Electro frame question

[NeoMoses]

I'll state this in the beginning: I'm not very good with electronics. With that being said, I wonder why a 'board' is necessary when making an electronic gun. Why can't one use a simple circuit with a battery, capacitor, solenoid, microswitch, and on/off switch to fire the solenoid? I have made simple circuits like this, putting the on/off switch between the battery and capacitor, then the trigger switch between the capacitor and solenoid. It worked fine. Is the board there to filter out the bounce? I didn't notice any bounce with the circuit I had, but I wasn't really pushing it. Can someone shed some light on this?

[Joni]

I guess it's possible to have a simple circuit like that, but I think the reason for using boards is the ability to have shot buffering, debounce setting, eye capability, different modes, intellifeed, timer, shot counter etc. You know, all those useless things that angels has =).

[tribalman]

i think part of the board is to filter the electricity going to the capacitor and the solinoid. and the rest is the angel thingy.

[Wynken]

I've been thinking about making a board like that for a while. I don't think it would take much. I think that one of the things that the board does is take a trigger input that's X ms long and turn it into one that is exactly what the gun needs to fire. In a circuit like that if you held down the trigger the solenoid would stay open and eat batteries. It also might overheat, I'd think.

I think it could definately be done though.

[JoyInTheMadness]

NPPL Rules state that a electronic gun cannot be governed by an on/off switch.

[Wynken]

What kind of switch can they be governed by? I guess I don't understand your post because don't all electro guns have a on/off switch governing when they fire?

[Fixion]

The circuit you have works, to a point. Lets say you held down the switch. What happens? It activates the solenoid, and as long as you hold down the switch, the solenoid is actutated. So after the hammer is released (spyders) and the gun fires, the hammer comes back to recock. Then what happens? You probably aren't fast enough to release the trigger and reset the sear. So while your circuit works, you effectivley turned a spyer into a blender. If your solenoid isn't rated for continuous operation (eg. pulse operation), then you can kill the noid. Plus you'd be wasting the batteries. The board usually controlls the user interface and the timing of the solenoid. There are very few guns where you circuit would work (the mag being one), but even there it is very inefficient and a bad design.

Now lets say you wanted to make an electric frame for a cocker, you not only have to controll two solenoids, but you also have to controll the precision timing of each one and the firing cycle of the gun. You can't do that with a simple circuit like yours.

[NeoMoses]

NPPL Rules state that a electronic gun cannot be governed by an on/off switch.

Could you please expand on this? Maybe with a link to the rule stating this, and a brief explanation of what you mean?

Fixion, I do understand your point about draining the battery and/or possibly damaging the solenoid if it's not rated for continuous use. For this argument, let's not go into cockers, let's just stick with mags (we are on AO, right?)

So... we've bought a solenoid rated at 10V continuous duty... using it as a sear tripper only. In a mag, if it stayed energized, you would only get 1 shot per trigger pull. Assuming you weren't retarded, you shouldn't kill your battery too quickly. 2 or 3 rechargeable 9 volts should last you a day of play. If designed right, you wouldn't need voltage regulation or dwell settings. 9V battery < 10V solenoid. Once the microswitch is pulled, the capacitor is discharged, activating the solenoid and tripping the sear. Nothing complex needed here.

I'm not saying this is the best idea ever. I don't want to develop this to sell, I just like to play around with stuff, and this is something I can do completely on my own.

[jon.brooks]

Neo,

Cool question. The primary goal of an electronic trigger is to provide a short pull with low resistance. As you know using a board is a convenient way to seat your electrical devices and prevent them from moving around. So I'll reword the question and assume you're asking the following....

Why are the e-trigger boards big?

Like a few of the guys mentioned... features (shot counter, burst mode, game timer... etc)

Why not use simple analog circuits?

Yes you're circuit should work with your assumptions and limitations (don't hold down the trigger too long, buy a lot of batteries, could care less about the features). However, you can still build an inexpensive LOW POWER triggering system with analog electronics. Your cost in batteries alone is an easy justification.

How you ask?

1) select a solenoid with the least amount of force to get the job done. for example you don't need a solenoid that can put a whole in concrete.

2) cut the power to the solenoid after it has done its job.


I'll play around with it at lunch and post some ideas.

Regards,
Jon

[SpecialBlend2786]

The circuit you have works, to a point. Lets say you held down the switch. What happens? It activates the solenoid, and as long as you hold down the switch, the solenoid is actutated. So after the hammer is released (spyders) and the gun fires, the hammer comes back to recock. Then what happens? You probably aren't fast enough to release the trigger and reset the sear. So while your circuit works, you effectivley turned a spyer into a blender. If your solenoid isn't rated for continuous operation (eg. pulse operation), then you can kill the noid. Plus you'd be wasting the batteries. The board usually controlls the user interface and the timing of the solenoid. There are very few guns where you circuit would work (the mag being one), but even there it is very inefficient and a bad design.

Now lets say you wanted to make an electric frame for a cocker, you not only have to controll two solenoids, but you also have to controll the precision timing of each one and the firing cycle of the gun. You can't do that with a simple circuit like yours.

Yeah, I think that sounds about right

[Fixion]

Could you please expand on this? Maybe with a link to the rule stating this, and a brief explanation of what you mean?

Fixion, I do understand your point about draining the battery and/or possibly damaging the solenoid if it's not rated for continuous use. For this argument, let's not go into cockers, let's just stick with mags (we are on AO, right?)

So... we've bought a solenoid rated at 10V continuous duty... using it as a sear tripper only. In a mag, if it stayed energized, you would only get 1 shot per trigger pull. Assuming you weren't retarded, you shouldn't kill your battery too quickly. 2 or 3 rechargeable 9 volts should last you a day of play. If designed right, you wouldn't need voltage regulation or dwell settings. 9V battery < 10V solenoid. Once the microswitch is pulled, the capacitor is discharged, activating the solenoid and tripping the sear. Nothing complex needed here.

I'm not saying this is the best idea ever. I don't want to develop this to sell, I just like to play around with stuff, and this is something I can do completely on my own.


Most solenoids can work at +-10% of their rated voltage. Alkaline batteries drain voltage faster than rechargables (nihm or nicad). Rechargable batteries keep their voltage pretty well, and as they run out of energy, the voltage suddenly drops. But the problem with rechargables is that they start at a lower voltage (usually). You would also need to make sure that your solenoid is strong enough. What is the model? If its a weaker one, you might need a ULT for it to work.

BTW on most sear trippers, you don't need/can't adust the dwell. However it is interesting that on my borhters Dragun LCD you can adjust the dwell.... I don't know what you can be adjusting on a seartriping blowback marker. You can't adjust the dwell (when the bolt is forward) because its a blowback. And who in their right minds would want to adjust the dwell when the bolt is back? The solenoid isn't fast enough to catch the hammer before it goes forward (after you pull the trigger).

[Timmee]

The board also gives the frame a great deal of consistency, in regards to the switching of the solenoid. In the case of the 'Mag, I don't think holding it too long would really hurt anything (except your battery), but not holding the trigger enough could cause the solenoid to switch off too soon, letting the sear reset before the bolt is completely back, which would lead to premature wear of the sear and/or bolt (the reason Boo-Yaah frames had trouble with increased wear to the sear and/or bolt is because their solenoid on time was around 6ms, whereas the E-Mag frame is 20-30 ms).