Transmitter / receiver troubles

Robotics and electronics discussion Miscellaneous
1

As a disclaimer, I’m new to alot of this, so I apologize in advance for any dumb questions.

I recently bought a 6 channel Vex transmitter / receiver, not knowing that the receiver communicates only with a Vex microprocessor. I have a few questions about methods of modifying the setup to work for my project:

  1. I have a Handy Board, and I was wondering if the receiver might be able to communicate with it. The HB uses an RJ11 cable for computer interfacing, and the Vex receiver uses RJ10 to communicate with its microprocessor. but are there RJ10 -> RJ11 adapters that could be used, and if there are, any thoughts on whether the information will be passed in a format readable by the HB?

  2. (a) Is there somewhere I can find a receiver that can be tuned to the frequency of the transmitter
    and (b) Would it necessarily control the servos directly or could it be used to send input information to the Handy Board? Both options may be desirable, I just want to see what’s out there.

Any input would be great, thanks for taking the time to help me out if you can answer any of these questions.

2

Hello,

It’s certainly possible to connect a Vex receiver to something else: one example is posted at http://www.idleloop.com/robotics/3ksumo/. However, you shouldn’t focus on the similarity of the physical connectors since that has nothing to do with the compatibility of the electrical signals. In the case of the Handy Board, the RJ11 cable is used for serial data and is probably connected to a hardware UART, which is not helpful in timing the pulses coming out of the Vex receiver. You need to determine what comes out of the receiver and then decide which hardware on your Handy Board is most suited to reading that. By the way, this might not be the best beginner project.

The transmitter is probably compatible with other receivers out there, but I’m not sure. If you have an RC receiver available, try sticking the crystal from your Vex receiver into it to see if it works.

- Jan