Re: Bit OT - accurate timing
Quote:
Originally Posted by
m_c
I've not been about for a while, but I know there are some electronic geniuses about on here (or at least people who have more of a clue than me!), so figured I'd ask here.
I know somebody looking for a timing system for races, but the quotes so far have been a fair bit more than what they'd hoped for. I reckon a basic system could be done for a far more reasonable sum, but I'm having trouble trying to find anything capable of supplying an accurate time.
The RTC chips I've found so far only seem to be able to supply the time to the nearest second, when ideally I'd need at least 0.1second or even 0.01second accuracy.
Like all things, I'm sure there is a proper name for what I'm looking for, but numerous google searches havn't tunred up anything useful, so does anybody have any suggestions?
Timing to 0.01sec is easy, just program up a PIC. Capturing and reading the time is more tricky. What did you have in mind?
Re: Bit OT - accurate timing
At the moment, my general thoughts are based around a couple of Cubloc modules.
Start line would involve an infrared break beam (or possibly just a switch activated by a small bar/lever), and a time gets recorded once the racer breaks the beam. This time would then be stored onto a backup (cubloc have a SD card module), and then also printed (I'm thinking small thermal printer for this bit).
The racer number would also be entered, and stored along with the time.
Finish line would also involve a break beam, with the time being read into a computer, aswell as another back-up made.
Then once the race is over, either the backup or barcodes are entered into the computer, to provide accurate race times.
My main problem just now is the accurate timing part of it.
Re: Bit OT - accurate timing
Quote:
Originally Posted by
m_c
At the moment, my general thoughts are based around a couple of Cubloc modules.
Start line would involve an infrared break beam (or possibly just a switch activated by a small bar/lever), and a time gets recorded once the racer breaks the beam. This time would then be stored onto a backup (cubloc have a SD card module), and then also printed (I'm thinking small thermal printer for this bit).
The racer number would also be entered, and stored along with the time.
Finish line would also involve a break beam, with the time being read into a computer, aswell as another back-up made.
Then once the race is over, either the backup or barcodes are entered into the computer, to provide accurate race times.
My main problem just now is the accurate timing part of it.
A PC has 1mS resolution inbuilt available to software applications but are you looking for something not PC based? What would be the interface to your system?
