Re: Upgrading Displays to I2C
Make sure you have adjusted the contrast on the I2C LCD converter board.
Dave, W0DF
|
Re: Upgrading Displays to I2C
Hank / K5HDE,
Jack / W8TEE,
I just finished assembly of Forty-9er/Nano/DDS/16x2 LCD/Encoder. Finally got the VfoSource sketch to compile but LCD only back lights and has the top row of matrix squares lighted (No alpha-numeric). I'm using a 16x2 LCD display (Chinese 1602A Ver2.0) with a piggyback I2C serial converter board (Type 1, A0, A1, A2) I soldered to LCD. I ran the suggested address scanner and got: Found Address 63 (0x3F).? I notice that the VfoSource sketch,? line 100, addresses: lcd (0x27, 16, 2);
Hank, I'm guessing that this is similar to your initial LCD problem. I downloaded the NewliquidCrystal_1.3.4.zip files but there seems to be a load of different .cpp and .h library files to choose from for various LCDs.
I'm? stuck...
Don / N5DM
Houston, Texas
|
Re: Modifying Frequency Range of DDS VFO
Great! ?Thanks Bud, I'll get it. ?I think that was one of the hits I had when I was searching for the header file.
73 Dave KF5OCP
|
Re: Modifying Frequency Range of DDS VFO
Yes, this is the page you get to if you go to Yourduino.com and look at their I2C displays. I'm pretty sure this was written by Terry King who owns Yourduino. He also served as Tech Ed on my Beginning C for Arduino book. He's a great guy and knows his stuff.
Jack, W8TEE
From: "lcolclough@... [SoftwareControlledHamRadio]"
To: SoftwareControlledHamRadio@...
Sent: Friday, May 27, 2016 8:14 PM
Subject: [SoftwareControlledHamRadio] Re: Modifying Frequency Range of DDS VFO
?
A good site Re: LCD I2C compiling and display issues.
Bud, K1LC
|
Re: Modifying Frequency Range of DDS VFO
A good site Re: LCD I2C compiling and display issues.
Bud, K1LC
|
Re: Modifying Frequency Range of DDS VFO
Dave,
At Jack's suggestion I used the following LCD file:? NewliquidCrystal_1.3.4.zip written by F Malpartida.? All other LCD files must be removed from the library or renamed.? There have been some previous posts on this subject which you might?look over?if you haven't already.
Bud, K1LC
|
Re: Modifying Frequency Range of DDS VFO
Hi,
Thanks for posting the code for a wider range VFO. ?I can't get the file to compile. ?The compiler wants an LCD.h file which is not part of the original VFO folder. ?I have tried several LCD.h files I've found on line but none match the function definitions in the sketch. ?Can you tell me where you got yours?
Thanks again,
Dave
|
Re: Faulty Mini 360 Buck voltage regulator in the nano-DDS kit
The horse may be bloody but isn't dead yet.
Certainly most of the circuits we amateurs build are very tolerant of values. In most cases close enough is good enough. One place where I break into my stash of top dollar components is caps in frequency determining circuits. An off spec cap that drifts with temperature is a no-go here.
A part of my psychological makeup is what I do for a living. I'm a helicopter mechanic. The end mechanic is the last inspector in the process. Even though the part has all the paperwork and rubber stamps saying it is good, we still inspect it prior to installation. The reject rate is thankfully small but the consequences of not doing this last inspection can be catastrophic. Very much like a certain US government agency our motto is "Trust but verify." Even if I had paperwork from a vendor saying a batch of components were in spec I'd still inspect each one prior to installation. I can't help myself.
One vendor on eBay I can recommend is ic.touch. Their niche is offering components in assortments to jump start your junk box. Small reject rate. Quick shipping. They?have been?one of my go-to vendors for a while. For the longest time they stuck with their niche of offering assortments. For bulk purchases you had to go elsewhere. I see now that they are offering some components in bulk. 200 ceramic caps for $4 and if the quality is like what I've experienced before then count me in.
Till later Hank K5HDE
|
Re: Faulty Mini 360 Buck voltage regulator in the nano-DDS kit
Hi Hank:
Believe me, I understand the economics of this situation. (Most people probably don't know it, but my Ph.D. is in economics, not EE.) Still, placing QA on the buyer is not how it should work. I've ordered stuff from Tayda, too, but my experience has been pretty good. There are two vendors in GA selling caps and resistor assortments that seem pretty good. Still, they should be doing the QA, not me. If testing the parts before sale doubles the price, I'll pay it because it won't slow down my assembly time. I still think if enough people make it known that a vendor supplies parts that are out of spec, they will take steps to do the QA themselves, or force their suppliers to do the QA.?
