I'm making an Apollo Command Module simulator using a number of computers and custom made and modded equipment, but i'm stuck on how to perform one critical action.
Instead of engineering my own drivers and such, I decided to route the switches of the simulator into a modified keyboard, which will then allow input into a computer and into a mission control environment. However, due to the keyboard memory limit, i can only press so many keys at a time before the keyboard can't see any more being pressed.
So, each switch in the simulator will be as the originals on the real capsule - single pole, double throw. I need a way for when the switch is thrown in either direction for it to provide a burst of current to connect the keyboard circuit and send a keypress command to the SIMcomputer. The only way I could think is to connect a motor to each switch position, and have that rotate a metal dongle, which would connect the two contacts on the inside of the keyboard - but that quickly gets expensive, and large, and the motor would be continously running, giving multiple keypress commands - i simply want one. I could hook up a transistor setup to that to shut it off, but i still would like to get rid of the motor completely. Is there some kind of component someone knows of that can perform this function? (prefer it to be cheap, possibly home-manufacturable, and if at all possible, simple and small.)
thanks!
Instead of engineering my own drivers and such, I decided to route the switches of the simulator into a modified keyboard, which will then allow input into a computer and into a mission control environment. However, due to the keyboard memory limit, i can only press so many keys at a time before the keyboard can't see any more being pressed.
So, each switch in the simulator will be as the originals on the real capsule - single pole, double throw. I need a way for when the switch is thrown in either direction for it to provide a burst of current to connect the keyboard circuit and send a keypress command to the SIMcomputer. The only way I could think is to connect a motor to each switch position, and have that rotate a metal dongle, which would connect the two contacts on the inside of the keyboard - but that quickly gets expensive, and large, and the motor would be continously running, giving multiple keypress commands - i simply want one. I could hook up a transistor setup to that to shut it off, but i still would like to get rid of the motor completely. Is there some kind of component someone knows of that can perform this function? (prefer it to be cheap, possibly home-manufacturable, and if at all possible, simple and small.)
thanks!