29 Feb
2008
29 Feb
'08
8:52 a.m.
On Thu, Feb 28, 2008 at 2:53 PM, Gene Buckle <geneb at deltasoft.com> wrote:
If you guys are serious, I'd be happy to design a
panel based on the specs
you guys come up with. I can make it on my ShopBot quite easily. The
electronics of course will still be up to you. :)
Well, my soldering skills aren't quite up to snuff (I learned how to
solder while growing up in a radiator shop ;). As for communications
protocol, using a microcontroller is a relatively inexpensive way to
implement RS-232 communications with the panel.
I do dabble in PIC programming, and I've got at couple of 40-pin PICs
that would probably fit the bill with a minimum of other electronics
(or use smaller PICs with more support electronics). Heck, a
sufficiently simple microcomputer emulator could probably be
implemented on said PIC, at some point. (Those are ideas I've been
rolling around in my head for quite some time.)
So we have someone willing to machine panels, and I'm willing to do a
bit of work with interfacing, if PICs are involved. All we need is a
good schematic, and a communications protocol to graft into an
emulator (and someone to do said grafting).
I can't help but wonder what kind of committee animal this could become. ;-)
Josef
--
"I laugh because I dare not cry. This is a crazy world
and the only way to enjoy it is to treat it as a joke."
-- Hilda "Sharpie" Burroughs,
"The Number of the Beast" by Robert A. Heinlein