Tool battery teardowns: Craftsman 19.2V and Ridgid 12V

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Russell Graves did teardown of a Craftsman 19.2V DieHard battery and a Ridgid 12V battery:

It’s time for more tool battery teardowns!  This week, I’ve got a Craftsman 19.2V DieHard battery, and a cute little Ridgid 12V battery.  They’re both lithium, and I’m going to dig into both of them, because that’s what I do with old batteries I pick up out of junk bins.
If you’re bored of tool battery teardowns, you could always send me more interesting things to mess with!  I enjoy poking around tool batteries, and a lot of the ones I pull apart are “new to the internet” in that they haven’t had a detailed teardown before.   It’s always interesting to see how different companies approach much the same problem.

More details on Syonyk’s Project blog.

Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB

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We go through a lot of prototype PCBs, and end up with lots of extras that we’ll never use. Every Sunday we give away a few PCBs from one of our past or future projects, or a related prototype. Our PCBs are made through Seeed Studio’s Fusion board service. This week two random commenters will get a coupon code for the free PCB drawer tomorrow morning. Pick your own PCB. You get unlimited free PCBs now – finish one and we’ll send you another! Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times every week:

Continue reading “Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB”

App note: The reduction of input voltage spike on power switches

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Another app note from Richtek introducing solutions for reducing the input voltage spike on power switches. Link here

The power switch is a low voltage, single N-Channel MOSFET high-side power switch, optimized for self-powered and bus- powered Universal Serial Bus (USB) applications.

In worse operating condition, an input voltage spike may over the chip’s maximum input voltage specification to damage the chip.

App note: Analyzing VIN overstress in power ICs

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Investigative app note from Richtek about the component failure point caused by EOS. Link here (PDF)

Failures in power ICs are often the result of Electrical Over Stress (EOS) on the IC input supply pin. This report explains the structure of power IC input ESD protection and how ESD cells can become damaged due to EOS. Common causes for input EOS are hot-plug events and other transient effects involving wire or trace inductance in combination with low ESR ceramic capacitors. Solutions are presented how to avoid EOS via special circuit and system design considerations.

Free PCB coupon via Facebook to 2 random commenters

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Every Friday we give away some extra PCBs via Facebook. This post was announced on Facebook, and on Monday we’ll send coupon codes to two random commenters. The coupon code usually go to Facebook ‘Other’ Messages Folder . More PCBs via Twitter on Tuesday and the blog every Sunday. Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times every week:

Continue reading “Free PCB coupon via Facebook to 2 random commenters”

Electric steam boiler – first steam

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Quinn Dunki has a great write-up on building this homemade-from-scratch electric steam boiler:

Yes, you read that title correctly. After many months of effort, this homemade-from-scratch electric steam boiler is finally going to make steam. Before we’re done, we’ll learn some sobering lessons about the dangers of live steam.
Now that our boiler is pressure-tested and all the accessories are hooked up, we’re ready to add heat to water and cause some trouble. Unlike a traditional fired boiler which would use fuel pellets, coal, wood, or some other combustible, this crazy contraption is “fired” with an electric immersion heating element built into the structure. In order to test making steam, we need to rig up the electrical bits.

Project info on BlondiHacks blog.

Check out the video after the break. Continue reading “Electric steam boiler – first steam”

#FreePCB via Twitter to 2 random RTs

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Every Tuesday we give away two coupons for the free PCB drawer via Twitter. This post was announced on Twitter, and in 24 hours we’ll send coupon codes to two random retweeters. Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times a every week:

  • Hate Twitter and Facebook? Free PCB Sunday is the classic PCB giveaway. Catch it every Sunday, right here on the blog
  • Tweet-a-PCB Tuesday. Follow us and get boards in 144 characters or less
  • Facebook PCB Friday. Free PCBs will be your friend for the weekend

Some stuff:

  • Yes, we’ll mail it anywhere in the world!
  • Check out how we mail PCBs worldwide video.
  • We’ll contact you via Twitter with a coupon code for the PCB drawer.
  • Limit one PCB per address per month please.
  • Like everything else on this site, PCBs are offered without warranty.

