Hi,
First off great site helped inspire the purchase of a Wild Thumper 6WD and wild thumper controller.
Just completed the "first fix", where I have wired up LiPo, high power switch and thumper controller board, and uploaded the "default" Arduino sketch (from Robosavvy site, using IDE version 0018), but not yet connected any sensors etc. I previously ran the "diagnostic" sketch Oddbot put together and all good. Sketch from here:
http://robosavvy.com/store/product_info.php/manufacturers_id/35/products_id/1878
Trying to establish control via serial connection, and only managed to get the following commands working when I changed the default .PDE file, funcion "Loop" where it checks value of Leftmode from 2 to the ascii value of 50:
if ((millis()-leftoverload)>overloadtime)
{
switch (Leftmode) // if left motor has not overloaded recently
{
case 50: // left motor forward
analogWrite(LmotorA,0);
analogWrite(LmotorB,LeftPWM);
break;
case 49: // left motor brake
analogWrite(LmotorA,LeftPWM);
analogWrite(LmotorB,LeftPWM);
break;
case 48: // left motor reverse
analogWrite(LmotorA,LeftPWM);
analogWrite(LmotorB,0);
break;
}
Using the following serial command from the Arduino serial monitor to set both motors in reverse for PWM of 255:
Serial.println("HB0ÿ0ÿ");
Please can anyone indicate if I'm using the serial command correctly, as I'm surprised I had to change the Leftmode decimal values to the ASCII values. I also tried using the "DEC" extension to the serial command without success. If example commands could be given that would be very much appreciated.
Also note that from the Arduino serial monitor I have to try several times (psting in the same command to the command line) before the command actually takes effect.
My thumper chassis came with the quadrature encoders on both centre wheels. Trying to understand the schematics of controller board and encoder (Im new to this but did successfully solder for the first time in about 25 years, having changed my Lipo battery connectors to XTs!) I assume I can use the digital inputs on the controller board, with GND (black encoder wire) on digital pin at edge of board, VCC (red encoder wire??) in centre pin then choice of white or yellow encoder wire to pin towards centre of controller board to provide speed pulse? If I wanted to use both white and yellow pulse signals for speed and direction how could I achieve this with the thumper board?
Many thanks in advance, and thanks for the inspiration!