Table of contents
Abstract
A mysterious black box addresses the Halloween theme of "Boo in a box".
Project
Intro
This blog is a 2024 Halloween project inspired by the theme "Boo in a box". The project uses a proverbial electronics black box to marry the Halloween box theme with element 14's focus on electronics. The classic electronics black box has mysterious inner workings than seem appropriate for a Halloween project.
The Proverbial Black Box - video
The Black Box Teardown - video
Audio
The audio is supplied by a BY8301-16P module which allows any sounds to be triggered by digital inputs or a serial interface - push buttons in my case.
The manual is in Chinese and not completely translated so I am including some instructions on how to load the module up with audio files.
Loading Audio Files
The module has a USB port that shows up as 2 disk drives when plugged into a computer, however one drive is so full, there is no room to copy anything to it. The other drive is not formatted properly to be accessed by a file manager. Fortunately the drive that is full has a program on it that will transfer files.
The file name is in Chinese, but it is the only file with a .exe extension. Start by running that program.
This program window will appear:
Click on this ???? tab to bring up a file requester
The program window now looks like this, with a blank files area:
Click this button to bring up a file requester.
Select the audio files you wish to copy and click Open. The files should be numbered as above.
This will paste the file names into the blank file area of the program like this:
Click the first tab. This goes back to this window.
Click the copy button as shown above.
Wait for the green progress bar to fill in and the copy is done.
You can close the program now. Disconnect the USB port and connect VCC to the module to start playing sounds.
The user manual is attached below.
Eyes
The Adafruit Monster Eyes were repurposed from another project, but suddenly stopped working after I had finally got them built into the head. It turns out it was a known bug with early versions of the eyes - I just had to go through updating the firmware. While I was at it I eliminated the splash screen, so now it is just spooky eyes. There is a link below to their web page.
Discussion
This project had such rich potential for creative features it was constantly morphing as it came together. The animatronic mechanisms were quite tricky to design and implement, especially the platform raising system. In order to allow the mechanism to fold flat and have a large extension all while keeping the platform horizontal, required some intricate design work.
The black box took a lot of work to measure, cut and assemble into a smooth perfect box... but then the paint job warped everything and made it look pretty crude....but I wasn't going to redo it...
The audio subsystem and the platform lift mechanism are both useful building blocks that I will likely use in future projects.
There has been a bit of a lull for me in element 14 activity, so it is good to start getting back into more content generation. I had a lot of fun with this project.
Audio User Manual