Most of the time, out of spec on a 10% resistor or cap doesn't make much difference in many of the circuits I build. On the other hand, if I know that the circuit requires a fairly precise bias on a transistor, I measure it before placing it in the circuit. Like you said, the opportunity cost of changing a part after it's on the board is a pain in the butt.
Anyway, let's put QA where it belongs...and that's not on us.
Jack, W8TEE
From: "HankEllis@... [SoftwareControlledHamRadio]"
To: SoftwareControlledHamRadio@...
Sent: Friday, May 27, 2016 12:05 AM
Subject: Re: [SoftwareControlledHamRadio] Re: Faulty Mini 360 Buck voltage regulator in the nano-DDS kit
?
I get it that we shouldn't have to resort to doing our own QA. However the problem is so widespread that it is impossible to control.
To a lessor extent I give the vendor a pass. He just gets a shipment at a very good price, then sells it on online auction. I don't like the quality from Vendor A, fine. I try Vendor B, C, D, etc until maybe Vendor CE finally has in spec parts at a good price. Which probably only will work until the next batch number rolls in.
I place the blame solely on the manufacturer. Yes he may make good in spec parts and those go to production manufacturers who will do their own due diligence to ensure quality control. Those units that don't make the cut you see on eBay. Rather sell sketchy stuff for a small charge and recoup some revenue than scrap the lot and recoup none is the business model.
For example those bypass caps I mentioned? They were from Tayda Electronics. As a vendor for the amateur radio?homebrew market they?offer very good prices and their customer service is top shelf. They sell on eBay as well as having a separate web site. Cost in lots of 100 is 0.009 each or 90 cents per 100. The same value cap at Mouser is 0.069 each or 6.90 per 100. Or go top shelf and see what Lady Ada at Adafruit offers. They come in packs of 10 and 10 packs will run you 17.60. I can throw away a bunch from Tayda and still be money ahead.
When I started homebrewing one of my Homebrewing Elmers (vs my DX Elmer or my Satellite Elmer) highly suggested that my next project should be a LC meter from Almost All Digital Electronics. Took his advice and assembled one. Good money spent. My Homebrewing Elmer hinted that some sources have questionable quality and to check each component prior to installation. Between the Fluke multimeter and the AADE LC meter I know what I'm stuffing in the board. That LC meter came in real handy when working out the final tank circuit of a 6C4/5763 vacuum tube rig I built.
Unfortunately the proprietor of AADE passed away last year and the future is uncertain?for AADE and the LC meter. As a future project we would do well to keep this piece of test equipment available to radio amateurs.
It's one thing to do QA on a batch of caps or resistors you got dirt cheap. It's another when you are dealing with fraud. Do an online search for 'fake transistors' and that will get you to double up on your blood pressure medications.
Till later Hank K5HDE
---------------------------------------------------------- Anytime someone finds a vendor, domestic or foreign, who sells product that is out of spec, they need to post that vendor's name on this forum. There's no need for this kind of crap and if enough of us detail who the bad suppliers are, they will learn that they have a choice: sort out the crap before they ship it, or lose sales here.
Jack, W8TEE?
|
Re: DDS VFO TXOffset Function
I have uploaded the source code to allow T/R offset for the transceiver (RXoffset.ino in the files section). Thanks to Joe KF7CX for testing the code with the standard display configuration!
As previously mentioned, a hardware mod is required to allow the Arduino to see a key input line and key the 49er via a key output line and an NPN transistor (see RX_Offset_mod.pdf in the files section).
The code I added/changed is commented with my call so it should be easy to find.? The amount of offset is set via the #define RX_OFFSET? statement. I have it set to -600 Hertz but it can easily be changed to suite your ear. I tried to keep as much of the original code as possible.
73,
Lou? W2ROW
|
New file uploaded to SoftwareControlledHamRadio
Hello,
This email message is a notification to let you know that
a file has been uploaded to the Files area of the SoftwareControlledHamRadio
group.
File : /RXoffset.ino
Uploaded by : lou_w2row <louvoerman@...>
Description : ino file that implements receive offset. Hardware mod required. See RX_Offset_mod.pdf in files section
You can access this file at the URL:
To learn more about file sharing for your group, please visit:
Regards,
lou_w2row <louvoerman@...>
|
Re: Faulty Mini 360 Buck voltage regulator in the nano-DDS kit
I get it that we shouldn't have to resort to doing our own QA. However the problem is so widespread that it is impossible to control.
