Even if the LED doesn't work, I have found that all of these codes are compatible... assuming you build the circuit mentioned in this thread. Allesio's latest version cut out several resistors, and never worked for me...

Load up the code from first page and see what you get. If no luck, modify your circuit to add in the parts that were taken out.

I'm not best placed to comment on the settings as I've not used that app for years, and even then I think I had issues with it or the JDM programmer I was using. The only observation is that whilst the osc setting is 4Mhz, I don't understand the CPU clock, which is set to 96Mhz /4 ? which would give 24Mhz. Having said that, the fact that the PC sees the device means it's running. My guess is that the problem is with the input section, and this could be due to the same problems that Telemachus mentioned.

The only way you are really going to prove this is to breadboard the original 8 channel schematic and load the code Mark J and myself produced. Please note the comments regarding the transistor in posts 142 to 145. If this then works, then you know it's something to do with the NG2 design.

Lads I need to apologise for being a plum

The fault was with the input side but not on the pcb board or the hex but a fault with the 6 pin plug for the back of transmitter...... I did say that the lead was working when setup through the audio port but forgot the fact it needed resistors adding to the pins when building it.

Took resistors out and it works fine.....

Now Malcolm I'm very disappointed you had not picked that up

Well that’s two out of three projects I have working now
I think it's time to give you guys a rest

Till next time

Paul

Originally Posted by incarpaul

Now Malcolm I'm very disappointed you had not picked that up

LOL - How the hell did I miss that one [inserts slap head smiley !]

Paul, glad to hear you have it working

I wonder if the PPM output could be achieved from USB much more simply using the MCP2200 chip? It's got 5 GPIO lines, a UART, royalty-free drivers, and no firmware required, and about $2 apiece from Digikey. Or free from Microchip's sample program.

Michael

Not looked at the data sheet, but the interfaces here reads the PPM and then sends it via the USB, it doesn't output PPM signals

I see--I had it backwards. Even so you could treat the UART as a bidirectional pair of one-bit data streams.

I'm not trying to get you to redo your project or anything--just tossing out the idea.

Michael

Hey, if you can come up with an alternative that doesn't require programing a PIC, and does the same job of reading the PPm train of pulses and be recognised by windows as a joystick then feel free to jump in here....

You have to bear in mind that this thread was started in 2006, and since then USB interfaces from china have swamped the market.... but back then most interfaces were still RS232 serial, or cost £50 or more. Also in that time technology has moved on and new chips like the one you mentioned might well be worth using

Originally Posted by Malc C

Hey, if you can come up with an alternative that doesn't require programing a PIC, and does the same job of reading the PPm train of pulses and be recognised by windows as a joystick then feel free to jump in here....

You have to bear in mind that this thread was started in 2006, and since then USB interfaces from china have swamped the market.... but back then most interfaces were still RS232 serial, or cost £50 or more. Also in that time technology has moved on and new chips like the one you mentioned might well be worth using

Far be it from me, the newbie, to bash the work of those who have gone before me. You did it and I didn't, so that's the score.

I was mostly just suggesting to consider the MCP2200, but I'll try to develop the idea a little further. I'm thinking out loud here, so pardon the mess.

The MCP2200 provides one UART, which Windows sees as a virtual com port. It also provides 8 GPIO pins, which are set through what Windows sees as a separate USB HID device. Microchip provides a library to control the GPIO pins.

To accomplish PPM input, we need to be able to see a pin go low for right about 0.5 ms, high for 0.5 ms, and then watch it stay high for up to one more ms, varied by the value being send on that channel.

Considering how the timing is everything, and USB makes no guarantees about when your message will get through, bit-banging the GPIO pins for the PPM won't work reliably. To get more reliable timing, we can use the UART.

We're looking to sample binary data off one single line, and we need to know when the edges come through. A UART rx pair can be though of as a clocked one-bit sampler. So we rig up a little oscillator that pulses the rx clock line at whatever time-resolution we want, perhaps 384 khz, and use what Windows thinks is a virtual com port to read in the data.

At a software level, we'll see a stream of bits. We use our knowledge of the 384 khz bit timing on the MCP2200 to estimate the timing of the edges. Voila, the PPM signal is observable in software, without having any special PIC-programming hardware.

I tossed out my suggestion of the MCP2200 without having read much of this thread (it's pretty long), so I wasn't expecting to have to emulate a joystick. I suspect it can be done by using a custom driver that replaces or supplements the standard virtual com port driver with one that interfaces to the subsystem that handles joysticks for Windows. I think that would be the hardware abstraction layer but I don't know for sure and haven't written a device driver like that.

Or we could forget the whole damn thing.

Perhaps an easier solution would be to use the GPIO and/or UART on the MCP2200 as a PIC programmer that itself requires no hardware to setup. It might be slow, since it would probably be bit-banged out the GPIO pins. But it would probably work to bootstrap up someone who didn't have a programmer or access to one. One wonders if there isn't already software out there that can program a PIC via an RS-232, parallel port or some other GPIO you can find on a common PC. Not that most computers have them RS-232 or parallel ports any more...

Michael

Originally Posted by michaelstoops

Far be it from me, the newbie, to bash the work of those who have gone before me. You did it and I didn't, so that's the score.

I was mostly just suggesting to consider the MCP2200, but I'll try to develop the idea a little further. I'm thinking out loud here, so pardon the mess.

Michael

Michael, I wasn't accusing you of "bashing" anyone's work... I was simply commenting on that technology available to the DIYer has now moved on and if you have an alternative suggestion then lets hear it - there is no score to settle.

Regretfully I no longer have the time to develop RC projects anymore. The Mods have kindly kept this post a sticky and allow me to moderate it, but it's nice to see folk keep coming back and it gets people like yourself thinking of alternatives. If you do start to develop something (hardware) then please feel free to post a link to the site / thread you create

What kind of voltage divider are you guys using for DX6 radio? Same as DX7? Like this one? http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showp...9&postcount=67

Please correct me if I understand wrong.. So this project uses a chip to which you connect a joystick and transmitter (via trainer port?) so you can operate your rc vehicle with a joystick...Do you have to use a computer? Which tx work, would the Turnigy 9x work and could we make it work ?

Thank you for the answers!

Originally Posted by msev

Please correct me if I understand wrong.. So this project uses a chip to which you connect a joystick and transmitter (via trainer port?) so you can operate your rc vehicle with a joystick...

Thank you for the answers!

Sorry, but yes you have misunderstood. This project allows you to connect a transmitter via its trainer port to a computer so you can control a virtual plane in an RC simulator running on a computer

Then it also blew by me ... I was under the impression ths circuit would allow a person to use a joystick on a RC transmitter to fly the plane.... am fairly certain I seen some examples of this somewhere in this thread unless I got sidetracked to another thread accidentally.... that being the case... I am looking for a thread that will aid me to do just that, Take my Saitek X-45 and use it to control my Futaba 6XA transmitter so I can fly FPV from a dvd screen (doing that now...just want to use my Saitek)

Anyone know of such a thread and can link me?

Originally Posted by gittarpikk

Anyone know of such a thread and can link me?

This one, for example, but I remember having read more about the subject, and also having seen info about comercial products for that.