We try to stagger free PCB posts so every time zone has a chance to participate, but the best way to see it first is to subscribe to the RSS feed, follow us on Twitter, or like us on Facebook.

Lattice iCE40 Ultra Plus FPGA: Gnarly Grey Upduino – Tutorial 1: The basics

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A how-to getting an LED flashing using VHDL from Harris’ Electronics:

The cheap price however comes with a few niggles, namely getting it up and running in the first place with the limited documentation. Gnarly Grey do a great job of explaining programming a starting program but don’t say much about further development. With that in mind, I’m going to run through the methodology of getting an LED flashing using VHDL. There seem to be a fair few Verilog methods but not many people seem to have touched upon VHDL with these FPGAs.

See full post here.

Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB

BP-600x373

We go through a lot of prototype PCBs, and end up with lots of extras that we’ll never use. Every Sunday we give away a few PCBs from one of our past or future projects, or a related prototype. Our PCBs are made through Seeed Studio’s Fusion board service. This week two random commenters will get a coupon code for the free PCB drawer tomorrow morning. Pick your own PCB. You get unlimited free PCBs now – finish one and we’ll send you another! Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times every week:

Continue reading “Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB”

App note: DC/DC converter testing with fast load transient

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Another app note from Richtek, this time about transient load testing on power converters and how you can make a simple and low cost fast transient tool. Link here (PDF)

Load transient testing is a quick way to check power converter behavior on several aspects: It will show the converter regulation speed and can highlight loop stability problems. Other power converter aspects like input voltage stability, slope compensation issues and layout problems can be quickly spotted as well. This application note will explain the practical use of load transient testing to diagnose DC/DC power converter problems.

App note: RT2875 3A automotive buck converter

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An application note from Richtek on buck converter used in automotive application. Link here (PDF)

Automotive environment can be quite harsh and designing electronics that need to work reliable in this environment takes special care, and often requires automotive qualified parts.

When designing voltage regulators that need to step down an intermediate voltage from the car battery supply, the car battery voltage fluctuation needs to be taken into regard.

The full operating temperature range needs to be considered for all aspects of the design, and all component parameters have to be checked over temperature.

The car radio receiver is nearby, which means that any switch-mode converter radiated emission needs to be minimized to avoid switch noise being coupled into the car radio receiver.

Free PCB coupon via Facebook to 2 random commenters

BP

Every Friday we give away some extra PCBs via Facebook. This post was announced on Facebook, and on Monday we’ll send coupon codes to two random commenters. The coupon code usually go to Facebook ‘Other’ Messages Folder . More PCBs via Twitter on Tuesday and the blog every Sunday. Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times every week:

Continue reading “Free PCB coupon via Facebook to 2 random commenters”

Big Timer

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Peter Scargill  has a nice write-up about a powerful timing node for Node-Red, the Big timer:

Big Timer is (probably) the best-ever timing node for Node-Red, providing a general purpose timer as well as  handling summer/winter correctly as well as (importantly) lighting up time (for which you should provide longitude and latitude). After all you probably don’t turn the outside lights on at 6pm!! You turn them on when it gets DARK.

Project info on Scargill’s Tech blog.

Tutorial: Using the Arduino’s internal EEprom to store calibration data and LCD screen fonts

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Edward Mallon writes:

This is a follow-up to our post about using Nokia 5110 screens on three unused analog lines with shift-out. That saved me from messing with the hardware SPI bus which we reserve for the SD cards. A secondary benefit is that the code is really lean, on the order of about 250 bytes for the default font after the compile if you already have EEprom.h in the build anyway. The font, however takes up about 500 bytes, and I wanted the smallest possible footprint so that we could add live data output to loggers that are already compile near the memory limits. As it turns out, stuffing those fonts into the internal EEprom was pretty easy to do:
Using the Arduino’s Internal EEprom to Store Calibration Data & LCD Screen Fonts

More details on Underwater Arduino Data Loggers blog.