To a lessor extent I give the vendor a pass. He just gets a shipment at a very good price, then sells it on online auction. I don't like the quality from Vendor A, fine. I try Vendor B, C, D, etc until maybe Vendor CE finally has in spec parts at a good price. Which probably only will work until the next batch number rolls in.
I place the blame solely on the manufacturer. Yes he may make good in spec parts and those go to production manufacturers who will do their own due diligence to ensure quality control. Those units that don't make the cut you see on eBay. Rather sell sketchy stuff for a small charge and recoup some revenue than scrap the lot and recoup none is the business model.
For example those bypass caps I mentioned? They were from Tayda Electronics. As a vendor for the amateur radio?homebrew market they?offer very good prices and their customer service is top shelf. They sell on eBay as well as having a separate web site. Cost in lots of 100 is 0.009 each or 90 cents per 100. The same value cap at Mouser is 0.069 each or 6.90 per 100. Or go top shelf and see what Lady Ada at Adafruit offers. They come in packs of 10 and 10 packs will run you 17.60. I can throw away a bunch from Tayda and still be money ahead.
When I started homebrewing one of my Homebrewing Elmers (vs my DX Elmer or my Satellite Elmer) highly suggested that my next project should be a LC meter from Almost All Digital Electronics. Took his advice and assembled one. Good money spent. My Homebrewing Elmer hinted that some sources have questionable quality and to check each component prior to installation. Between the Fluke multimeter and the AADE LC meter I know what I'm stuffing in the board. That LC meter came in real handy when working out the final tank circuit of a 6C4/5763 vacuum tube rig I built.
Unfortunately the proprietor of AADE passed away last year and the future is uncertain?for AADE and the LC meter. As a future project we would do well to keep this piece of test equipment available to radio amateurs.
It's one thing to do QA on a batch of caps or resistors you got dirt cheap. It's another when you are dealing with fraud. Do an online search for 'fake transistors' and that will get you to double up on your blood pressure medications.
Till later Hank K5HDE
---------------------------------------------------------- Anytime someone finds a vendor, domestic or foreign, who sells product that is out of spec, they need to post that vendor's name on this forum. There's no need for this kind of crap and if enough of us detail who the bad suppliers are, they will learn that they have a choice: sort out the crap before they ship it, or lose sales here.
Jack, W8TEE?
|
Re: Faulty Mini 360 Buck voltage regulator in the nano-DDS kit
Anytime someone finds a vendor, domestic or foreign, who sells product that is out of spec, they need to post that vendor's name on this forum. There's no need for this kind of crap and if enough of us detail who the bad suppliers are, they will learn that they have a choice: sort out the crap before they ship it, or lose sales here.
Jack, W8TEE?
From: "HankEllis@... [SoftwareControlledHamRadio]"
To: SoftwareControlledHamRadio@...
Sent: Thursday, May 26, 2016 6:28 PM
Subject: [SoftwareControlledHamRadio] Re: Faulty Mini 360 Buck voltage regulator in the nano-DDS kit
?
It has been my observation that parts sourced from China obtained through eBay can sometimes have sketchy quality control.
Recently I obtained 200 .1uf 50v ceramic caps from one of the more respected suppliers. Checked each one and 80% were outside a +- 20% tolerance. Check of resistors frequently finds ones out of tolerance also. Logical to think that ICs and PCB products may have defective units also. Browsing through the posts here you can find instances of faulty finals and LM386 chips in the Forty-9er.
Like with the caps even though I chunked 80% of them, it was still cheaper to source through eBay than through more traditional sources such as Mouser and Digikey. As long as I know up front to do my own QC I'm cool with it.
Myself, if at all possible,?I check the value or function check?each component prior to stuffing it in the board.
Not a slam to those kitting the nano-DDS kit. Just an observation of what we in the homebrew world have to deal with.
Till later Hank K5HDE
|
Upgrading Displays to I2C
In my junk box I have a supply of 2x16 LCD displays. These all have the analog interface where it takes several wires from the microprocessor to the display to make it work. This project introduced me to the I2C bus which only uses?two data wires plus the power and ground. Nice. Now, is it possible to upgrade the older displays to the I2C bus? Yes and it's easy.
On eBay search for 'I2C'. Then sort by 'Price + Shipping: Lowest First'. What should show up near the top is something like this. | | | | | | US $0.76 New in Business & Industrial, Electrical & Test Equipment, Electronic Components | | | | Preview by Yahoo | | | Picked up four to try it out. All were Version 1 as described at the Arduino Wikispaces page. ?Soldered them in and gave the hardware a trial run.
