Complex animatronics

[Gilrock]

The ServoDog documentation states that it automatically detects DMX so it should work with the Falcon configured like that.  I don't know about the channel starting at 25.  What if you had three 16 channel LOR AC controllers daisy chained in front of it?  I would make it work first as unit id 1 just to get it working and then experiment with moving it higher.  LOR has typically always used 16 channels per unit id but it all depends on whether its running legacy or normal addressing mode.

[bobschm]

I decided to simplify things. I set the LOR board to unit 1, which makes the start channel 1. I have the F16 at 192.168.0.60 with Universe 203 (510 channels) dedicated to this LOR board. That makes the absolute address for that universe 8035 to 8544.

I set serial output 3 to DMX. I switched the jumpers on socket DMX3 to LOR position and plugged in with a CAT5 cable.

I tried absolute address 8035. I tried Universe 203, channel 1. I tried a servo effect. I tried a simple ramp. I tried a simple on/off effect. I tried a skull model. I tried a moving head light model.

I never get any response from the penguin. 

I can't find any tutorial or video where an F16V3 is running an LOR board. Everything is using the old V2 and a crossover cable.

Any ideas on what else I can try?

[Gilrock]

At this point I'm not really sure how you are testing it.  You could be running a sequence from a Pi or xScheduler or using the xLights Test dialog or an active sequence on the grid.  No way for me to really know what's wrong.  You could be sitting here testing and not have Output to Lights checked for all I know.   You haven't shown any xLights screenshots or Falcon setup screenshots so we don't really know how you have things setup.  I would be testing as absolute address 1 everywhere.  You also could have probably tested it with the LOR USB dongle using the Add LOR button for an output.

[bobschm]

At this point, I;m convinced I'm doing something incredibly stupidly wrong. I need another set of eyes to look this over and see if you can flag what I'm missing. I got a Son of Chuckie (SOC) from Skulltronix now. It's pugged into DMX port 2 of a F16V3 with the jumpers left in DMX (not LOR) position.  I made a cable to connect a CAT5 to the SOC input (white/org to +, org to -, brn to gnd). Verified 6vdc to SOC power. Falcon is powered and runs lights.

Setup: created universe 300 with 50 channels for penguin.
Layout: just brought in the standard DMX Skulltronix model. Set controller output to DMX:2. Not at all sure that's correct.
Sequence: Checked output to lights, dropped a servo effect onto DMX model, selected jaw, and moved slider. No response from the servo. Servo tests good on my test rig.

So what did I do wrong?

[Gilrock]

You need to set the "Start Channel" parameter of the model to match the universe being used on the controller.  Sounded like you want to use universe 300 so set it to "#300:1" if you want universe 300 channel 1 to be the start channel for that model.  That "DMX:2" field is purely for using the controller upload feature where xLights can try to automatically configure your controller for you.  That field is optional but the start channel must be correct.

[bobschm]

I set it to #300:1 as you suggested but still no control of the servo. I've done more reading and I'm confused by two things. First, the F16V3 configuration pages say that both DMX 2 and string output 16 are set to Universe 300. Is that normal? Secondly, there is a section of the SOC literature that warns against using channels 1-8 as they are reserved for configuration commands. I notice the Skulltronix model starts at channel 9. Does that correspond to servo pin A on the board? Should I be declaring #300:9?

Am I making this harder than it should be?

[Gilrock]

For the F16v3 you are in control set it however you want it.  Just pick a universe and make sure its on the E1.31 page.  I don't think it matters you can tell it to use the same universe on every output if you want.

For the servo board yes I believe the first 8 channels are used for other things although I think channel 8 is your power so if you don't have anything writing to channel 8 no servos will move.  When I first created the model I used to have the Jaw default to channel 1 and then I would set my start channel to 9 in the universe.  That confused Jerry so he wanted me to make the defaults so that you use start channel set to 1 in the universe and then that makes the Jaw default to channel 9.  You could set it up either way as long as the channel overlay properly it works either way.  But if you are using the latest defaults then you need to use 1 for the start channel.  That also allowed the power channel to be included as channel 8 instead of you having to create a second model to control the power to the servos.  You need to drop a DMX effect at the beginning of the sequence that does a short on / off pulse to channel 8.  Personally I never understood that power channel.  Jerry says it needs to see a 0 but our default is to output 0's so I've seen the board not work until I do a quick 255 and then 0.  But I never read any documentation.   Sounds like you have so you should have read what to do with that channel.

[bobschm]

Gil, you really DO rock! Once again you have provided the missing piece of the puzzle. I put a servo effect on the DMX model, moved power up and down with the slider, and bang! Everything works as expected.

Thank you for saving Christmas (at least for me).

[Gilrock]

So since you're talking about the "rock" part of my profile name I'll share the funny story.  It was probably at least 18 years ago I was setting up an account on Battlenet to play Warcraft III and I needed to come up with a gamertag name for the account.  So I had a bunch of CDs lying around cause I was in the middle of transferring all my CDs to MP3 and I look over and there sits a Brad Gillis CD titled "Gilrock Ranch".  So I said hey that's got Gil in the name I'll use that.

[bobschm]

Okay, Gilrock it is!

To keep this thread alive, here's another issue. Programming the SOC will be daunting so I'm still experimenting with the ServoDog. Since Nobody can get a ServoDog to work with a F16V3 and  my E.31 bridge is apparently defective, I decided to set up an LOR network using the LOR dongle. It works fine on Comm3 to setup and test the penguins using the ServoDog utility. So in setup I clicked Add LOR and set it to Unit 1 (Dan the penguin), 8 channel AC controller on Comm 3. Then I built a model of 8 strings with 1 node each. When I sequence this, it looks perfect in the previews. But the penguin doesn't respond. It's like I didn't check output to lights. I did check it!

I tried setting up a USB network instead.
I tried single color white. I tried single color intensity. Same result.

 Is this the correct way to model an 8 channel AC controller?

[Gilrock]

I just don't know much about the ServoDog and whether it requires special commands to set it up.  Do you have a normal LOR AC box that you could connect instead and then see if those same commands light up the lights?  I don't really know if the ServoDog requires the same DMX commands that work for lights or whether they have their own special protocol.

[bobschm]

I found an interesting note in the ServoDog manual that says the utility program does not send intensity commands but instead outputs direct commands like "Send 1500uS pulses" and therefore bypasses all the limits set on the board.  (I can control servos using the utility via the 458 dongle). This seems to imply that normal operating mode is to send LOR intensity (0-100%) commands to the ServoDog and the board will interpret them and send pulses to the servos.

Regardless, I have yet to get anything I own to output any data at all to the ServoDog from xLights. The ServoDog LED shows no data coming in.
 
At this point, I'll probably run last year's show on LOR. I'll revisit this after the holidays with more hardware and hopefully get xLights to speak penguin.

[Gilrock]

Well we have users that say they are using the ServoDog.   The amount of help you get is limited here on the forum because most help is on Facebook.  If you don't like using FB that's fine but the lack of help is the cost.

[bobschm]

Well we have users that say they are using the ServoDog.   The amount of help you get is limited here on the forum because most help is on Facebook.  If you don't like using FB that's fine but the lack of help is the cost.

Users are talking to the ServoDog with anything but a F16V3. I think my DMX bridge is also kaput since it can't control anything at all. I have tested replacement on the way. So hopefully that will talk to the ServoDog.

I wasn't sure this was xLights related so was reluctant to clog FB with it. I think it's a hardware issue with the V3 and my particular bridge.

[Gilrock]

Well the F16v3 works with DMX on plenty of other devices so I chalk this up to the typical experience of LOR always being different.