It has a drop ceilign now, replacing with the same. I have a decent idea of where to put lights int he ceiling - but that will not be the layout lighting. Layout lighting will be LED strips. Basic plan so far is two strips of white, a strip of RGB, and a strip of blue, so I can do anything from night through sunrise to high noon to sunset. The RGB ones I got came with a cheap controller that only does 16 steps per color and is useless, but I recently picked up a driver that is compatible with DMX as used in theater lighting (just a protocol on an RS422 network) so I cna get 256 steps per color, and in just playing around with it using the same LED strip, I was able to make some decent fades and transitions.
I have a fairly developed track plan for the lower level, although final positioning will have to wait until the demo of the mess that is there now is done so I can get truly accurate measurements (t’s probably close enough now - I never draw my plans to use ever last inch anyway).
It’s not what you see on my web site, that’s my old house. Soon as they got done ripping the current one back to bare walls, I will get pictures of my space now, and get back to updating my site. I did have a few threads here on the new places with the outline and the plan I am currently workign with. Who knows, once I have a big empty space to look at, I might come up with a different idea. My current plan may have been subconciously influenced by the walls and other features that are being removed, even though the blank canvas I was drawing on was based on just the outline of the space.
i committed to helping someone with an interlock. seems that fabricated PCBs would be a reasonable approach
wondering what other choices for board fabricators there are. is JLCPCB simply the least expensive ($2 for 5 ~4x4" board)??
also wondering about schematic capture and layout tools. I’m familiar with ExpressSch/Pcb but assume PCB output may not be usable by other fabricators. Am told KiCAD is a more professional tool that outputs Gerber files which I believe are standard.
also wondering what the common mistakes are when designing and laying out a tool
I am far from an expert - I’ve drawn 3 boards now in my life. And the third one is just from a simplified schematic of the second one.
I tried KiCad, but I had a hard time getting a handle on the whole process - getting your parts int he library for the schematic part plus getting a footprint to put it on a PCB just seems relly awkward to me. I suppose if I kept using it more, I would eventually get used to it. But I heard about JLCPCB and their compelte integration - they have the design software, board supply, AND a good selection of components (not as good as Mouser or Digi-Key, but not bad) - really and truly integrated. Every part int heir inventory has a library item for EasyEDA, and the EasyEDA BOM can be used to fill your LCSC shopping cart with the parts you need.
EasyEDA DOES allow you to save standard Gerber files, you aren’t stuck using JCLPCB if you draw your board with EasyEDA. But they do make it easy - one click and it’s uploaded to JLCPCB and it tells you how much it will cost. The promo rate is only for a board up to 100x100mm. But they are pretty inexpensive with larger boards as well. And ou cna get them in different quantities, and the more you get, the less per board you pay.
There are tutorials for all the free programs, like KiCAD and EasyEDA, that will walk you through drawing the schematic using that particular tool, and then laying out the PCB. It turned out to be much easier than I thought it would be.
KiCAD and EasyEDA seem to be the only practical free software packages now, Eagle is still free but very limited, and there’s one other that there is a way to get a free non commercial license that removes many of the limitations of the free one (the limitations are almost always in the size of a board you cna design and/or the number of components - and number of components is very eacy to exceed even for something fairly simple. Like I said, I tried KiCAD but had a hard time - and I use other C
i’m really glad you brought up the SMC circuit using LM324s. The circuit is not capable of dirving regular motors, but it worked on the tortoise motors. I think I can do a simple board using 324s, mpc23017 to drive 8 switch machines and have 8 I/O for buttons or LEDs.