Problems with external emitter...

[Jeff Bell]

Greetings!

I'm trying to resolve being able to recieve IR from our seating area, then transmitting from a different spot. My idea was to construct an external emitter, run that to the back of the theatre, and leave the USB-UIRT at the front of the theatre.

I built one of these (see "Connecting the IR Emitters", about halfway down the page), and put the emitters/wiring into a plastic project box, with a 1/8" jack on the case (so I could try different length cables to get it to the back of the theatre)

Problem is, it doesn't work. Should this emitter setup work with the USB-UIRT? I'm using 2 Radio Shack emitters (part # 276-143C), and a rather long, 20' cable. I don't think it has anything to do with the length - I tried plugging the emitters directly into the back of the UIRT, and still got no signal.

Even putting the emitters RIGHT up against the equipment, nothing happens. The UIRT itself works perfectly fine, and transmits from an insane distance quite happily, even bouncing off walls (I wonder if there's any health hazard, given its strength - I'll have to keep an eye on my wife, to make sure she doesn't start glowing )

Any thoughts? Any help would be appreciated. If there are better plans for emitters, I've got no problem building something else.

Cheers!

Jeff

[jrhees]

Jeff,

The problem you're having is due to the wiring of your 1/8" jack. The wiring for the UIRT2 is *not* standard (and I'm not sure why Don made the UIRT2 jacks this way. Anyway, the USB-UIRT wires the Anode to the tip (like the UIRT2) but the Cathode goes to the BARREL.

Also note that the USB-UIRT wires a second current-limited Anode drive to the RING so that you can effectively run two sets of emitters.

-Jon

[Jeff Bell]

...the USB-UIRT wires the Anode to the tip (like the UIRT2) but the Cathode goes to the BARREL.

Excellent! Thanks for the quick response Jon - I'll report back after I rewire it.

Cheers!

Jeff

[jrhees]

Once I figure out how to post pictures and diagrams within this forum I'll put up some threads with technical details, wiring diagrams, etc.

-Jon

[Jeff Bell]

Yay!

Works perfectly with the cathode wired to the barrel. Also, just for future reference, there's no problem with fairly long cable runs - I've got a 20' shielded cable attached to the port on the back of the UIRT.

Cheers, and thanks Jon!

Jeff

[jrhees]

Once I figure out how to post pictures and diagrams within this forum I'll put up some threads with technical details, wiring diagrams, etc.

-Jon

[JimHugh]

Why not just post them out on http://home.earthlink.net/~jrhees/USBUIRT/

[Guest]

[/quote]The problem you're having is due to the wiring of your 1/8" jack. The wiring for the UIRT2 is *not* standard (and I'm not sure why Don made the UIRT2 jacks this way. Anyway, the USB-UIRT wires the Anode to the tip (like the UIRT2) but the Cathode goes to the BARREL.

Maybe because the external emitter for some cable boxes are wired that way. At least the one that came with my box is + to tip and - to the ring.

Cheers,
-Don (Not the one above)

[Guest]

This saved me a bunch of problems - rewire Cathode to the BARREL for emitters.

Another issue is that of Girder - all of the commands and events were for the UIRT plugin. Girder will complain that that plugin is not loaded.

I edited my .GML file replacing every <ActionType>31 with <ActionType>75 and every Device="31" with Device="75".

I got the 31 and 75 from the File -> Settings -> Plugins area in Girder.

Hope this helps others - I would have had to spend a LONG time redoing these commands within Girder .

[I also posted this on AVS]