DOWNRANGE Operator Manual

01What this system is

DOWNRANGE controls 8 rotating targets. Each target sits flat at its home position, rotates 90° to an open (exposed) position on command, holds there for a set time, then rotates back home. Every lane is timed independently.

You drive all of it from a web page served by the controller itself. Connect a phone, tablet or laptop to the trainer's own WiFi, open the page, and you have the whole range in front of you. Nothing is installed, and no internet connection is involved at any point.

The three levels of organisation

Everything in the interface is built from the same three-deep structure. Learn this and the rest of the manual follows:

Who can do what

There are two levels of access, and the split is deliberate: running the range never requires a login, changing it does.

02Safety first

• Nobody downrange while the system is powered. A course can start from any connected device, and a running course keeps cycling on its own timer until it finishes or is stopped.
• Keep hands clear of the rotation path when a lane shows anything other than HOME. A lane in EXPOSED is not finished — it is holding, and it will drive itself home when the hold time expires.
• Stop is your emergency control. It is on every screen, at the top of the page, and it cuts all eight drivers immediately. Know where it is before you start a run.
• Stop does not park the targets. It halts them wherever they happen to be, part-rotated included. Use Home All Targets to bring everything back to a known position before anyone approaches the target line.
• Treat a FAULT as a physical problem. It means a lane did not reach its limit switch — usually a jam, an obstruction or a mechanical failure. Power down before investigating it by hand.
• Confirm the lanes are at home before going forward. Read the lane grid on the course screen, and confirm visually. Do not rely on the page alone.

03Getting connected

The controller hosts its own WiFi access point out of the box. Nothing else is needed — no router, no internet, no app.

1. Power the unit. The TFT screen on the controller comes up and shows the network mode and IP address.
2. Join the trainer's WiFi from your phone, tablet or laptop:

   Network (SSID)	Target_System_AP
   Password	targetrange123

   Your device may warn that this network has no internet. That is expected — stay connected to it.
3. Open a browser and go to http://192.168.4.1. Type it in full, including http://, so the browser does not try to search for it.
4. Wait for the boot splash. The badge and motto animate for about three seconds, then the control interface appears.

Reading the controller's TFT screen

The small screen on the unit itself is the authority on how to reach it. It shows:

• AP followed by an IP — the unit is hosting its own network. Join Target_System_AP and browse to that address.
• WIFI followed by an IP — the unit has joined an existing network. Connect your device to that same network and browse to the address shown.
• The active mode, course name and Level x/y when a course is loaded, or NO COURSE LOADED, plus the current phase in a pill at the bottom.

Multiple devices at once

Several people can have the page open at the same time and every one of them can send commands. All displays refresh once per second from the same controller, so everyone sees the same phase, the same lane states and the same clock. There is no "control lock" — coordinate verbally.

04Reading the screen

Three elements sit at the top of every screen and never change, no matter how deep into a course you are.

Header

• EN / SI — language. English is the default; SI switches all operational text to Sinhala. The choice is remembered in that browser only, so each operator's phone can be set differently. Unit branding and the motto stay in English by design.
• Admin Login / Log Out — see Admin login.

Manual Control panel

The bordered panel below the header is always available, on every screen, to every operator. It holds the four range-wide controls and a live status line. It is covered in full in Manual control.

The status dot

Next to the dot, the text shows the current phase — and, when a course is running, the course name alongside it (for example EXPOSED — Course 02 - Chase). If a lane has faulted it reads FAULT — Home All to clear instead.

Breadcrumb

Below the manual panel, a small trail shows where you are: the mode, then the course, then what the builder is doing — for example ADVANCED / Course 02 - Chase or Manual Control / Test Run. The current position is highlighted in orange.

Navigation back out is always by the buttons at the top of the content area — ← Courses and ← Modes. The browser's own back button is not used by this interface.

05Manual control

These three controls are independent of any course. They work from any screen, at any time, for any operator, and they override whatever is currently running.

