Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: Homebrew PCBs

----- Original Message -----
From: "Roy J. Tellason" <rtellason@...>
To: <Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 31, 2004 12:43 AM
Subject: Re: [Homebrew_PCBs] homebrew rotary multi-position switch


> On Monday 30 August 2004 07:29 pm, ron amundson wrote:
>
> > One could also use optocouplers and a mylar disk...
> > bit it gets spendy.
>
> Not necessarily. I have a couple of motors equipped with such encoders.
And
> you have two of them in any given mouse that's out there -- it shouldn't
be
> too hard to adapt that technology to be used with a knob and a shaft,
though
> a good bit of weight behind the panel gives it a better feel.
>
> This sort of thing was actually used, in a z80-based system to control
most
> all functions on the Moog Source -- you had what was basically a membrane
> panel, where you selected what function you wanted to mess with, you had
a
> couple or three digits of LED display to tell you what the current value
was,
> and you had one big knob to fiddle with it.

Electro-mechanical encoders are quite cheap, they are made by ALPS and
Bourne. One of those with a small MCU and a display will do what you want.

Leon