DC16

[davisgraveyard]

I am trying to get my DC16 to work with my Prop-1.

I want to hook up several 12V LED's to the DC16 and be able to turn them on and off.

The LED's will only light up if I put the copper wire to the V+ and the silver wire to the Grnd on the DC16.   So I wired all the silver wire sides to the Grnd and each of he copper wires to the OUTx pins.

I set the switch to 2.

I am doing just a basic command to test to see if the LED will turn on.

SEROUT 7, OT2400, ("!DC16",%11,"P",1,1)

The jumpers for address are set right.   The baud is set right.  The cable to the Prop-1 is connected to PIN7.
The prop-1 has a ULN2003 installed.   

I was operating a AP8 in the chain and that was working fine but the DC16 wasn't doing anything.   I have removed the AP8 for testing and just have the DC16 connected to the Prop-1.

So what am I doing wrong?

Jeff

[gadget-evilusions]

You need to have your led's connected to +V and the output, not the output and gnd. The outputs when activated conncect to ground not supply power.

[JonnyMac]

Brian is right: the DC-16 outputs are just like the Prop-1 and Prop-2; they're active low, so the common side needs to be connected to V+.  Leds have a flat edge on their body; this is the negative terminal that will connect to OUTx -- just make sure you have an appropriate resistor in the circuit.

[davisgraveyard]

Thanks guys.  swaped the wiring and all is well.  I thought that might be the case thats why I posted the question.

I am using the MiniSpotlights from Burt of Bad Boys Scenic Design Fame.   They already have the resistor wired in and the work great with the Prop1 and now the DC16 too.

Jeff

[JonnyMac]

If you connect those directly to a Prop-1 or Prop-2 you can fade them up or down with the PWM instruction.

[gadget-evilusions]

If you connect those directly to a Prop-1 or Prop-2 you can fade them up or down with the PWM instruction.

So the DC-16 will only do on and off, no PWM right? I am building my first project with a dc-16 right now. I was hoping to be able to PWM on the dc-16. I need 21 outputs for strings of led's. I might only be able to PWM the ones I can actually attatch to the prop-1 right?

[JonnyMac]

The DC-16 is only capable of on and off.  While you can do PWM on the Prop-1 and Prop-2, it only works to ramp up (from fully off to fully on) or ramp down (from fully on to fully off).  And you must do it in a loop.  If you want the ability to PWM an output and have it maintain that level while the program is doing other things you must use a Prop-SX.  Ironically, I just posted an LED dimmer demo (which uses background PWM on four outputs) last night in the Prop-SX forum.