What happens if you press them mid-course

• During a running course — any of the three ends the run. The course does not resume; to continue you start it again from the beginning, or start the level you want from the course screen.
• Open All while homing — the home operation is abandoned and the lanes reverse to open. The reverse also holds: Home All cancels an in-progress Open All.
• Home All after a fault — the fault clears and every lane, including the faulted one, is commanded home. If the mechanical problem is still there, that lane faults again within six seconds.

06Test Run a Course

Test Run a Course in the Manual Control panel opens the full course builder, pre-loaded with a working sequence, and runs whatever you leave in it once — without writing anything to the device. Nothing is saved, and no login is required.

Use it to try a timing idea before committing to it as a real course, or to run a one-off sequence that does not belong in the library.

The starting template

It opens with a single-lane chase across all eight targets:

Every field is editable exactly as in a real course — add levels, change the pattern, reselect targets, retime it. See Building a course for what each control does.

Running it

1. Press Test Run a Course. The breadcrumb reads Manual Control / Test Run.
2. Edit the sequence, or leave the default as it is.
3. Press Run Test. The sequence starts immediately and the interface returns to the mode-select screen.
4. Watch it run on the status line in the Manual Control panel — a test run has no course screen of its own, so that line is your readout.
5. End it early with Stop or Home All Targets.

07Modes

The first screen after the splash offers four tiles. All four are unlocked, and each one holds its own independent library of courses.

Tap a tile to open that mode's course library. From anywhere deeper in the interface, ← Modes returns you here.

When logged in as admin, two extra panels appear below the tiles on this screen: Course Library Backup and Network.

08The course library

A grid of cards, one per course. Each card shows the course name and, underneath, the number of levels plus any tags — built-in for a factory course, disabled for one that has been turned off.

Tapping anywhere on a card opens that course. As an admin, each card additionally carries a Disable / Enable button and a × delete button in its top corner, plus a + New Course tile at the end of the grid.

Each mode holds a maximum of 16 courses. Saving beyond that returns "course limit reached for this mode" — delete or replace an unused course to make room.

09Running a course

Opening a course gives you the run screen: what it contains, live state, and the controls to run it. No login is needed to run anything.

The parts of the screen

1. Title and level count, top left.
2. The HUD, top right — a MM:SS clock counting elapsed time since the run started, the current phase, and the status dot.
3. Banners — a red fault banner and a green completion banner, shown only when they apply.
4. Progress line — Level 3/7 · EXPOSED · Cycle 2/3, live.
5. Level list — every level, numbered, with its sections summarised underneath and a ▶ Start button on each row. The level currently running is highlighted.
6. Lane grid — eight tiles, LANE 01 to LANE 08, each showing that lane's live state.
7. Console — the three large paddle buttons.
8. Admin row — Edit Course and Delete Course, shown only when logged in.

Reading a level row

Each level lists its sections in the form the builder produced them. For example:

Targets are listed 1–8 here, matching the lane numbers on the range and the chip numbers in the builder.

The three console buttons

Running one level on its own

▶ Start on a level row runs just that level and then stops, instead of chaining into the rest of the course. The phase ends at LEVEL COMPLETE rather than COMPLETE. Use it to drill or check a single stage without resetting the whole course.

While it runs

Everything refreshes once per second. The active level row highlights, the lane tiles change state, the clock counts up, and the progress line tracks level and cycle. When the last level finishes, the green banner reads ✓ Course complete — all levels finished.

10Status reference

System phase

Shown in the HUD, in the Manual Control status line, and on the controller's own TFT screen.

Lane state

Shown on each of the eight lane tiles on the course screen.

11The three patterns

Every section in every course is one of three patterns. Understanding exactly what each one does with the clock is the difference between a course that drills what you intended and one that just moves steel.

Sync — everything together

All selected targets rise together, hold together, and return together. The classic exposure drill.

Sync fields

• Targets — which lanes take part. Unselected lanes stay home.
• Hold (ms) — how long they stay exposed.
• Home Wait (ms) — rest at home between cycles, inside this section.
• Cycles — how many times to repeat. 0 means loop forever until stopped.
• Pause After (ms) — wait after the whole section finishes, before the next section or level.

