Ricky T.:
I know this subject has been discussed in previous forum posts, but I didn't get a clear understanding of how pit stops/car refueling work in UR 3.0 - so forgive this rehashing of the topic. First of all, my track is Tomy/AFX HO - I took several hours to look on the web to see if there was any kind of old track still available that I could make "real" pit stops with - I didn't find any. So, I started looking at the pit stop or refueling options that various race management software provides. I found one where you stopped your car for 2 seconds on the same detector used for counting laps; that seems cool, but probably hard to hit that small target. So, I eventually ended up reading about how UR 3.0 handles it - and there is where i got a bit confused.
I drew the diagrams below to try to depict how I THINK (or hope) it works - I'd appreciate it fi you'll tell me if I am right, or if not, correct my misunderstanding.
Attachment 47620
The upper portion of the diagram shows a 2-lane track with two infrared detectors in each lane - the regular lap count detector (blue circles) and a second "pit out" infrared detector (green circles). If I understand how this might work, after the car passes by the lap count detector, it enters the "pit area" - i.e., the place between the two detectors. As long as the car doesn't go past the "pit out" detector, it is still in the pit, and would get refueled. That assumes that UR 3 (or whatever the input device is, like a Phidget digital input) ignores the times when there are very short times between detector outputs - i.e., during normal racing.
Since UR 3 only has one pit sensor signal per lane, you have to have somehow combine the signals from the lap count and "pit out" infrared detectors. I don't know if UR 3 would allow the signals to be combined and feed the SAME SIGNAL into both the "Detect Slot Car" and "Pit Sensor" inputs for a lane, so I drew a logic OR gate that combines the signals to feed only the lane's "Pit Sensor" input. The bottom portion of my drawing shows how the timing would look for such a hardware setup.
So would UR3 work with this setup? What does the "Wait (ms) before refuel starts" in Circuit Settings do? Any help would be most appreciated - it seems adding this feature to my track would result in a lot of fun and additional challenge!
Regards,
Paul (BBB)