High Powered Targeting light on amazon

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by otherguy

We used a CREE flashlight similar to what Adam linked. A little smaller from the sounds of it. Ran off a single AA in the stock configuration.

Ours was wired through a spike so we could turn it off as it could interfere with our cameras detection of the goal.
This means 12vdc going to the flashlight coming off the PDB.

To get down to the 1.5vdc needed by the light, we used a tiny little buck regulator. They are adjustable and $10 for qty 5 on Amazon with prime shipping.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B014Y...SoL&ref=plSrch

You can get them off eBay for cheaper but you'll be waiting 3-5 weeks for delivery.

The cool thing is that the regulator board is small enough to fit in the area the battery formerly occupied. So packaging was real clean. These will work to step 12vdc down to whatever your flashlight needs.

A note of caution. Some of the metal body flashlights out there have their case shorted to ground. So keep an eye on how things are mounted to ensure isolation from the chassis. A hose clamp with rubber gasket worked great for us.

Sent from my LGLS751 using Tapatalk

Which flashlight did you use?

[R.C.]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

Which flashlight did you use?

Look above broo!

http://goo.gl/ptnOUi

[otherguy]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

Which flashlight did you use?

Too fast. Tried to sneak an edit in before someone asked. Had to dig through my purchase history.

[Kevin Ainsworth]

Pwnage, student John Duffy, designed a custom Photon Cannon back in 2013 and we redesigned it this year to make it smaller and lighter.

Here's what when into it...
CREE_XPEBWT-L1-0000-00C51 Xlamp XP-E2 High Power LED Star, Cool White = $3.49
TDK_CC6-1205SF-E Converter DC/DC 6W Sngle 12V to 5V 1.2A = $15.96
Resistors to dial in voltage and therefore brightness.
Army Surplus Len?
Custom Aluminum Housing
Powered by a spike relay

More work than a purchased flashlight, but the projection is a diamond (diode shaped) that is extremely crisp edged. John designed the aluminum housing to be slotted so we can slide the lens forward and backwards to set the focus at the nominal working distance.

[Tom Line]

We used this flashlight:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I chose it because it was powered by 3 AAA batteries. That is 'nominally' 4.5 volts, but I know fresh AA's sometimes go up to 1.6V. I didn't feel bad driving it from a cheapie 12 to 5 volt DC DC converter from ebay:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Better-Water...-/380794929775

Hint: Water Game

And here's what it looked like on field:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KA0_ILmJoXw

We had it focused so it spanned the bottom goal edge-to-edge.

[tjwolter]

OK, ridiculously basic question here but bear with a mentor for a soon to be second year team. I can see how these light sources would work well in tele op, just pick up the reflective tape around your target and pull the trigger. Are they also being used significantly in autonomous?

T Wolter

[otherguy]

Originally Posted by tjwolter

OK, ridiculously basic question here but bear with a mentor for a soon to be second year team. I can see how these light sources would work well in tele op, just pick up the reflective tape around your target and pull the trigger. Are they also being used significantly in autonomous?

T Wolter

They are primarily an aid in teleop to get the robot aligned at a distance quickly without added software complexity.

In auto they aren't as helpful in my opinion, unless you have a game where your robots alignment, at the beginning of auto, is critical. In this case they could be used to align your robot to some target position.
In our case, the light was helpful In debugging our auto modes in that we could see if a shot was missed due to the chassis being misaligned or if there was variability in our shooter or ball compression that led to a miss. This information, while not the primary intent of the light, was helpful in getting things dialed in.

[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by tjwolter

OK, ridiculously basic question here but bear with a mentor for a soon to be second year team. I can see how these light sources would work well in tele op, just pick up the reflective tape around your target and pull the trigger. Are they also being used significantly in autonomous?

T Wolter

Generally, humans aligning a flashlight are faster than camera tracking, so teams that use both rely on the flashlight in teleop. In auton, you generally have the time you need to get a camera tracked shot dialed in anyway, and you don't have a choice in the matter since it's autonomous, so cameras are used there.

[wilsonmw04]

I would strongly encourage everyone who uses a photon cannon to be able to turn it off in game. A spike works really well for this. As we went through the season, the flashlight got more and more scrutiny. Being able to tell the inspector that it was only active during alignment got us through more than one inspection. I was told if it was constantly on it would have been deemed "unsafe" and we would not pass inspection.

[IKE]

Originally Posted by wilsonmw04

I would strongly encourage everyone who uses a photon cannon to be able to turn it off in game. A spike works really well for this. As we went through the season, the flashlight got more and more scrutiny. Being able to tell the inspector that it was only active during alignment got us through more than one inspection. I was told if it was constantly on it would have been deemed "unsafe" and we would not pass inspection.

As I told a lot of teams, if another team or ref complains about you temporarily blinding them, then it will have to come off.

I have had to talk to a few teams about that complaint, and one where the light may have changed the outcome of a match in 2013 due to blinding an entire operators station. In that case, if the robot hung pointed towards the opposite alliance, its light would cause so much glare on the center drivers panel that you could not see through it. I also had complaints from a couple refs. This lead to me requesting the team turn it off for that event.
**************************************************

In auto, some teams will use colored lights or a colored filter to cause a different color of light to be reflected from the retro-reflective tape on targets. This allows for them to more easily differentiate from the reflective light on the tape and potential background lights.

[ahartnet]

Originally Posted by wilsonmw04

I would strongly encourage everyone who uses a photon cannon to be able to turn it off in game. A spike works really well for this. As we went through the season, the flashlight got more and more scrutiny. Being able to tell the inspector that it was only active during alignment got us through more than one inspection. I was told if it was constantly on it would have been deemed "unsafe" and we would not pass inspection.

Anyone have a pike replacement? I haven't been able to find a place to purchase any.

[MichaelBick]

Originally Posted by Chris is me

Generally, humans aligning a flashlight are faster than camera tracking, so teams that use both rely on the flashlight in teleop

I find this statement a bit too general. 1836 dialed in our autonomous camera usage enough to consistently use camera targeting in teleop too (from what I remember, we didn't miss more than one auto shots through OC finals). Camera tracking was definitely easier/faster for the drivers, and our flashlight was the backup, alignment confirmation, and allowed us to target "through" nets.

[marshall]

Originally Posted by ahartnet

Anyone have a pike replacement? I haven't been able to find a place to purchase any.

Someone earlier mentioned the PCM but there is no direct replacement as of yet that I'm aware of.

I will also mention this widget:

http://www.ctr-electronics.com/gadge...er-module.html

Combined with this widget:

http://www.ctr-electronics.com/hro.html

Would make for a decent spike replacement. Keep in mind that for the price of those two you're getting 6 spikes, and they are a lot smaller and weigh less. Will require some coding though.

I am not making any statements as to how you have to wire that in to make it work per FRC rules though...

[ahartnet]

Thanks. I've seen the hero but hasn't considered looking at it to possibly replace the spike.

We used the pcm for our led ring light. I think they could do something like 500 ma split across all outputs.

[BrendanB]

Originally Posted by MichaelBick

I find this statement a bit too general. 1836 dialed in our autonomous camera usage enough to consistently use camera targeting in teleop too (from what I remember, we didn't miss more than one auto shots through OC finals). Camera tracking was definitely easier/faster for the drivers, and our flashlight was the backup, alignment confirmation, and allowed us to target "through" nets.

I think that's why Chris used the term "generally".