I´m thinking of a project, where I need to control a number of button presses. It seems, that people before me have done it using solid state relays. I intend to replicate it, but out of pure interest, could it be done using the Arduino(UNO) itself?
The project is a guitar controller, playing Guitar Hero/Rockband on the PS3. The main board of the guitar controller needs the button curcuits closed or open, with it´s own 4,5V. Could the Arduino be used as a solid state relay in this case, or could the current destroy it?
Sorry about the newbie questions...don´t say you weren´t warned:-)...
Below is a link to the original design. It was built using SSR´s for the guitar controller operation...only they were using a different EPROM("propeller") instead of the Arduino.
It depends on how the buttons are wired on the original. If you want to make sure there's no interference with the original guitar-shaped controller, you probably will need sort of solid state relay or opto-coupler. If you know have more ideas on what kind of voltages (I guess either 3.3V or 5V) and the polarity used on the buttons you can probably also use simple mosfet. But don't forget in that case the common ground between the Arduino and the the controller.
It appears, from a quick google search, that PS3 controllers are standard USB devices.
Instead of mucking about with the internals of a controller, it might be cheaper and cleaner (albeit a little more time-consuming) to use one of the new Arduino Unos, a Teensy, or a USB BitWhacker to emulate it.
It depends on how the buttons are wired on the original. If you want to make sure there's no interference with the original guitar-shaped controller, you probably will need sort of solid state relay or opto-coupler. If you know have more ideas on what kind of voltages (I guess either 3.3V or 5V) and the polarity used on the buttons you can probably also use simple mosfet. But don't forget in that case the common ground between the Arduino and the the controller.
The buttons are activated by closing a curcuit of 3,3V to GND between pins on the controller mainboard. Im not sure about the sharing ground thing, I can´t imagine it´s as easy as plugging in a wire between the Arduino GND and the guitar controller GND:-)
But how would you go about this thing with MOSFET´s?
It depends on how the buttons are wired on the original. If you want to make sure there's no interference with the original guitar-shaped controller, you probably will need sort of solid state relay or opto-coupler. If you know have more ideas on what kind of voltages (I guess either 3.3V or 5V) and the polarity used on the buttons you can probably also use simple mosfet. But don't forget in that case the common ground between the Arduino and the the controller.
Well, I found that very interesting, but had no MOSFET...but I made it work with a simple transistor BC547...I´m probably frying something, but sofar it has worked just fine! This is the schematics:
