counting system.
Does anyone have some to recommend? Does a cheap system exist? We need a
system that can be run with upto 6 cars, and that isn't very expensive,
since this is for pure fun only, no organized racing.

Hope someone knows of something, and yeah, we have to buy it over the
net...since we live in Norway, kinda far away from most of you guys :-)

Jorgen

[Lapdragon]

"J rgen" <jorgen@SCHMOOOO.pilot.online.no> wrote in message news:<tm3H9.6505$8E1.122824@news4.e.nsc.no>...
> Hi
>
> My friends and I have built a miniz-track in a friends basement. We have
> been racing for fun for two-three months. Now we want to step it up, and buy
> a counting system.
> Does anyone have some to recommend? Does a cheap system exist? We need a
> system that can be run with upto 6 cars, and that isn't very expensive,
> since this is for pure fun only, no organized racing.
>
> Hope someone knows of something, and yeah, we have to buy it over the
> net...since we live in Norway, kinda far away from most of you guys :-)
>
> Jorgen

You might want to check out the Lapdragon system. Check it out at:
http://www.lapdragon.com

Each racer would need to buy their own, but you can all use them
simultaneously.

-Brian

[Scrumpy]

I'd guess you won't find a ready made, low cost lap counter that can
differentiate between 6 cars. Such a counter would have to receive a
different signal from each car as it passed the counter to correctly record
completed laps per car. If you have an electronics savvy friend, perhaps he
could build one ;-)

If a counter just counted passes irrespective of the car, then it couldn't
handle cases where cars are overtaken or crash out for x laps.

A lesser alternative would be to use a simple lap counter that can count
and time laps. You could then race a single car at a time, like the
laptimings that result in starting positions in an F1 race. I know thats
not what you want but it's just a suggestion :)

Tomy produce a simple lap counter for Bit Racers. If you shop around it can
be bought cheaply but it might be worth posting first in this newsgroup or
a BitChar-G forum for people's opinions about it. Here are a couple of
Tomy's pages with photos of it
http://www.tomy.co.jp/bit_charg/products/parts/parts_accessory.html
http://www.tomy.co.jp/bit_charg/world/play/play_p0.html

You can find more info about it if you do a Google search for "lap counter"
and CA-02.

Cheers,
Scrumpy :)


"Jørgen" <jorgen@SCHMOOOO.pilot.online.no> wrote in
news:tm3H9.6505$8E1.122824@news4.e.nsc.no:

> Hi
>
> My friends and I have built a miniz-track in a friends basement.
> We have
> been racing for fun for two-three months. Now we want to step it up,
> and buy a counting system.
> Does anyone have some to recommend? Does a cheap system exist? We
> need a
> system that can be run with upto 6 cars, and that isn't very
> expensive, since this is for pure fun only, no organized racing.
>
> Hope someone knows of something, and yeah, we have to buy it over the
> net...since we live in Norway, kinda far away from most of you guys
> :-)
>
> Jorgen

[Lapdragon]

The Lapdragon system works such that each car has it's own onboard
counter. Therefore, there is no limit to the number of cars running
simultaneously. Several cars share a single transmitter positioned on
the side of the track.

http://www.lapdragon.com

[Dennis Clark]

I'm curious. I've a design for an inexpensive lap counter system for
a small number of cars, like what local clubs and such would use. Is
there anybody out there really that would be interested in such a thing?
To keep prices down I'd love to make it self-contained, with a serial link
to a PC to get stats for printout. What break points for price would be
of interest? Obviously $50 or free is a high desire, but lets be real.
$300?
$200?

$???

I'm looking to see if its worth going through the pain of getting the
design through the FCC regs, which, BTW, aren't free either. My current
design specs are a 3ms resolution (IOW, .003 seconds minimum resolution),
6-10 cars, each carrying a transponder, a central controller that displays
car laps, best lap time, racing order and time remaining. A serial port
query would deliver a race report whose data I've yet to decide, to the
PC so it could be printed. Obviously this is a very price sensitive
crowd - The idea is to create something that every club would be able to
afford easily.

thanks,
DLC
--
================================================== ==========================
* Dennis Clark dlc@frii.com www.techtoystoday.com *
* "Building Robot Drive Trains" published by McGraw-Hill 2002 *
================================================== ==========================

[Jørgen]

We are thinking around 300$
I don't like the lapdragon cause it can't connect to a computer. We have an
"older" laptop which we want to use for this matter.
We have looked at a few. One type which makes use of a flag on each cars
antena. Lasers or lights record every time the light is broken....you use
one flag i different hights to record the different cars. The other type is
when all the cars have transponders(?) installed in the car. This last one
seems much more expensive though....