Chase — an overlapping wave

Targets fire in a sequence you define, and the sequence overlaps: the instant one step is commanded home, the next step is commanded open. There is never a dead gap, which is what makes it read as a wave running down the line.

Chase fields

• Steps — an ordered list. Each step has its own target selection, so a step can be a single lane (1), a pair (1,2) or any combination. Steps run top to bottom. Up to 16 steps per section.
• Hold (ms) — exposure time for each step. It is the same for every step in the section; for different holds, use several sections.
• Cycles / Laps — how many times to run the whole step list. 0 loops forever.
• Pause After (ms) — wait after the section finishes.

Random — one at a time, unpredictable

Targets fire one at a time, each picked at random from the selected set, for as long as the time frame lasts. The same target can come up twice in a row — each pick is independent.

Random fields

• Targets — the pool to draw from. Deselect a lane and it is never picked.
• Hold (ms) — exposure time for each pick.
• Time Frame (ms) — how long the whole section runs. 30000 is 30 seconds.
• Pause After (ms) — wait after the section finishes.

Choosing between them

12Building a course

The builder is the same screen everywhere: + New Course in a mode, Edit Course on a course, and Test Run a Course in the manual panel all open it. Only the button at the bottom differs — Save Course or Run Test.

Layout

1. Course Name — free text, at the top.
2. Level cards — one per level, in run order. Each has a name field, a Disabled checkbox, and ↑ ↓ × to reorder or remove it.
3. Section cards — inside each level card. Each has the three pattern tabs, its own Disabled checkbox, a × to remove it, and the fields for the chosen pattern.
4. + Add Section at the bottom of each level card, + Add Level at the bottom of the course.
5. Save / Cancel at the very bottom.

Selecting targets

Sync and Random sections show a row of eight numbered chips. Tap to include or exclude that lane — highlighted means selected. Chase sections show one chip row per step, so each step gets its own selection.

Building a chase step list

1. Set the section type to CHASE.
2. The section starts with one step containing lane 1. Adjust its chips to whatever should fire first.
3. Press + Add Step and set the next step's targets. Repeat down the line.
4. Remove a step with the × at its right. A section must keep at least one step.
5. Set Hold and Cycles / Laps below the step list.

Switching a section's pattern

Tapping a different pattern tab rebuilds that section with the defaults for the new pattern. Your Hold, Pause After and Disabled settings carry over; target selections and pattern-specific fields do not. Set the pattern first, then the details.

Saving

Save Course writes to the current mode's library and returns you to where you started — the course screen when editing, the course list when creating. Cancel discards everything since you opened the builder; there is no undo and no draft recovery.

Rules the builder enforces

13Field reference

Milliseconds at a glance

Library size limits

These bounds keep the device's memory use predictable. They are set in the firmware and can only be raised by re-flashing.

14Disabling vs deleting

Disabling is the safe alternative to deleting — the same idea as commenting out code. The item stays on the device, keeps its settings, and can be switched back on at any time.

What operators see

• Not logged in — disabled items simply do not exist. They are absent from the course list and from level lists.
• Logged in as admin — they appear dimmed, marked disabled or with a DISABLED badge, and can still be started directly for testing.

What the engine does

On Run Full Course, the engine starts at the first enabled level with at least one enabled section, and skips over every disabled level and section as it chains. A course whose levels are all disabled cannot be started — it reports "course has no active levels".

When to delete instead

Deleting is permanent and cannot be undone from the interface. Use the × on the card, or Delete Course on the course screen. Built-in courses cannot be deleted at all.

15Admin login

Running the range needs no login. Changing what is on the device does. Press Admin Login in the header, enter the password, and the admin-only controls appear immediately on whatever screen you are on.

Unlocked by logging in

• + New Course, Edit Course, Delete Course and the × on course cards
• Disable / Enable on courses and levels
• Visibility of disabled items
• The Course Library Backup and Network panels on the mode screen

How the session behaves

Use Log Out in the header when you are done, particularly on a shared or borrowed device — the session is stored in that browser and survives closing the tab.