First I ran the address scanner sketch and each reported 0x27. Then added in the LiquidCrystal_I2C library from the vfo-source-rev6 code for this project. Copied the demo sketch from the wikispaces page, compiled, and ... fail. The line that sets the LCD address has a call of POSITIVE that the compiler didn't like. Quick internet search revealed that it was a library issue. Downloaded and installed the library from the link at the wikispaces page. Recompiled and all is well.
Ran the sketch and each display is responding as it should. Do be aware that you will have to tinker with the LCD contrast through the pot on the I2C module. If you do not have any characters displaying it may be just a contrast issue. Had to adjust all four of mine.
One more oh by the way. The address scanner sketch has you set the Serial Monitor speed to 115200. While the demo sketch has the speed at 9600. Had me scratching my head for a minute why it wasn't working. After the forehead slap I set the speed at the Serial Monitor dropdown box to what the code asked for. Duh. As we say at my workplace, "Never overlook the obvious."
So for less than $1 shipped you can upgrade those displays.
Till later Hank K5HDE
|
Re: Faulty Mini 360 Buck voltage regulator in the nano-DDS kit
It has been my observation that parts sourced from China obtained through eBay can sometimes have sketchy quality control.
Recently I obtained 200 .1uf 50v ceramic caps from one of the more respected suppliers. Checked each one and 80% were outside a +- 20% tolerance. Check of resistors frequently finds ones out of tolerance also. Logical to think that ICs and PCB products may have defective units also. Browsing through the posts here you can find instances of faulty finals and LM386 chips in the Forty-9er.
Like with the caps even though I chunked 80% of them, it was still cheaper to source through eBay than through more traditional sources such as Mouser and Digikey. As long as I know up front to do my own QC I'm cool with it.
Myself, if at all possible,?I check the value or function check?each component prior to stuffing it in the board.
Not a slam to those kitting the nano-DDS kit. Just an observation of what we in the homebrew world have to deal with.
Till later Hank K5HDE
|
Transmit status LED for DDS/VFO 49'-er? Expand Messages
Can anybody tell me where I would make a tap on the 49'er keyer section so I could have a front panel indication of the transmit state? I'd like to use a small led. I found one at RS and it would need 12V, however I could find something lower power if needed.. I just need to get an idea where the +/- connections would be for this particular board.
Steve NS3L
|
Re: In need of some vfo help
Thanks for the help on the display , that part is working now.. now to rack my brain on other problems.
|
Faulty Mini 360 Buck voltage regulator in the nano-DDS kit
Well I finally got to building the nano-DDS kit, Nice, very nice. But I had difficulty with the mini360 regulator board. I could not get it to adjust below 8.7v, I had a few in my stock box so no biggie but I tested the replacement before I swapped out the one I had already fitted, yep, the new one adjusts down to 5v no worries so I went ahead and replaced the original. I tested the original outside of the nano kit and sure enough it would not go below 8.7v. I mention this to prospective builders and suggest that you test the module before you fit it. This is just a heads-up to save prospective builders some potential trouble and is absolutely not a criticism. Thanks again for a great project. Blessings
Wayne - NQ0RP
|
Debco has a 10 pack of 5.1V 1W zener diodes for $1.25 and a 2 pack of 22uH chokes for $2. I buy a lot of stuff from them...husband and wife team, both hams, and great people.
Jack, W8TEE
From: "n9jcvphone@... [SoftwareControlledHamRadio]"
To: SoftwareControlledHamRadio@...
Sent: Thursday, May 26, 2016 9:22 AM
Subject: [SoftwareControlledHamRadio] part swap anyone?
?
I would like to trade; 2 1W 36 Zerner Diodes 2 100uh inductors
for? 2 5.1 1W zener diodes 2 22uh inductors
I can send today. ?Send me an email to n 9 j c v @ mail.com
Thanks b
|
Re: Looking to gather the parts
Well, my update is that I made it back from FDIM and have been checking out some new toys.
I ordered the remaining parts/modules for the DDS VFO and should have all that in a few weeks. In the meantime, I'll be finish getting the parts together for the MMR 40.
The plan is to get the NANO/DDS VFO running, build the MMR 40, then put them together. The integration will require changes to the code to have the DDS generate the ~3 MHz VFO signal and display the 7 MHz operating frequency.
Stay tuned for more updates.
Dave, N4ELM
|
jjpurdum