PING Development

From On-signal: Projects & Research

Description

The on going development of PING. Perfecting the technics and playability.. The main parts which still are in development are the bats and the canons.

The bats

Pingpong bat with electret microphone

First 2 versions of PING we had bats with 'mechanical' sensors/switches for the I/O interface. This means that the system could be fooled, by just pushing the bat and by that firing the other canon. Now we are trying to implement a microphone (electret microphone;http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elektretmicrofoon) into the bats.

By filtering the signal, recorder by the mic, we can fire the canon on the sound (which is vibration) of the balls hitting the bat. By filtering only on a few frequencies of the ball hitting the bat, we can make it work.

The canons

The main problem with the canons was the 'ball-release' device. Which some time released not 1 ball, but more. At PING v1 and v2 we used the device used in cars for the electronic locks. Now we obtained some pinball-machine parts, which are easier to control. ((fotootje??)) For the ball-release device we are thinking of a construction which will work for 100% and will only release 1 ball at a time (but still fast enough to play fast rallies).