If a login is rejected

• Login failed: wrong password — the password does not match. It is case-sensitive.
• admin login required on an action you expected to work — your session was ended by someone else logging in, or by a reboot. Log in again.

16Backup & restore

On the mode-select screen, logged in as admin, the Course Library Backup panel exports and imports the entire course library — all four modes in one file.

Export

Export All Courses downloads downrange-courses.json to the device you are browsing from. It contains every course in every mode, including disabled ones and any edits you have made to the built-in courses.

Import

Import Courses asks for a file and merges it into the device:

• A course whose id matches one already on the device overwrites that course.
• Anything else is added.
• Nothing on the device is deleted by an import.

Because matching ids overwrite rather than duplicate, re-importing your file onto a freshly re-flashed controller replaces the stock starter courses with your customised versions and restores everything else — no duplicates, no manual clean-up.

1. Log in as admin and go to the mode-select screen.
2. Press Import Courses and pick your .json file.
3. Confirm the warning. The import cannot be undone.
4. Read the result — it reports how many courses were imported, and lists any entries that had problems.

Restoring the factory courses

There is no "reset to defaults" button. A mode's library is reseeded with the three starter courses automatically only if its file is missing or fails its integrity check at boot. To get clean starter courses back deliberately, keep an export taken from a freshly flashed device and import that.

17Network settings

By default the controller hosts its own access point, and everything works with no other infrastructure. You can instead have it join an existing network — a range or building router — so it is reachable without connecting to a separate WiFi each time.

The Network panel is on the mode-select screen, admin only. Its top line reports the current state:

Joining a network

1. Enter the WiFi Network Name and WiFi Password.
2. Press Connect & Restart and confirm.
3. The controller reboots immediately and tries to join for up to 15 seconds.
4. Read the controller's TFT screen for the result — it shows either WIFI with the new address, or AP if it fell back.
5. Connect your device to the same network and browse to the address shown.

Going back to AP mode

Forget Network / AP Only clears the saved network and reboots into access point mode. Use it when moving the unit to a site whose network it does not know.

You cannot be locked out

If the controller cannot reach the saved network — wrong password, router down, out of range — it falls back to hosting Target_System_AP on its own after 15 seconds. There is always a way in; check the TFT to see which mode it came up in.

18Faults & troubleshooting

What a fault actually is

Each lane is given 6 seconds to reach the limit switch it was commanded toward. If it does not get there, that lane's motor driver is cut and the lane is marked FAULT. A fault also halts the running course so it cannot silently advance to the next level with a lane out of action.

A fault is a real, physical symptom. The usual causes are:

• Something jamming the target's rotation.
• A limit switch knocked out of alignment, so it is never triggered.
• A wiring fault on that lane's switch or driver.
• A motor or driver failure.

Clearing a fault

1. Press Stop if anything else is still moving.
2. Identify the faulted lane from the lane grid on the course screen.
3. Power down before touching anything mechanical.
4. Clear the obstruction or correct the fault.
5. Power up and press Home All Targets — this clears the fault flag and re-homes every lane.
6. Confirm all eight lanes report HOME before restarting the course.

Interface problems

Behaviour that is not a fault

19Built-in courses

All four modes start with their own copy of these three courses. They are editable but not deletable, and each mode's copy is independent.

Course 01 — Ladder

Seven levels of all-eight-targets Sync, with the hold time stepping down each level. A minute at home between levels.

Course 02 — Chase

Three levels of overlapping wave, each 200 ms hold and 3 laps.

Course 03 — Random

One level, one Random section: all eight targets in the pool, 200 ms hold, 30-second time frame.

20Quick reference

Connection

Start-of-session checklist

1. Power up. Confirm the TFT shows an address.
2. Connect and load the page.
3. Press Home All Targets. Confirm eight × HOME.
4. Confirm the range is clear.
5. Pick a mode, pick a course, run it.

End-of-session checklist

1. Stop, then Home All Targets.
2. Confirm eight × HOME.
3. Export the library if courses were changed.
4. Log Out if you logged in.
5. Power down.

Glossary