20 x Cathedral Chime MIDI Doorbell System

[Jeff]

Hi All;
I'm an experienced EE, with almost no musical capability or any MIDI background :(

A decade ago I had an idea for an exotic and elaborate door chime system in our home. I wanted to build up a chime set of two or three octaves, and power it with some type of embedded controller. Various tunes would be saved to internal or external memory. It took me a decade to get around to making it. And fortunately there were plenty tools available now!

I recently came upon a very nice set of 20 cathedral chimes with electric actuators.

I bought the nifty MD24 kit, and assembled a programmable power supply and solenoid drivers around it.

Channels 0-19 are used as notes, and channels 20-23 are set up as a four-bit resolution volume control system (programmable power supply for the solenoids).

I then bought a MIDI file 3.5" floppy storage device, and one of the USB MIDI interface devices to output MIDI files from the computer and save them as MIDI files on the 3.5" floppy player.

I'm hoping you're still following me at this point :)

Where I am lost is trying to figure out what the note assignment is and how to configure the MD24 hardware to function as I have configured the electronics. And then be able to play off-the-shelf MIDI files needing little if any modification.

I've included some images of the hardware for your amusement.

The completed system will be embedded into a hollow wall near the large entry to our home. I have already designed the doorbell interface, although that portion is not shown.

Thanks, jeff

[John]

Hi Jeff,

Great project, thank you for the detailed post. I hope you'll post a video of the chimes in action.

Your project should work great--all we need to do is send a SysEx configuration message to the MD24.

Please let me know which notes correspond to the MD24 outputs 0-19. You can see a list of midi note numbers here: http://highlyliquid.com/support/library/midi-note-numbers/

Also, let me know which output 20-23 corresponds to which bit in the volume level. (which output is the most significant bit, etc.)

After I have that information, I'll post a configuration sysex message for you to use.

[Jeff]

Hi Jeff,

Please let me know which notes correspond to the MD24 outputs 0-19. You can see a list of midi note numbers here: http://highlyliquid.com/support/library/midi-note-numbers/

Also, let me know which output 20-23 corresponds to which bit in the volume level. (which output is the most significant bit, etc.)

After I have that information, I'll post a configuration sysex message for you to use.

John, Thank You very much for your reply and offer of assistance. Your example will help me to understand the interface and sysex messages. Critical for any changes I would make later on.

The MIDI note number 69 (A4) is MD24 output 0, and MIDI note number 88 is E6.

The volume MSB is output 23. The output voltage is the highest (loudest) with the upper four bits off (logic zero).

I'll be happy to record some videos of it playing, before and after installation.

Regards, Jeff Thomas

[John]

Hi Jeff,

Here's a sysex configuration message for the application. More info about sending the message from your computer is here: http://highlyliquid.com/support/library/midi-sysex/


// Header
F0 00 01 5D 03 01

// Outputs 0-19: Note Trigger, Note #s 69-88 (45h - 58h)
00 01 00 45
01 01 00 46
02 01 00 47
03 01 00 48
04 01 00 49
05 01 00 4A
06 01 00 4B
07 01 00 4C
08 01 00 4D
09 01 00 4E
0A 01 00 4F
0B 01 00 50
0C 01 00 51
0D 01 00 52
0E 01 00 53
0F 01 00 54
10 01 00 55
11 01 00 56
12 01 00 57
13 01 00 58

// Outputs 20-23: Note Velocity Bits 3-6
// Most recent note will determine volume level.
// Velocity is a 7-bit value. Using highest 4 bits. Bit 6 is MSB.
14 0E 00 00
15 0F 00 00
16 10 00 00
17 11 00 00

// Footer
F7


The only issue is that outputs 20-23 are providing a "positive logic" representation of the velocity value. So based on your description, you'll have to invert those outputs to interface with the solenoid power selector.

More info about configuring the MD24 is available in the MD24 firmware user manual, available from the MD24 product page (http://highlyliquid.com/kits/md24/).

Let me know if you have questions--I look forward to hearing about your results.

[Jeff]

WooHoo! Success! I have a functional computer keyboard controlled chime action.

I had to reboot my little keyboard MIDI program to get it working following sending your sysex message.

Now it's time to start working the bugs out.


Thanks Again for your help here. Regards, jeff

[John]

Did you remove the comments (lines beginning with "//") when using the sysex file generator? I think this is the source of the problem.

[John]

WooHoo! Success! I have a functional computer keyboard controlled chime action.

I had to reboot my little keyboard MIDI program to get it working following sending your sysex message.

Now it's time to start working the bugs out.


Thanks Again for your help here. Regards, jeff

Great to hear. :) By the way...if you were to post a schematic, I know of several other users that would be really happy.

[Jeff]

Great to hear. :) By the way...if you were to post a schematic, I know of several other users that would be really happy.

Hi John, I certainly will.

And Thank You again for the great assistance.

