Curt von Badinski
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- Jan 25, 2011
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Todays update from our site:
We are making quite a bit of progress on the system. The big time sink has been the controller, receiver, and motor driver. After all the problems with the original design we went with an entirely new (more powerful) architecture from the previous Impero design and put MANY protections in place to prevent inadvertent damage by batteries/ESD etc. Additionally everything has been designed to pass FCC and CE testing which we have scheduled to happen in August. The motors are 80% done, there are functioning test units but we still have a few more components that need to manufactured on the lathe. I'm trying to get a video together for you guys but I want to have everything packed up nicely instead of having a bundle of wires on the table moving the motor back and forth.
One thing I would like to some feedback from the community is regarding the encoder. We are using a 12-bit (1024 line) encoder that gives an enormous amount of resolution on the output. We went down this path to allow us to limit the motor range to a very small throw while maintaining the resolution necessary to map that range out to a full 360 degree turn of the control knob. It would come in handy for use on short throw lenses and some 3D applications. The problem is that all the other motor manufacturers use 11-bit (512 line) encoders by default due to the resolution available in 16mm motor form factors. This resolution difference means that when our motor is used on a Preston or C-Motion system it will appear to be twice as slow as a motor using an 11-bit encoder. At our current stage of development I hesitate to change things so my plan is to go forward with the 12-bit design and offer a resolution reducer box at some point that can take the 12-bit encoder signals and drop them down to 11, 10, or 8 bit outputs. The other option is to have the other controller companies modify their firmware to give the end user an option to select different encoder resolutions.
Additionally we are making the Impero mini controller and Impero-Pro controller at the same time as a lot of the components are the same on the hardware and software side of things. The mini controller is plastic and does not require much labor on our side thus assembly takes no time at all. The pro controller is billet aluminum and has many more machined components and sensor boards. If the pro controller takes much longer then we may opt to give existing customers a free Impero mini controller to get the systems shipping then follow up with shipping out the pro controllers when they're completed.
-Curt
We are making quite a bit of progress on the system. The big time sink has been the controller, receiver, and motor driver. After all the problems with the original design we went with an entirely new (more powerful) architecture from the previous Impero design and put MANY protections in place to prevent inadvertent damage by batteries/ESD etc. Additionally everything has been designed to pass FCC and CE testing which we have scheduled to happen in August. The motors are 80% done, there are functioning test units but we still have a few more components that need to manufactured on the lathe. I'm trying to get a video together for you guys but I want to have everything packed up nicely instead of having a bundle of wires on the table moving the motor back and forth.
One thing I would like to some feedback from the community is regarding the encoder. We are using a 12-bit (1024 line) encoder that gives an enormous amount of resolution on the output. We went down this path to allow us to limit the motor range to a very small throw while maintaining the resolution necessary to map that range out to a full 360 degree turn of the control knob. It would come in handy for use on short throw lenses and some 3D applications. The problem is that all the other motor manufacturers use 11-bit (512 line) encoders by default due to the resolution available in 16mm motor form factors. This resolution difference means that when our motor is used on a Preston or C-Motion system it will appear to be twice as slow as a motor using an 11-bit encoder. At our current stage of development I hesitate to change things so my plan is to go forward with the 12-bit design and offer a resolution reducer box at some point that can take the 12-bit encoder signals and drop them down to 11, 10, or 8 bit outputs. The other option is to have the other controller companies modify their firmware to give the end user an option to select different encoder resolutions.
Additionally we are making the Impero mini controller and Impero-Pro controller at the same time as a lot of the components are the same on the hardware and software side of things. The mini controller is plastic and does not require much labor on our side thus assembly takes no time at all. The pro controller is billet aluminum and has many more machined components and sensor boards. If the pro controller takes much longer then we may opt to give existing customers a free Impero mini controller to get the systems shipping then follow up with shipping out the pro controllers when they're completed.
-Curt
