Control+ General Discussion

[Gimmick]

23 minutes ago, mortil said:

• does not matter if i move the slider 10% or 100% still same problem

 

Not sure if we're talking about the same thing:

In your first video the motor reacts to new inputs, in your second video the motor reacts to the wiggle around 0 when you let go the slider. What happens if you constantly move the slider up and down for new inputs?

 

[mortil]

1 minute ago, Gimmick said:

Not sure if we're talking about the same thing:

In your first video the motor reacts to new inputs, in your second video the motor reacts to the wiggle around 0 when you let go the slider. What happens if you constantly move the slider up and down for new inputs?

 

it stops and directly starts moving again.  very annoying.  

So you can hear it drop power and pick up power 

[allanp]

Could you rule out interference by trying it far away from your house, like more than 100 meters away?

[2GodBDGlory]

I find it curious to note that the first four C+ Technic sets (Crawler, Liebherr, Rally Car, and Volvo) all used Xl motor(s) for drive, but the fifth and sixth (Buggy and Zetros) have both made due with Ls. I almost wonder whether Lego has realized the Xl's power equivalency to the L and has canceled it for future sets. I don't really expect that this is the case; likely the rumored CAT will include at least one Xl, but it does seem like an intriguing possibility, at least. Either way, I'm happy for Lego to continue using as few Xls as possible, to bring down prices of the much more useful L!

[Andman]

43 minutes ago, 2GodBDGlory said:

I almost wonder whether Lego has realized the Xl's power equivalency to the L and has canceled it for future sets.

I hardly can imagine that they didn't notice that there is no diff between the C+ XL and C+ L motor. In fact there is. The internal gearing makes the differences. The C+ L motor offers more precision, which makes it a better choice for example for controlling pneumatic valves or steering. The C+ XL offers more inertia. Though I'm not sure how big the advantage of the XL over the L motor is.

[ord]

5 hours ago, Andman said:

The internal gearing makes the differences. The C+ L motor offers more precision

That is good to know. Do you have information about the precision of other current generation motors (e.g. SPIKE Prime)?

[kbalage]

8 hours ago, 2GodBDGlory said:

I find it curious to note that the first four C+ Technic sets (Crawler, Liebherr, Rally Car, and Volvo) all used Xl motor(s) for drive, but the fifth and sixth (Buggy and Zetros) have both made due with Ls. I almost wonder whether Lego has realized the Xl's power equivalency to the L and has canceled it for future sets. I don't really expect that this is the case; likely the rumored CAT will include at least one Xl, but it does seem like an intriguing possibility, at least. Either way, I'm happy for Lego to continue using as few Xls as possible, to bring down prices of the much more useful L!

I don't think there're any deeper reasons behind the motor usage other than the sets' requirements. Maybe as the first C+ set, the rally car used an XL motor for drive to offer a starter set with both L and XL motors. Based on my tests (video below) the XL motor handles low rpm / high load situations better than the L motor, so it fits in the sets you mentioned. The buggy is a light car with the motor output geared up so L makes sense. The Zetros seems to be contradictory for the first sight, but with the hard coupled dual motors it is already more powerful than it ideally supposed to be, there's really no need to use XL motors. I'm sure the CAT will use XL motors if needed.

 

[2GodBDGlory]

You're right, there is a small difference under load, but if I remember correctly it was mostly only noticeable with higher voltage power supplies, unlike the power supplies used in the vast majority of sets sold. I don't think the difference is great enough for Lego to really justify continuing the larger Xl, but they honestly probably will keep making it indefinitely.

This is really just wild speculation, anyways!

[Maaboo the Witch]

Just found out that the servo motor from 42114 isn't sold as an individual unit, and it hasn't been available on TLG's parts service for quite a while. Given that the dumb hub from 42113 can be purchased on its own, I don't know why TLG hasn't done the same with the servo.

[howitzer]

5 minutes ago, Maaboo35 said:

Just found out that the servo motor from 42114 isn't sold as an individual unit, and it hasn't been available on TLG's parts service for quite a while. Given that the dumb hub from 42113 can be purchased on its own, I don't know why TLG hasn't done the same with the servo.

I can't find any of the angular motors in the Lego website being sold as individual units. In B&P I can find the large angular motor but it's out of stock, while the medium angular motor can't even be found.

I wonder if the availability varies by country?

[Glaysche]

You can buy the Spike Prime angular motors from the Lego Education web site at least in the US.

[AVCampos]

Yes, and although they for some reason have different internal IDs, their characteristics are the same.

[MP LEGO Technic creations]

Just noticed the small angular motor. 

It seems to be "temporarily out of stock" although I haven't seen it before. 

https://education.lego.com/en-us/products/lego-technic-small-angular-motor/45607

[AVCampos]

Along with the LED matrix and the smaller hub, it will appear in SPIKE Essential: https://education.lego.com/en-us/products/lego-education-spike-essential-set/45345#spike™-essential

[Ngoc Nguyen]

Reject smart motors, return to PF 

[Toastie]

54 minutes ago, Ngoc Nguyen said:

Reject smart motors, return to PF

Oh no, just move on from Technic to TrainTech

Spoiler

The smart motors are such a nice way to accelerate trains really slowly to full speed (instead of having them jump forward when friction forces are successfully fought) - or just drive them regardless of load or friction forces (curves vs straights) at 5% speed

Best
Thorsten

[Tcm0]

2 hours ago, howitzer said:

I can't find any of the angular motors in the Lego website being sold as individual units. In B&P I can find the large angular motor but it's out of stock, while the medium angular motor can't even be found.