Jorgen


"Dennis Clark" <dlc@io.frii.com> wrote in message
news:3df414c1$0$19416$75868355@news.frii.net...
> I'm curious. I've a design for an inexpensive lap counter system for
> a small number of cars, like what local clubs and such would use. Is
> there anybody out there really that would be interested in such a thing?
> To keep prices down I'd love to make it self-contained, with a serial link
> to a PC to get stats for printout. What break points for price would be
> of interest? Obviously $50 or free is a high desire, but lets be real.
> $300?
> $200?
>
> $???
>
> I'm looking to see if its worth going through the pain of getting the
> design through the FCC regs, which, BTW, aren't free either. My current
> design specs are a 3ms resolution (IOW, .003 seconds minimum resolution),
> 6-10 cars, each carrying a transponder, a central controller that displays
> car laps, best lap time, racing order and time remaining. A serial port
> query would deliver a race report whose data I've yet to decide, to the
> PC so it could be printed. Obviously this is a very price sensitive
> crowd - The idea is to create something that every club would be able to
> afford easily.
>
> thanks,
> DLC
> --
>
================================================== ==========================
> * Dennis Clark dlc@frii.com www.techtoystoday.com
*
> * "Building Robot Drive Trains" published by McGraw-Hill 2002
*
>
================================================== ==========================

[Jerrit Tyler]

Dennis Clark, considering the price of current lap counters on the
market (that can distinguish between each car) I would easily pay $600
for this type of system.

Jerrit











"J rgen" <jorgen@SCHMOOOO.pilot.online.no> wrote in message news:<sb6J9.6940$hV6.120042@news2.e.nsc.no>...
> We are thinking around 300$
> I don't like the lapdragon cause it can't connect to a computer. We have an
> "older" laptop which we want to use for this matter.
> We have looked at a few. One type which makes use of a flag on each cars
> antena. Lasers or lights record every time the light is broken....you use
> one flag i different hights to record the different cars. The other type is
> when all the cars have transponders(?) installed in the car. This last one
> seems much more expensive though....
>
> Jorgen
>
>
> "Dennis Clark" <dlc@io.frii.com> wrote in message
> news:3df414c1$0$19416$75868355@news.frii.net...
> > I'm curious. I've a design for an inexpensive lap counter system for
> > a small number of cars, like what local clubs and such would use. Is
> > there anybody out there really that would be interested in such a thing?
> > To keep prices down I'd love to make it self-contained, with a serial link
> > to a PC to get stats for printout. What break points for price would be
> > of interest? Obviously $50 or free is a high desire, but lets be real.
> > $300?
> > $200?
> >
> > $???
> >
> > I'm looking to see if its worth going through the pain of getting the
> > design through the FCC regs, which, BTW, aren't free either. My current
> > design specs are a 3ms resolution (IOW, .003 seconds minimum resolution),
> > 6-10 cars, each carrying a transponder, a central controller that displays
> > car laps, best lap time, racing order and time remaining. A serial port
> > query would deliver a race report whose data I've yet to decide, to the
> > PC so it could be printed. Obviously this is a very price sensitive
> > crowd - The idea is to create something that every club would be able to
> > afford easily.
> >
> > thanks,
> > DLC
> > --
> >
> ================================================== ==========================
> > * Dennis Clark dlc@frii.com www.techtoystoday.com
> *
> > * "Building Robot Drive Trains" published by McGraw-Hill 2002
> *
> >
> ================================================== ==========================