I was so lazy that I didn't compose it in ORCAD in advance of wiring it up as I usually would. It was all from a scrap piece of paper ;). I'll get this drawn up and post a PDF of the schematic here for others to use as an example.

I'll also revise the circuit to include R/C pulsed outputs if preferred so that I don't have to edit note lengths to work with the chimes.

Regards, Jeff Thomas

[Jeff]

OK, John's care package with the new Beta firmware rev 1.2 arrived yesterday.
I spent a few minutes looking over the PDF, and poked in a few different pulse length values to test. In all, I generated sysex messages with 240ms, 120ms, 100ms, 76ms. I settled on 76ms, as this value worked well in low and high volume, and tended to keep the noise from the dampers to a minimum. Of course, your mileage may vary depending on your hardware.

I pasted the sysex message below (note volume is off):


F0 00 01 5D 03 01
13
00 01 00 45
01 01 00 46
02 01 00 47
03 01 00 48
04 01 00 49
05 01 00 4A
06 01 00 4B
07 01 00 4C
08 01 00 4D
09 01 00 4E
0A 01 00 4F
0B 01 00 50
0C 01 00 51
0D 01 00 52
0E 01 00 53
0F 01 00 54
10 01 00 55
11 01 00 56
12 01 00 57
13 01 00 58
14 0E 00 00
15 0F 00 00
16 10 00 00
17 11 00 00
F7

Thank You very much John! It saved me from having to add a bunch of r/c circuit timers to the board, or editing the note lengths of each MIDI tune.

I'll follow up with a link to a video of it running, before installing it into the wall cavity.

Regards, Jeff

[Jeff]

Hi all!

I finally converted the video of the MD24 powered Deagan door chimes and put it up on youtube. Hope you enjoy it.
Again, Thank You John for all your help and advice.

Regards, Jeff


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmi_gWO997E

[John]

Hi Jeff,

It looks and sounds great! Thanks so much for posting the video--I will include this in next user project blog entry.

[John]

Jeff,

I forgot to mention it--this project was the subject of last week's blog entry:

http://highlyliquid.com/blog/?p=379

Thanks again for posting the images & video. If I can belatedly add any links to the blog entry, please let me know.

[Jeff]

Jeff,

I forgot to mention it--this project was the subject of last week's blog entry:

http://highlyliquid.com/blog/?p=379

Thanks again for posting the images & video. If I can belatedly add any links to the blog entry, please let me know.


Hi John, Thanks for doing that!

I had a few more short videos saved from the keyboard sessions, and posted them as replies to the original videos. One is a short test of five Christmas tunes.

Regards, Jeff

[Jeff]

I finally found the time to put up a webpage detailing the build and installation of the Deagan MIDI Chimes doorbell.

http://www.amug.org/~jthomas/chimes.html

Hopefully it'll bring additional business to Highly Liquid. There have been many email inquiries on the You Tube vids.

Regards, Jeff

[John]

Jeff, thanks for posting the extra details, and for the link!

[Jeff]

I had a few emails from folks interested in a complete, and non-homebrew looking MIDI doorbell chime system.

I decided to design a complete solution in a compact package, ready to power a set of cathedral chimes. This door chime system has been named the 'CLEF'. It integrates a MIDI sequence file recorder and player, along with an MD24 decoder processor, and an intelligent, processor based doorbell button interface.

It can power up to 21 cathedral chimes, using a programmable output voltage varying from 6 to 22vdc at 4 amps.

Here's two images of the CLEF controller hardware:

http://www.amug.org/~jthomas/clef2.jpg


http://www.amug.org/~jthomas/clef3.jpg


Click here for the link (http://www.amug.org/~jthomas/chimes.html)

Many Thanks to John for his efforts in designing the MD24 rev G and related program software.

Regards, Jeff

[engrssc]

I have an MD24 Rev E with an 004667 m/p. Looking to program (each) output to operate as a one shot with a somewhere around 50 - 70 ms pulse. The output to be reset as soon as the MIDI input (keyboard key) for that output port is released. The object is to have a momentary pulse output to drive Deagon chime drivers.

Rgds,
Ed

[John]

I have an MD24 Rev E with an 004667 m/p. Looking to program (each) output to operate as a one shot with a somewhere around 50 - 70 ms pulse. The output to be reset as soon as the MIDI input (keyboard key) for that output port is released. The object is to have a momentary pulse output to drive Deagon chime drivers.

Rgds,
Ed

Hi Ed,

We're no longer shipping upgrade ICs for Rev E MD24 boards. But you can get fixed-pulse length output from a Rev G MD24 with a firmware update:

http://forum.highlyliquid.com/showthread.php?t=661

Do you have a Rev G MD24 on hand?

[Jeff]

I've been assisting Ed via email on his chime project.
Thanks John for noting the firmware differences on the fixed length feature in Rev E; I'd completely forgotten about that.

He is working on varying the timing for what works best with his solenoid rack.

Hopefully he'll post a followup here, or in a new thread about his work.

Regards, Jeff