Working Stargate with Arduino Control

thingiverse

** STOP!!!! **** Glitch has come out with a new version of the stargate that blows this out of the water! check it out here http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1603423 This is my Remix of Glitch's working Stargate. I remixed this with the following changes: I altered the Base extensively, so that it prints in one large piece on a 150mm ^ 3 print bed ( with separate sides and a top cap ) The base also has mounting for a NEMA 17 Stepper motor , and an Arduino UNO with a Motor Shield. The Gear was modified to snugly fit onto the stepper motor, and added a hole through which the Stepper motor could be tightened to its mount. I combined some parts that were 2 pieces into one piece so that the build required less gluing and was structurally stronger I also have included the DialingSequence Arduino sketch that I wrote to control the project. Detailed instructions are now available, click on Instructions to view them Video of the final result: http://youtu.be/JDSCKgwPn2k A HUGE thank you to Glitch for the original design of the working stargate! ** V 1.01 Update 15/12/2014 ** Altered the Base to add more material to the interior vertical pillar on the micro controller side for more support for printing without support material. Altered the Base to have have smaller holes so it will slice properly ( 5mm diameter became 4mm diameter ) Altered the Pins on Side1 and Side2 to have smaller pegs to fit the new holes ( 4mm diameter to 3mm diameter ) Updated files are now named _17_1_x_Base-BTM_V1_01_fixed.stl _18_1_x_Base-Side1_V1_01_fixed.stl _19_1_x_Base-Side2_V1_01_fixed.stl Instructions on the thingiverse page had randomly been mostly deleted, luckily I had them saved as a text file and have restored them ( to a slightly earlier version ) Instructions Working Stargate with Arduino Control = The Electronic components that you'll need for this Project are: 1 x Arduino Uno ( https://www.adafruit.com/products/50 ) 1 x Adafruit Motor/Stepper/Servo Shield for Arduino v2 Kit - v2.3 ( https://www.adafruit.com/products/1438 ) 1 x Stepper motor - NEMA-17 size - 200 steps/rev, 12V 350mA ( https://www.adafruit.com/products/324 ) 9 x NeoPixel Diffused 5mm Through-Hole LED ( https://www.adafruit.com/products/1938 ) 1 x 12 VDC 1000mA regulated switching power adapter ( https://www.adafruit.com/products/798 ) 1 x 1000 µF Capacitor 1 x 300Ω to 500Ω Resistor 22 AWG Wire ( you could use a smaller wire, but this is what I had, and it is more than capable of handling the current that the electronics will draw ) File names I have named the files so that they tell you my suggested order they are needed for the build in, a s well as how many of each item to print, and a description of the piece for exmaple _01_8_x_DoubleMiddle-1.stl "01" This is the first piece for the build, "_8x" you will need to print 8 of them "DoubleMiddle-1" This is a piece I Doubled from Glitch's design, it is for the Middle ring, and there are 2 different components for this larger part Pieces If my doubled pieces are too large for your printer, you can use the single pieces from Glitch's original design, it will just require more gluing, and may be a little less strong structurally if a lot of gluing joints line up. This build has Several components; the actual Gate itself, the base, and the electronics. The Gate consists of 4 Layers which I refer to as Middle, Back, and Top, and the Symbol Ring. Middle The Middle section is the most structural part of the gate, it consists of the 'Track' that the Symbol ring spins in, and it holds the wiring and LEDs . When I was combining parts from 2 pieces into one from Glitch's original design, I made it so that the Middle section is offset by half a length from the Top and Back pieces. I did it this way so that the joints that you have to glue don't all line up, so that the gate is stronger. These files make up the Middle ring: _01__8_x_DoubleMiddle-1.stl _02__1_x_DoubleMiddle-2.stl Symbol Ring The Symbol Ring is the geared piece that has the Gate symbols and actually spins. I have made no changes to these files from Glitch's original design aside from fixing some models to be manifold. I only included them for the sake of completeness. The pieces should be assembled clockwise sequentially ( i.e if piece 1 is at the top , piece 2 is to the right, 3 is to the right of that etc. until piece 10 is connected back to the left of piece 1) These files make up the Symbol Ring: _03__1_x_sg-ring-1.stl _04__1_x_sg-ring-2.stl _05__1_x_sg-ring-3.stl _06__1_x_sg-ring-4.stl _07__1_x_sg-ring-5.stl _08__1_x_sg-ring-6.stl _09__1_x_sg-ring-7.stl _10__1_x_sg-ring-8.stl _11__1_x_sg-ring-9.stl _12__1_x_sg-ring-10.stl Top The Top layer consists of several parts, The Chevrons that sit over the LEDs, the Light caps for those, and an an inner cover. The top layer is attached to the Middle layer, and is what keeps