Quadlex 350 - lex lighting

[Galvonaut]

I've just had a rummage and found one of the modules complete with mount which you should be able to throw straight in to your laser. I'm not sure what colour - probably red?

If you PM me your address I'll pop it in the post for you.

Keith

[The_Doctor]

A little concerned that you can't make it do anything other than self test. If the show card is working properly it should still drive the motors whether you have diodes in or not.

That's interesting. How many contacts are there on the laser connectors? Enough to suggest any complexity beyond power, ground, modulation? That it does a self-test at all suggests most of it is good, but the lasers may have been part of that test sequence. As it makes no sense to fire lasers into a system that obviously fails a test, they may have been tested last, and the test may be stalling near its end right now. (Unrelated, but I have an SY99 synthesiser whose display was broken. When building an external one to connect via a 25 pin connector I learned that the display was also part of the self-tested hardware, and I had to either use the old broken internal one, or the external one, just to get it to complete the test before use. This was what led to my thoughts about the possible laser test.)

[Galvonaut]

That's a good point!

[The_Doctor]

Best one I got. Remember Paul Merton on Just A Minute, saying of Nicholas Parsons.. "Best chairman we got!". Only chairman they had...

[Pugdaddy]

there are 2 control boards, maser and slave... they are identical other than the control chip is on the master.

connections to the master board:
dip switches
dmx
volum / mic / power on led
4 x connections to the galvos
12v output wire - which I think connected to the laser (I've tested the voltage when running and it is constant, but does fluctuate as if the control board is altering the voltage)
cooling fan
ribbon connecting to the slaveboard

sockets not in use:
2x 5v outputs
ttl1 and ttl2 (doesn't look like anything has been plugged into these)


slave board:
ribbon from the master board
4x connections to the galvos
12v output (as master board)

ttl 1 and 2 don't look used on this board either


in summary...

looks like the are only 2 x 12v connections to the lasers (one from each board)... therefore I'm assuming this unit only has 2 lasers

seems very odd though that the start up sequence appears to fail, because the 12v outputs wouldn't return a signal to the board.

[Pugdaddy]

just had a thought ...

could it be possible that the control board recognises that the 12v connector (to the laser) is not pulling a current - therefore failing the test/start up sequence???

[Galvonaut]

The 12v output should be steady, other than maybe a ~5 second delay on startup. This is likely power for the lasers.

The TTL is used to modulate the laser, so should be ~5v, although measuring on a meter will likely be less as it will be turning on and off pretty quickly.

The unit I have here has a dual red/green driver but only has the red diode attached - not sure what happened to the green. So you are right about the 2x 12v output, other than each laser driver drives 2 lasers. Unfortunately the unit I have here only has the red diode - not sure what happened to the green. It also has a fan output on it.

Once you receive the laser, chuck it in and see what happens. If the laser comes on but the stepper motors fail to run correctly, I imagine there is a fault: the lasers should not come on with a static beam.

I'll have another rummage and see if the green turns up before I send it. It would be nice if you could get 3/4 of it working!

Keith

[Galvonaut]

Couldn't locate the green I'm afraid. Just posted it, then went to a shop and on the way back was stuck in traffic outside the post office. I had to use 'FRAGILE' tape as I had run out of normal stuff. I watched in disbelief as a Royal Mail employee threw every bag and package he was collecting several feet to the back of his van!

Lucky your package isn't too fragile!

[Pugdaddy]

Hi Galvanaut

You've got to love the postal service

Thank you for sending it. I'll let you know how i get on.


If it still wont kick into action I think I'm going to look at making a sound card DAC.
Ive built a few PCs in my time, so im hoping it wont be too difficult

[Pugdaddy]

Next project in mind ....

I got an old LCD projector that takes input from a dvd plaver.

I going to see if i can fire a laser through the LCD Cell. Ive get a small red line laser that I was considering using.

@Galvanaut... you ever seen it done? or would it blow the LCD cell?