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Rob Klingberg
Greetings. I recently got into some of these bigger builds and want to add some effects to them.
My most recent build is a knock-off version of the Bugatti Chiron from yourwobb.com. It's the police car version, and they have a lighting kit that goes with the regular car build, but it would be missing the things that make a police car a police car: strobes on the roof, headlights, taillights, etc.
Does anyone have any recommendations for adding the strobe effects using effects boards? I've done a little reading on Arduino, but not enough to know if or how I might be able to create the effects. I've looked through some of the effects boards here, and I don't know if they would provide the effects that would simulate the strobes.
Thanks in advance!
Greg
instructions: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZVokodIcZmeKZI4ThBaM_3oOrRPzA6Y1/view
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Greg Michael Hi Greg, thanks for your post. That's a really nice looking version of the Bugatti. I will say that it drives me nuts, though, to see products like these with Photoshopped lighting effects like the lightbar, when the kit doesn't include them!
Looking at the base lighting kit, I'd say go with that to light up the main elements of the vehicle. Then we could make the lightbar for you, and it could integrate with the rest of the light kit. Would that work? The only issue is: I can't tell from the website how exactly the lightbar is built, or how it mounts to the roof of the car. I'd need detailed pictures of both of those things in order to make a lightbar for you. If you have a chance to send those close-up pictures, or if you have a PDF of the car instructions themselves, that would be great if you could send.
Thank you!
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Rob Klingberg I'm perfectly fine with augmenting the base lighting kit. I figured that would be the way it would be done anyway. 😁
As for how the light bar is mounted, the lights are roughly equivalent to a 3x10 brick with a hollowed out bottom. They connect to each other using a 3-peg axle through the 2 ends of angled beans that stick up out of the roof. Both sides of the lights have axle connectors, so their orientation is not fixed.
More than anything, I would appreciate help with learning what boards and effects can be created. Once upon a time I went to school for electronics, so my knowledge of LED lights and circuits may be higher than the average visitor, but that doesn't mean that I have a great grasp of how to implement them! 😜
I have attached pictures of the lights and the page of the book where they are installed.
Once again, thank you in advance for your help.
Greg
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Greg Michael Thanks for the photos and information. Wow, those look like some very odd bricks. Usually the clone brand sets use the same shapes as LEGO, but these parts don't look familiar to me at all. Are they hollow inside? What are the inside dimensions of open space? The reason I ask is because I think the easiest way to make this work would be to create a flex circuit board with lights on it, that would slip inside the hollow space inside the trans red and blue parts. These could then be controlled any number of ways.
Is there any identifying part number for these two pieces? Maybe in the back of the book where LEGO typically shows the part numbers for their sets? I have some contacts in China and would like to see if I could obtain some of these pieces to experiment with-- I do agree they make really nice lightbars for Technic vehicles, so would be interested in exploring further.
Thanks!
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Rob Klingberg sorry this took so long to reply to. I was trying to see if I could find any resellers of these transparent pieces, but came up empty. I took a number of pictures of them including with a ruler for sizing.
Yes, the interior of the piece is indeed hollow, so if a small enough sized board with LEDs can be made or obtained, they should fit inside the hollowed out space.
The pieces do have an imprinted code on them: C348. The red piece has 2-1 and the blue piece has 2-2 additionally.
Thanks!
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Rob Klingberg
Here's a whole bunch of pictures for nearly every aspect of the piece.
The inside cavity is:
0.3230in deep (8.20mm)
0.8055in wide (20.45mm)
1.5985in long (40.60 mm)
The overall height: 0.451in (11.45mm)
There is a 0.0485in (1.20mm) decrease in height 0.3545in (9.00 mm) in from each end
The overall length is 2.4765in (62.90 mm)
The overall width is 0.937in (23.80mm)
The side that attaches to the axles comes in 0.1575in (4.00mm) from the edge, making it recessed.
There are 4 "triangles" supporting the joint between the top and sides. They are approximately 0.810in (20.60 mm) in from each edge, and 0.951in (24.15 mm) apart from each other.
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Greg Michael Hi Greg, I made up a prototype that I'm hoping will fit inside the cavity under the bars. The boards are each 38mm x 18mm-- based on the photos you provided, it seems that should fit inside the bottom. These will be thin boards so hopefully they'll just insert inside. I've ordered these and they should arrive in 3 weeks. I'll keep you posted!
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Greg Michael Glad you like it. Well, I'm an English major and totally self-taught on this stuff! :-) It's been quite a journey for sure. I took the measurements you sent me and used a free program called KiCad to design the circuit boards for the lightbars. You can find good tutorials on KiCad on YouTube-- that's how I learned it. I wrote the program for the effects in Arduino and uploaded it to the small effect controller you see in the video-- also designed in KiCad. That's basically how I do all of our products-- KiCad, Arduino, a lot of hand placement of tiny components, and many many re-tries when things don't work the way I expect them to. But that part, I'm sure you're very familiar with, coming from the analog days! :-)