the Symbol Ring in place while it is spinning. The Chevrons purpose is to cover the wiring, holding the LED's in place, as well as conceal the gear teeth of the Symbol Ring, and do most of the work keeping the symbol ring in place. They attach to the outer edge of the Middle ring. Because I made these parts offset from the Middle pieces, the part isn't also joined at the same point that it covers the LEDs The Chevrons of the Top layer are made with the file: _13__9_x_DoubleTop.stl The inner cover also keeps the Symbol ring in place, it attaches flush to the inner edge of the Middle ring. it consists of _14__9_x_sg-inner.stl The Light Caps sit directly overtop of your LEDs. I highly recommend printing these in either a transparent material, or a transluscent Red material. the fit into the Chevron parts They use file: _15__9_x_sg-light-1.stl Back The back is the decorative back side of the Stargate. it glues onto the back of the Middle section and provides more structural support as well as finishing the appearance of the Stargate. The back is made from the file: _16__9_x_DoubleBack.stl Printing & Assembly To begin with, I found it was usefull to print an extra "_03__1_x_sg-ring-1.stl" at ~50% Z scale to use as a guide to help you line up the Middle pieces when they're being glued together. The Gate I printed all of the Gate pieces at 0.1mm Layer height, 35% infill, with no support material needed. I highly suggest using Super glue and not Hot glue, as hot glue takes up a lot of space, and the extra material will throw off the desgin, making things not fit together properly when you're assembling all the components together. Start by printing the parts to make the Middle ring, _01__8_x_DoubleMiddle-1.stl makes up the bulk of the section, with one piece made from _02__1_x_DoubleMiddle-2.stl that is slightly different in that it has spacing for the gear to fit into , and for the wires for the LEDs to come out of. glue the pieces together on a flat surface, using your extra sacrificial Symbol ring piece as a guide to make sure that the middle pieces are lined up properly. Be careful not to accidentally glue your guide to your middle pieces. Once the middle ring is complete , Print the Ten Symbol ring pieces , and glue them together. I suggest using the Middle ring that you already assembled as a guide to make sure that your Symbol ring is lined up properly. Again be careful not to glue the symbol ring to the Middle component , or else your Stargate won't spin! At this point you can wire up your LEDs. I chose to use 5mm NeoPixels for several reasons. The NeoPixels can all share a common 5V line, and a common Ground, and have a Data in and Data out. This means that you can run one 5V line all the way around the gate, one Ground line all around the gate, and have a Data line that is chained between each Neopixel. This means that at any given point you only need to have 3 wires running around the gate. Much easier for wire management than if you needed to have an individual 5V line for each LED, and it only uses one pin on the Arduino! Using Neopixels also means that you have full RGB colour on all of your chevrons. As far as screen accuracy I can't think of a reason to make your stargate light up purple or green, but it can look really neat none the less. It also means that you can adjust the colour of your Neopixels if the light cap pieces that you use have a tint to them to give you the exact colour of light that you want. Connect the power to the NeoPixels in parallel NOT in series. If you're new to Neopixels, I HIGHLY recommend reading the Adafruit NeoPixel Überguide, by Phillip Burgess https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-neopixel-uberguide/overview You'll want to include the resistor on the Data line between the Arduino's Data pin and the Data In on the first Neopixel, and also include your Capacitor between the 5V and Ground lines before the Neopixels ( this is to protect the NeoPixels from a sudden surge when you first apply power to them ) I used Hot Glue to hold the Neopixels in place on the middle section, and you can see how I oriented my Neopixels to fit in an example picture I included in the gallery for this Thing. Be sure to leave enough wire leading into the first NeoPixel so that there will be room to connect everything , and route the wire so that it doesnt get caught in the Gear when its spinning. I HIGHLY recommend testing the wiring of each NeoPixel as you go to prevent headaches down the line! Once you have wired and THOROUGHLY TESTED your entire NeoPixel strand, you can print the Top pieces and glue them onto the Middle section. Make sure that your Symbol ring is sitting in the track of the middle piece when you glue your top pieces on! You may need to slightly trim out the underside of the Chevron pieces to get them to fit overtop of the NeoPixels proerly ( this trimming will be hidden ) Test to