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3 replies

Stray start impulses and other fun.

M mikehancockMember
Last night I ran a practice race for my intramural league with the new wireless system. The temperature varied from 5F to 10F for the three hours we were out there. The total course length was about 1200 ft and the TX and RX had fairly decent line of sight.
We had the following equipment set up:
Timer: Alge Timy XE, alkaline batteries
Wireless system: Alge TED TX400 (to start gate) and TED RX (to Timy), alkaline batteries
Finish: Alge RLS1n, alkaline battery
Start: Reliable Racing start gate of some vintage, auto return
Display: Alge D-Line display, portable battery

The first thing I noticed when I set up and tried to align the TED system was a relatively high-pitched, oscillating tone at the RX instead of the constant tone I had when I did a dry run at home. Moving them around didn't seem to change the tone. I was running short on time and it was only a practice race, so I didn't change the batteries. The manual didn't mention this specific problem, so I went with what I had.

I did have a little problem with getting impulses to transmit from the RX to the Timy. Disconnecting the outputs of the RX and shorting them together produced a valid start on the Timy, but I had to cycle Timy power to get the Timy and RX to communicate. Is this normal?

The last issue I had was with stray starts. Every 10th or so racer would have an exceptionally long time displayed. I would have to hold the start while I triggered the finish sensor a few times to catch up with the number of start impulses. I let it sit for 5 minutes with no starts to see if I was catching interference, but nothing was evident. It's possible I'm getting multiple triggers from the old start wand, as when it's pushed hard and fast it bounces and clicks multiple times. It has a pretty weak return, so initial trigger to bounce can take up to a second to complete. Will increasing the Timy delay time or block time mask this? I know we should probably replace the start gate, but the funds aren't there right now. Since we don't run USSA or FIS races, the accuracy of the wand isn't all that critical.

Thanks for any help you can give us.
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fkpfkpMember
It would appear that you have to find out if the TED units are being interfered with at your location by RF that is overpowering the system. The TED receiver is constantly trying to pick up a relativly weak signal. Ham radios are notorious for blasting high amounts of RF and perhaps there are some of them around on a close enough frequency to interfere. The interference issues are almost always at the receiver end.

Try to run all of this with the start gate and photocell wired direct to the TIMY in a controlled enviornment at a reasonable distance between devices. Everything should work fine hardwired. If it doesn't at least log down what fails to work properly.

Then introduce the TED system making sure that the transmitter is at least 20 feet from the receiver.

If it behaves normally move to a football field or parking lot that has approximately the same distance as the ski hill. The idea is to operate the system in an area removed from the possible source of interference.

Move back to the ski area once the other tests are recorded and see what happens. The frequency of the TED units will have to be changed if the interference returns.
marclacaillemarclacailleMember
After all these tests or before if you prefer make sure you have ample power. Just one lousy battery in the receiver is enough to make it start skipping impulses. I have seen cases where on the TED receiver you hear the impulse but it does not trigger the timy.

If you can, use a din cable between the receiver and the timy and the timy will power the receiver instead of the batteries,it works great if you have external power for your Timy.
M mikehancockMember
I played around with the Timy and noticed that the Delay for Chan 0 was set at .05 seconds, which would definitely cause a double trigger with our current start gate. I set it for 10 seconds and hopefully that will clear up the false starts.

The wavering sync tone has me a little concerned, but I will use it for a couple more training sessions and see what happens. Dry runs at various locations haven't duplicated the sound, so I may have gotten some interference from somewhere.

The batteries were my first thought, but they test out fine (Radio Shack battery tester) and replacing them seems not to have any effect. I use the Timy with batteries as Fred has recommended to keep the power clean.

I'll keep you updated.

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