PAC-MAN Character Night Fly (combat?) for Flite Fest East

phacious

New member
What do you all think about building and flying LED-illuminated PAC-MAN shaped characters at Flight Fest East? This seems like something a few of us would enjoy. And if they'll let us do combat with these at night I think that would be a hoot.

It occurred to me a long while back that it would be fairly easy make an animated PAC-MAN and/or ghost with led strips glued to the bottom of a circle/tombstone shaped wing. I started building a +40" circle wing out of 3/4 blue foam for this purpose but never finished it. I was starting to clean and organize my shop (lol) for flite fest projects and it dawned on me that led pacman screams flite fest. I hope I can fit this into the van...

20170628_193536.jpg

I have an HK led flasher to "animate" the mouth.
 

phacious

New member
Are you going to spin it for the POV effects or just use it as a fixed led strip? Some day I'm going to play with addressable LEDs, I just what it to be... cheapish, and that might require a lot of self fabrication and programming :(

On the PAC plane-front, I think its ready for a maiden if the weather will cooperate (it won't). If not, I can work on the leds.
I measured it, this thing is a full 4'.
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LitterBug

Techno Nut
Moderator
There will be spinage for the POV. just trying to decide what frame and how to minimize weight. They aren't light....

LitterBug
 

Snarls

Gravity Tester
Mentor
Someone should get a high watt LED and put it on their multirotor to light up a good portion of the field. Something like Daniel from RCTestflight did. Then you could fly planes underneath without needing night flying lights!

Speaking of addressable LEDs, I just picked up 100 of these for a non RC related project. I'll probably end up putting some on my aircraft at some point anyway.
 

LitterBug

Techno Nut
Moderator
I have a 700 lumen bike headlight. Would not light up enough space to fly, but it is unbelievably bright shining down from above. Don't want to give away all my ideas though... ;-)
 

phacious

New member
Someone should get a high watt LED and put it on their multirotor to light up a good portion of the field. Something like Daniel from RCTestflight did. Then you could fly planes underneath without needing night flying lights!

Speaking of addressable LEDs, I just picked up 100 of these for a non RC related project. I'll probably end up putting some on my aircraft at some point anyway.

Whats the cheapest, lightest way to drive the addressable LEDs? Some aurdino board I'm sure? I saw a project that used some aurdino and a bitmap image for light sequences but I forgot what it was :(, thought I saw it on here because it was for planes and drones. Does anyone know what that is or know of something similar?

Anywho, got a flight in this morning. It's tail heavy and a handful in the wind. I think I'll move the battery to the belly so I can move it farther forward and maybe the mass below the centerline will help the stability. The control surfaces seem a bit too bulky being 3/4" blue foam, I might replace them with DTFB or sign board.
 

Snarls

Gravity Tester
Mentor
Whats the cheapest, lightest way to drive the addressable LEDs? Some aurdino board I'm sure? I saw a project that used some aurdino and a bitmap image for light sequences but I forgot what it was :(, thought I saw it on here because it was for planes and drones. Does anyone know what that is or know of something similar?

Yep pretty much any arduino should do it. I'm planning to use my LEDs with an arduino nano for a project.

Check out this project. It is not for aircraft, but it is the same principle and shows you how to set things up.

 

phacious

New member
You guys are a bad influence, I have 6 planes to get flyable for Flite Fest and now I'm shopping for this stuff ;)
If anyone knows of some good articles specific for the RC hobby please drop a link here, I don't want to reinvent the wheel.
 

phacious

New member
The pac-plane is almost on the final stretch. I need to finish the power distribution and connect the led blinker.

20170703_185828.jpg 20170703_192428.jpg


I have been very distracted with the idea of addressable LEDs. This project probably won't benefit from them, but I now have the parts on hand to make a very cool night flyer with almost unlimited light sequences. It is a lot cheaper and easier than I was led to believe. I'm using a $4 ardunio nano and a $20 16 ft strip of addressable leds cuttable to size. Basic patterns and sequences are literally copy - paste. I think I'll right an article on this when I've made some progress. There are so many possibilities with a arduino microcontroller, like controlling the color or pattern based off throttle position, switch ,or pot (it can read PWM input from an RC receiver) or making sections parts of the led strips pulse red when the flight battery is getting low. This kinda thing is right down my alley, wish I would have looked at this sooner.
 

LitterBug

Techno Nut
Moderator
Love the PAC as-is. The sequencing gives you a reason to come back next year! :) Still working on getting my broke stuff fixed. Will probably end up putting my MonkeyLights on something last minute on site next week.

Cheers!
LitterBug
 

Snarls

Gravity Tester
Mentor
Looks great phacious! Yea the adressable LEDs really have endless possibilities. I have a pack of 100 individual LEDs waiting to be used. Gotta finish up some other projects first.
 

LitterBug

Techno Nut
Moderator
Got a 5 meter strand of white LEDs. Going to try to make a giant lighted race gate to hang under my A450quad or F550hex for you to fly the PAC through... ;-)
 

phacious

New member
Best case, the pac-plane would wear your drone for a few seconds before it hits the ground. More likely I would never get close to it, the opposite of what I'd be trying to do. Here is the light cycle:


I might build another plane at flite-fest for the addressable leds during down time. Snarls, I think I'd take up knitting instead if I had to solder 100 leds individually after putting this thing together, but I may be a little burnt out.
 
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Snarls

Gravity Tester
Mentor
Snarls, I think I'd take up knitting instead if I had to solder 100 leds individually after putting this thing together, but I may be a little burnt out.

Well if you have some time to burn and want to improve your soldering skills you might consider it :p I plan to use mine in a project where strips would have been less desired otherwise for sure the strips would save a lot of time and headache.
 

LitterBug

Techno Nut
Moderator
This was absolutely awesome to watch fly at night! Great job @phacious ! You had some really great builds including your other lighted design that you whipped out with programmable lights and the X looked really great flying in the combats!

Cheers!
LitterBug