[Paul Riddell]

we are a small club just starting in Addlestone surrey in the uk we would
be intrested ### seems to have the market cornerd and it is a lot of cash
to find when you are trying to get started
"Jerrit Tyler" <jerrit@grnet.com> wrote in message
news:ae7c35cb.0212100843.63f01ce3@posting.google.c om...
> Dennis Clark, considering the price of current lap counters on the
> market (that can distinguish between each car) I would easily pay $600
> for this type of system.
>
> Jerrit
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> "J rgen" <jorgen@SCHMOOOO.pilot.online.no> wrote in message
news:<sb6J9.6940$hV6.120042@news2.e.nsc.no>...
> > We are thinking around 300$
> > I don't like the lapdragon cause it can't connect to a computer. We have
an
> > "older" laptop which we want to use for this matter.
> > We have looked at a few. One type which makes use of a flag on each
cars
> > antena. Lasers or lights record every time the light is broken....you
use
> > one flag i different hights to record the different cars. The other type
is
> > when all the cars have transponders(?) installed in the car. This last
one
> > seems much more expensive though....
> >
> > Jorgen
> >
> >
> > "Dennis Clark" <dlc@io.frii.com> wrote in message
> > news:3df414c1$0$19416$75868355@news.frii.net...
> > > I'm curious. I've a design for an inexpensive lap counter system
for
> > > a small number of cars, like what local clubs and such would use. Is
> > > there anybody out there really that would be interested in such a
thing?
> > > To keep prices down I'd love to make it self-contained, with a serial
link
> > > to a PC to get stats for printout. What break points for price would
be
> > > of interest? Obviously $50 or free is a high desire, but lets be
real.
> > > $300?
> > > $200?
> > >
> > > $???
> > >
> > > I'm looking to see if its worth going through the pain of getting the
> > > design through the FCC regs, which, BTW, aren't free either. My
current
> > > design specs are a 3ms resolution (IOW, .003 seconds minimum
resolution),
> > > 6-10 cars, each carrying a transponder, a central controller that
displays
> > > car laps, best lap time, racing order and time remaining. A serial
port
> > > query would deliver a race report whose data I've yet to decide, to
the
> > > PC so it could be printed. Obviously this is a very price sensitive
> > > crowd - The idea is to create something that every club would be able
to
> > > afford easily.
> > >
> > > thanks,
> > > DLC
> > > --
> > >
> >
================================================== ==========================
> > > * Dennis Clark dlc@frii.com
www.techtoystoday.com
> > *
> > > * "Building Robot Drive Trains" published by McGraw-Hill 2002
> > *
> > >
> >
================================================== ==========================

[Jonny Hodgson]

Paul Riddell wrote:
> we are a small club just starting in Addlestone surrey in the uk we
> would be intrested ### seems to have the market cornerd and it is a
> lot of cash to find when you are trying to get started

Start with a board carrying ten 'clicker counters' and a bloke with
a stop-watch - or progress to a computer (laptop running QBasic, or
a Commodore, BBC-B or even maybe a Spectrum!) with a program that
counts laps when you press the number keys, and times 5 minutes
internally.

I've raced under this type of system at several fledgling clubs,
and while it's a little more work it allows funds to be put towards
more essential stuff like track markings.

Jonny

[Paul Riddell]

the trouble with that system is it looks very amartish to any one who comes
along that has raced with transponder type counter, we are in a world of
must have!
"Jonny Hodgson" <jp_hodgson@eRnEgMiOnVeEer.com> wrote in message
news:KUnM9.1213$0c4.257047@newsfep1-win.server.ntli.net...
> Paul Riddell wrote:
> > we are a small club just starting in Addlestone surrey in the uk we
> > would be intrested ### seems to have the market cornerd and it is a
> > lot of cash to find when you are trying to get started
>
> Start with a board carrying ten 'clicker counters' and a bloke with
> a stop-watch - or progress to a computer (laptop running QBasic, or
> a Commodore, BBC-B or even maybe a Spectrum!) with a program that
> counts laps when you press the number keys, and times 5 minutes
> internally.
>
> I've raced under this type of system at several fledgling clubs,
> and while it's a little more work it allows funds to be put towards
> more essential stuff like track markings.
>
> Jonny
>
>