2DOF motion simulator build

I'm looking for some potentiometers for the build and I came across this (it's the 149):
http://www.vekoy.com/UserFiles/File/PDF-liitteet2/149-VISHAY.pdf
It's a 10Kohm cermet potentiometer with 300° degree mechanical and 270° degree electrical turn.
Would these work well with a diy motion simulator?

I personally suggest the 180 Hall effect's everyone uses and Ensure you get some coupler's along with them.

Hi,
at my first build i was using some Vishay Cermet Pots too. I don't know which exact one it was. They worked very well and are very robust. But i used them without gearing so i had some resolution lost. I will use them in my new build too, until i got some hall effects.
As mentioned very often use flex couplings they make the build so much easyer.
I use this one and the cermet pot fits nice in the 6,35 hole. http://www.ebay.de/itm/201247866202?_trksid=p2059210.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

Hello,
Photo of my newly commissioned 2DOF.
2 important things in my opinion:
1. arms on engines must be properly sized and secure.
2. driveshaft under the seat must be very well set in rotation and axial
https://www.youtube.com/user/corbeau1971/videos
Greetings.
Stéphane

Little progress. I bought the Vishay cermet pots and I should get them this week. I also got the power cord for the psu and managed to get it running


The "mod" was really easy, I just used a servo cable and connected all the wires.
I also got my cheap Chinese H-bridges today. Now it's time to solder some wires to the psu and see if I can get my motors to turn.

How's the noise level on the fans ?

They're pretty noisy. I definitely have to do something about the fans. My phone said the noise was around 75-78 dB (if you can trust the dB meter on it).

How close are you holding the phone to the PSU....maybe ill try a dB app and see what my 600's run at.

I held the phone about 30cm from the psu.

ya those little apps dont work very well, Lol

I decided not to use the 1300w power supply as it was way too noisy. I tried to make it more silent by adding couple of resistors to the fan leads, but it would have required to disassemble the psu to atoms. Instead I got two HP ESP113 32A psus from work .
Getting them to turn on was a bit more challenging than plugging in a servo wire.
Luckily the internet had already solved it:
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=358340

After some time soldering, I got them to work.

I got the potentiometers this week and today I started to build a platform to test the electronics.
I mounted the motors to a wooden platform with corner metal peaces from local hardware store. I used a M6 threaded bar that I cut in to appropriate length to attach the motors to the corner metals.

I also added one long threaded bar to the top mounting hole on the motors to make it more rigid.

I attached the potentiometers with a 3d printed part that I drew. Now I'll have to find a way to attach the potentiometers to the motor shafts.

I attached the pot holder model to this post if someone has any use for it. It's the Potentiometerholder.zip . There's a stl and sketchup file in it.

I also started to wire things, but it's getting late so I'll continue tomorrow.

I would personally modify the motor brackets and lower the motor's closer to the plywood. Lucian had mounts like that and im pretty sure a screw or 2 snapped in the process.

I did it the same way. Like noorbeast said in my thread, the shaft is not hardened, so no special drills are nedded and it's going very easy. I just screwed an m6 screw in and cuttet it with a saw. Fits perfect over the flexible couplings on ebay.

I can tell you right away that those motor mounts will not hold that motor. you will get crazy flex until something breaks and then your sim will go all nutty and it wont be fun.

Thank you for the input. I'll have to find a way to lower the mounts of the motors. Maybe cut the L-bars a little and attach the motors to the lower holes on them.
This will not be the final version. I just mounted the motors on the plywood to test out the electronics so I'm more than happy to hear improvement ideas for the final version.

I wired everything today and it does not look pretty, but it gets the work done:


I haven't attached the pots to the motor shafts yet. I'd prefer a way without drilling a hole to the shafts as I only have a cheap 12v drill that would probably let smoke out if it came in contact with something harder than a plywood. I have an idea of how to connect the pots with Sugru and a 3d printer. If that doesn't work, I'll have to try drilling a hole and hope that my drill can withstand it.

I got the motors to turn by turning the pots by hand, but there's a problem with the PSU's. Every time the motor stops the PSU goes down for quarter of a second. Does anybody know why that is happening? the psu's stay on while the motors start to move.
I would think that the motors don't draw any current when they're stopping so it wont be overloading the PSU? or is it the "backslash" current from the motors that shuts down the psu's?

I'm still having problems with my PSUs. they were shutting down when the motors started/stopped (when pwm is set to max).
I managed to keep the PSU's alive when the motors start by adding a 27000 uF capacitor parallel to the motors before H-ridges to provide the starting current (the caps are pretty big).

The PSUs still shut down when the motors are stopping.
I talked to one of my coworker and he suggested that maybe the voltage spike produced by the motors when they stop is shutting down the PSUs. He suggested that I'd add a diode parallel to discharge the voltage spikes. Unfortunately that did not help.
Does anybody have any suggestions what I could try to get the PSUs to work?
The PSUs model number is HP ESP113 and they're rated at 32A.

If not, I'll have to think about replacing the PSU's one more time.

I started the frame build this weekend. I ended up building the frame out of 3x3cm steel tube instead of aluminium profile.

Here's some photos of the building:

Cutting the pieces:


The plan before anything is welded:


Here's the chair that I'll be using:


Time to weld things together:


"Almost" finished:


I attached the sliding mechanism from the chair to the "feet" end to move the pedals instead of the chair. It helps to keep the center of gravity in place for different sized people.


The end result of 8 hours cutting, tinkering and welding


I also managed to solve my problem with the PSU's shutting down when the motors stop! I attached a diode to the +12 wire to stop the voltage spike reaching the psu's and shutting them down.

Nice jub , but be cautious of making the seat adjustable as you will upset the balance. Fix the balance point for the heaviest person and make wheel and pedals adjustable.