Skip to main content

Cumbria Area Group Meeting

 Some 15 members joined us for the second Zoom meeting of the Cumbria Area Group on 11/09/20

John Farrell (North Wales Area Group ) gave us his interesting presentation on the CBUS beginners kit 101 which he was test building prior to its Kitlocker release.  We were joined by Howard Watkins, well know MERG personality and creator of the build documentation for this kit. 



The kit purposely contains boards from the original CBUS range including CANACC8  which requires some slight modification (additional parts are provided) , a CANACE8C  which is a 5 Volt module powered from the CANACC8, an Experimenters kit and a 12 Volt DC supply with mains lead.


With the boards connected you are then able to create events without the need of a computer. A DIL switch on both main boards is used instead.

John had purchased separately a CANGIZMO  board which is a very useful testing and debug tool.


A most useful discussion ensued.


It was suggested that we develop something to assist our members on getting started with programming  Arduino. It was generally accepted that this would be useful and the idea is being developed. Watch out for further updates on the Blog.


It was noted that some of the other Area Groups are working on developing projects where interested members can contribute perhaps with a view to either exhibiting or publishing in the future.


Again the blog may be a useful way to share this information.


A video of the presentation might be made available at a later date.


Our thanks to John Farrell his presentation.


Next Cumbria Area Group meeting is planned for Friday 25th Sept. 14:00.


If you have not joined the Cumbria Group, you can edit your profile settings on the MERG site

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Train sequence / timetable using Arduino

                              Following discussions in a MERG Zoom meeting about potential projects for the Cumbria virtual area group I have started this blog to share my ideas for building a train sequence / timetable system based on an Arduino UNO. The trigger for this project was Andy Robb's article in the MERG journal (June 2020 edition). In it Andy describes using an UNO with a OLED display to produce an electronic station display board.  Having tried out Andy's version I started thinking about expanding the idea and have come up the following list of possibilities: 1. Replace my card index train sequence with an electronic version. 2. Have the train sequence synchronised with the on platform displays. 3. Display an analogue clock on the station display and have it display the train times. 4. Store the position reached in the sequence so that it starts where it left off on power up.  To mak...

Push button Ezypoints

 A few months ago I produced a batch of Ezypoint kits for our local members to overcome a shortage in the Kitlocker.  At that time the kit was produced on stripboard which some members find problematic. An additional PCB board normally available from MERG was not available either.  Alan Turner ( the PCB designer) had only a few boards available but graciously provided me with the gerber files to allow me to order PCBs directly from China . Having sourced all necessary components, the kits were duly made up. I find this simple kit is really useful for automation projects. A toggle switch provides either a HIGH or LOW on the PIC input pin to determine which of the two servo positions is selected. For a particular application, I wanted to use a push button to toggle the position on alternate presses of the button. This involved a rewrite of some of the code in the PIC. I initially developed the program using an Arduino as a means of testing the logic. When this was successfu...

Cumbria Group Meeting Friday 9th October

 Although this was only a coffee and chat meeting, eleven members joined us for an interesting session which basically covered what was on our workbenches. Some members suffered from technical gremlins on the Zoom session but hopefully they will have that sorted for next time. Andy Woolass had volunteered to be a guinea pig for building the latest version of an EzyBus Input Module. It was a fairly straightforward build but the lack of sufficient ground points for external connections was a suggested improvement. The original Input board which used an MCP23017 Module was originally supplied by Davy Dick for £2. Members trying to build their own using a provided PCB, sometimes fell foul of the different form factors of this Module which caused obvious fitting problems. It is for this reason the PCB has been redesigned to accept a more standard 28 Pin DIL device. The Kit will be available in the Kitlocker, but at £7.20 it is a little expensive. Various members showed Arduino developme...