I wonder if the availability varies by country?

I think that it depends on how long they've been available. LEGO usually takes about a year until the parts are available seperatly. Mindstorms sensors are missing, too.

[howitzer]

Apparently there is now a physical PU remote that can be used with all of the modern hubs:

 

[Toastie]

1 hour ago, howitzer said:

Apparently there is now a physical PU remote that can be used with all of the modern hubs:

I don't know, but that remote was there in the first place, wasn't it?. What is happening is (I believe) that folks figure out how to make use of the event "this or that button pressed". Software-wise, this is all you need to know: When is a button pressed. Software-wise, you can do what ever you want with that piece of information.

The hubs are BLE servers, and depending on what firmware is running on the server, it will respond accordingly. The hardwired PUp remote is "just" a client, throwing out data (this button pressed, that one); the server has to recognized that. And then respond. 

Summary: The PUp remote does what they hardwired in there. The hubs respond, as per their firmware. I believe there was a lot of "Py" in the movie; that may well change what servers (PUp hubs) do, once flashed. But, as far as I know, not the remote. All a remote of that type can do is, reporting that a button was pressed.

So in essence it is not the remote, it is the hubs interpreting the remote's codes. One4All remote is then an issue for the hubs responding. The remote is dumb. As far as I believe. I just work - uhmm - there. Not here.

Best
Thorsten

[AVCampos]

That physical PUp remote is the same we've been having for years, that came in the two City PUp trains. The difference is that, installing Pybricks on the hub, now it can connect to the remote and react to button presses.

Video explanation by RacingBrick:

 

[howitzer]

7 hours ago, Toastie said:

I don't know, but that remote was there in the first place, wasn't it?. What is happening is (I believe) that folks figure out how to make use of the event "this or that button pressed". Software-wise, this is all you need to know: When is a button pressed. Software-wise, you can do what ever you want with that piece of information.

The hubs are BLE servers, and depending on what firmware is running on the server, it will respond accordingly. The hardwired PUp remote is "just" a client, throwing out data (this button pressed, that one); the server has to recognized that. And then respond. 

Summary: The PUp remote does what they hardwired in there. The hubs respond, as per their firmware. I believe there was a lot of "Py" in the movie; that may well change what servers (PUp hubs) do, once flashed. But, as far as I know, not the remote. All a remote of that type can do is, reporting that a button was pressed.

So in essence it is not the remote, it is the hubs interpreting the remote's codes. One4All remote is then an issue for the hubs responding. The remote is dumb. As far as I believe. I just work - uhmm - there. Not here.

Best
Thorsten

 

6 hours ago, AVCampos said:

That physical PUp remote is the same we've been having for years, that came in the two City PUp trains. The difference is that, installing Pybricks on the hub, now it can connect to the remote and react to button presses.

Video explanation by RacingBrick:

<snip>

Either way, having a physical remote for your PU MOCs is now available quite easily. As I see it, the biggest flaw of the PU ecosystem has now been fixed - though I could see how you might want to have also a remote with proportional control and more controls for complex operations. Thanks @kbalage for the explanation on how to get this to work!

[Gimmick]

28 minutes ago, howitzer said:

 

Either way, having a physical remote for your PU MOCs is now available quite easily. As I see it, the biggest flaw of the PU ecosystem has now been fixed - though I could see how you might want to have also a remote with proportional control and more controls for complex operations. Thanks @kbalage for the explanation on how to get this to work!

having a physical remote without an additional smartdevice :) If you just want a physical remote, you do not need pybricks.

[howitzer]

17 minutes ago, Gimmick said:

having a physical remote without an additional smartdevice :) If you just want a physical remote, you do not need pybricks.

Yes, that's the important thing.

Now if only TLG added an official out-of-the-box solution...

[Gimmick]

4 minutes ago, howitzer said:

Yes, that's the important thing.

Now if only TLG added an official out-of-the-box solution...

They are working on it, but it is not clear (at least for me) from the slides if the release will be this year or 2022...

[kbalage]

TLG is also working on a similar standalone solution to run code on the hubs, the only big question is the timeframe when they manage to have it completed and released. 

1 minute ago, Gimmick said:

They are working on it, but it is not clear (at least for me) from the slides if the release will be this year or 2022..

I wouldn't expect it this year for sure.

The real question at this point - how an "official" solution could be better and more convenient then Pybrick's implementation and does it really worth the wait? If I think about it, to beat Pybricks they'd really need to release a physical controller with proportional joysticks, then simplify the code blocks and make it possible to create a configuration for the controller and hub(s) that can be saved on the device(s) to run it without the smart device.