make sure that your Symbol ring still spins freely as you glue on each top piece. When you're gluing the Chevrons on , also make sure that you glue each Chevron's edge to its neighbour pieces as well as to the middle section. also make sure that the inner top covers are glued to their neighbours as well. I used Hot glue to attach the Light caps overtop of the Neopixels, this gave a good glow to the entire light cap piece when lit , and was easy to glue in. Be carful if you do this however! , the heat of the hot glue can warp your light cap part. Once everything is dried and secure in place , you can turn your Gate upside down ( on a flat surface ), and start to print and glue on the Back pieces. The Back pieces are offset from the Middle pieces, so they should line up so that the glue joints of the middle pieces are in the middle of each back piece. Congratulations! you have assembled your Stargate! now its time to print the base and set the Gate in place! The Base I printed all of the Base pieces at 0.3mm layer height to decrease the print time. Print your main Base piece! , this one is going to take a long time. Mine took 11.5 Hours at 0.3mm layer heightI built mine from an earlier version of the base design, I have modified the base model since then to account for some modifications I had to make as I built mine, but I have not printed the base as it is now. Once you have your Base printed, print the sides and Top Cap and make sure that they will fit onto the baseAgain, the sides are slightly different than the ones that I used in my build, I added the pins built into the sides AFTER I made mine ( I used finishing nails in my build ) I also added the hole for the Power and USB Cables for the Arduino Print out your Gear that will fit onto the Stepper motor, and slide it onto the drive shaft of the Stepper. Now slide the Stepper motor into place, and secure it by screwing it to the base structure through the hole in the gear. For testing purposes I suggest leaving the sides off of the base for the first few tests, the sides do add some support to hold the gate up, so you might have to carefully hold the gate upright for your initial testing. Slide the Assembled Gate down into the baseso that the teeth of the Sybol ring intersect with the teeth of the gear on the Stepper motor's shaft. Upload the provided Arduino sketch, DialingSequence.ino ,to your Arduino, connect the Stepper motor to the motor shield, and connect the Neopixels to the 5V , Ground, and Data to pin 6 on the Shield/Arduino I have attempted to comment everything you need to know about the Arduino sketch into the sketch itself, and won't explain it here, if you need any help with it, please leave a commentAs of right now , there are some small tweaks I'm intending to make to the Ardunio sketch, so that the symbols will line up better with the chevrons when the symbol ring spins, and so that it will properly dial the address provided ( its currently miscalculating every other symbol backwards, the ring will spin , but it wont line up with the intended symbol ) Be sure that you install the power jumper on the motor shield, and that you are using a wall wart of sufficient power to power your stepper motor. ( 12 V 1 Amp that I used was sufficient ) Do NOT power the Ardunio with the motor shield connected to the stepper soley from your computer's USB port. This could cause damage to your USB bus as the Stepper is intended to work on 12V , and may draw more current in spikes than the 500 mAh that computer USB ports are rated to provide For more information about Stepper motors and the Motor shield, you should read the Adafruit Motor Shield V2 for Arduino guide by Limor Fried ( Lady Ada ) at https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-motor-shield-v2-for-arduino Once you have tested the Gate in place on the Stepper motor , you can install the Arduino & motor shield into the holder in the base, and route your wires so that they won't get caught in the gear when it spins. then you can install the sides on your base, slide the Gate into place and snap the top cap into place! if you need to take your Stargate back out of the base, you will have to release the side's pins from teh base, then roll the stargate to one side, sliding the side down until it slides off of the Chevron piece and can be pulled off. Then repeate the process for the other side. Congratulations! you've built your own working Stargate! I'm more than happy to help with any questions or modification suggestions anyone has, message me or leave a comment on this thing and I'll get back to you as soon as I am able ( Though it might take a little while, I won't be checking Thingiverse every day! ) All credit to Glitch for the incredible design of the Working Stargate! all I have done is merge some thigns together, and alter the base to fit an Arduino and Stepper motor ( And wrote the Arduino sketch ) Enjoy!