Re: [amsat-bb] PC control of actuator arms

["Frederick M. Spinner" <fspinner@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

If you've already come up with a degrees to pulses translation table for 
your arm  (if not, measure it or do the trig to figure it out), why not 
program a little PIC or AVR (or a basic stamp or somehting like that)  to 
convert from a supported tracking format (like FODTRACK) to the pulses?

FODTRACK for example puts out 0-255 in an 8-bit byte from a parallel port.  
You could read that in, and upon changes, count +/- one table entry in the 
pic.  Other interface types could give you one degree resolution...

It's a little bit of work, but it could be done fairly easily.

Fred W0FMS

>From: "Keith Bainbridge" <vk6xh@arach.net.au>
>To: "amsat" <amsat-bb@AMSAT.Org>
>Subject: [amsat-bb] PC control of actuator arms
>Date: Wed, 17 Sep 2003 13:02:00 +0800
>
>Hello all,
>I'm wondering if any of the experts out there have come up with a program 
>to
>count the pulses from an actuator arm, in my case a Geotrack TD24  24" arm,
>and interface with the azimuth rotator , an Emotator 1103 mxx.
>I use a Moteck 2 controller on the actuator arm and have a read out that
>I've calibrated to give me a manual setting for elevation.
>It would be nice to be able to track the birds automatically using my
>laptop.
>The set up I have on my 2mtr dish is very robust and it would be a shame to
>change it for a weak elevation rotator just to get tracking by PC.
>If any one has tackled this problem please contact me, it would be most
>helpful.
>73 de Keith VK6XH
>vk6xh@arach.net.au
>
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