Posted by JMDickson on 16, 2001 at 9:37 PM:
In Reply to: Printing encoder wheels posted by bernard on 16, 2001 at 1:45 PM:
That would be me...
What kind of printer did you use?
I tried both a laser and a thermal wax transfer, but I ended up using a laser to get the best results (The edges were much sharper).
I also tested both MS and Logitech optics and both worked fine through the transparency sheets. I don't know what brand sheets I used though.
One idea I had was to stack and align 2 disks. This cuts down on the light getting through, but the teeth are much darker.
You may want to reduce the number of teeth. I made a special disk with an earlier version of the program. There were 4 rings that ranged fron 64 to 256 teeth, and I ended up using ~100. The movement was smooth and control was very precise. If I put too many then fast spinning caused problems.
Let me know what you find out.
JD
: Okay, I used that Encoder Wheel creator program (I'd credit the creator of the program but can't find the name in a help file or text file with the program) to create a 3 or 4 inch wide encoder wheel to use with my mouse. I printed the encoder on a piece of transparency. Problem...once I got it installed in the spinner the mouse's reader didn't even recognize any motion when it was spun. YES, I fiddled with the position of the reader and the wheel. No matter what I did, it wouldn't read it at all. Would the problem be that the encoder maybe didn't print DARK enough, or that the transparency isn't transparent enough?
: Would like to hear from some people that have printed their own encoder wheels to use with a mouse, and have had success.