Wireless races ahead!

Though not strictly speaking in our sphere of interest we thought this wireless application would be of interest to you. And possibly inspire you with an idea for one of your applications!

LPRS is supplying their market leading easyRadio Advanced (eRA) wireless modules to Microgate, the specialist Italian sports timing system manufacturer, for use in their new wireless athletics training timer – WITTY.

The new Microgate WITTY has been designed as a portable, practical and precise athlete timing system which meets all the requirements of the latest training methods. It can perform all the measurements typical of modern athletic preparation including sprint, shuttle, resistance and courses whilst also meeting many custom requirements. The WITTY can acquire results with accuracy higher than one thousandth 1/1000 of a second.

Significant features of this timer include an intuitive and easy to use graphical interface with a colour display, simple and fast learning process, single or double timing photocells available with unlimited extra photocells for unlimited intermediate times, calculation of speed (km/h, m/s, mph), fast data transfer to PC (for rankings, data assessment and export) via an on-board USB interface and water resistant. Operational for 10 hours from internal batteries WITTY is supplied in a backpack for complete portability.

The key to the success of the system is the use of LPRS eRA modules to transfer data from the self-configuring photocells, which are easy to set up and offer fast repositioning when moving from one exercise to another. The eRA modules offer reliable wireless transmission up to 150m range and provides selectable transmission frequencies, allowing multiple WITTY systems to be used in the same training area.

Federico Gori of Microgate srl comments; “We have a very good working relationship with LPRS and have used LPRS products for many years in our ski race timing gates. The new eRA wireless modules offer exceptional versatility and were simple to design-in to our products.”

The Microgate WITTY system may be expanded with the addition of further photocells (single or double) to record lap times. A range of accessories are available including starting pads, time displaying LED boards and direction indicators. The WITTY is compatible with the Microgate Optojump Next system, an optical measurement system which can measure flight and contact times during the performance of a series of jumps to an accuracy of 1/1000 of a second.

The recently introduced easyRadio Advanced (eRA) wireless module range of transmitters and transceivers incorporates the unique LPRS easyRadio software protocol and build on the simplicity of previous easyRadio (02) modules by remaining true to the original brief of “reducing time to market by removing the complexity associated with the radio software development interface”.

As well as many new and advanced features eRA offers a much improved transmitting range with latest field tests reporting 1.6 mile coverage owing to narrow-band operation and greater immunity from interference. Other innovative features on the easyRadio Advanced transmitters and transceivers include the ability to change the bandwidth of the radio from 150KHz down to 12.5KHz thus providing narrow-band performance on a wide-band budget. eRA modules can also interface to other raw data modules using either FSK (FM) or ASK (AM) modulation modes. Using the free flash firmware upgrade tools from LPRS new updates/features can be quickly programmed by engineers, making a truly future proof solution. Designed with a back compatible pin configuration, current easyRadio 02 users can easily upgrade to easyRadio Advanced versions with a minimum of fuss.

In addition to designing and manufacturing the highly successful easyRadio Advanced (eRA) wireless modules, the full LPRS product range now includes, Raspberry Pi and Arduino Shield wireless platforms, narrow band long range wireless modules from CDP, the IQRF range of wireless networking components, the IQVC range of visual control panels together with antenna, wireless key fobs and a wide range of sensor products.