Via the comments.

#FreePCB via Twitter to 2 random RTs

IRToy-600x369

Every Tuesday we give away two coupons for the free PCB drawer via Twitter. This post was announced on Twitter, and in 24 hours we’ll send coupon codes to two random retweeters. Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times a every week:

  • Hate Twitter and Facebook? Free PCB Sunday is the classic PCB giveaway. Catch it every Sunday, right here on the blog
  • Tweet-a-PCB Tuesday. Follow us and get boards in 144 characters or less
  • Facebook PCB Friday. Free PCBs will be your friend for the weekend

Some stuff:

  • Yes, we’ll mail it anywhere in the world!
  • Check out how we mail PCBs worldwide video.
  • We’ll contact you via Twitter with a coupon code for the PCB drawer.
  • Limit one PCB per address per month please.
  • Like everything else on this site, PCBs are offered without warranty.

We try to stagger free PCB posts so every time zone has a chance to participate, but the best way to see it first is to subscribe to the RSS feed, follow us on Twitter, or like us on Facebook.

Tutorial, experiment and teardown of a 24GHz Doppler radar module

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Shahriar posted a detailed analysis of a CDM324 24GHz Doppler radar module from IC Station:

Opening the module reveals a series of microwave PCB components and several active devices. A complete analysis of the module is presented. The unit is then measured and the impact of antenna impedance and power supply voltage on the output frequency is measured. The phase noise of the output signal is also measured. Using a series of servo motors, the radiation pattern of the antenna array in both azimuth and elevation is also presented.

More details on The Signal Path blog.

Check out the video after the break. Continue reading “Tutorial, experiment and teardown of a 24GHz Doppler radar module”

Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB

BP-600x373

We go through a lot of prototype PCBs, and end up with lots of extras that we’ll never use. Every Sunday we give away a few PCBs from one of our past or future projects, or a related prototype. Our PCBs are made through Seeed Studio’s Fusion board service. This week two random commenters will get a coupon code for the free PCB drawer tomorrow morning. Pick your own PCB. You get unlimited free PCBs now – finish one and we’ll send you another! Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times every week:

Continue reading “Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB”

App note: Designing applications with Lithium-Ion batteries

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More Li-ion battery applications from Richtek. Link here (PDF)

Lithium-Ion batteries have several advantages when compared with other battery types: They are light weight, and energy density of lithium-ion is typically twice that of the standard nickel-cadmium. Li-Ion batteries have no memory effect, and the self-discharge is 6 ~ 8 times less compared to nickel-cadmium. The high cell voltage of 3.6 volts is often sufficient to power applications from a single cell. These properties make Li-Ion batteries very popular in modern portable electronic applications.

App note: Switching battery chargers

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App note from Richtek about several aspects of switching chargers for single cell Li-Ion batteries. Link here (PDF)

Longer battery life and shorter charging times are some of the challenges in battery management in modern hand-held applications like Smart-Phones, Tablet PCs, POS and other portable equipment.

Devices with powerful processors are more power hungry and require larger capacity batteries to guarantee battery life. To quickly charge large capacity batteries, powerful high current chargers are needed. Linear chargers have too limited charge current capability for this purpose, so switching charger topology has to be adopted.

Grbl_ESP32 CNC development board

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Bart Dring has designed a development board for using CNC on Grbl ESP32:

This is a Grbl_ESP32 CNC Development board. This is a quick and easy way to use and test CNC on the ESP32 controller.
Grbl is a great CNC firmware that has been around for nearly a decade. It was originally designed for the Arduino UNO and basic 3 axis CNC routers, but it has been ported to other CPUs and was the basis for many other CNC and 3D printer firmwares.

Project info at Buildlog.Net Blog. It’s also up on Tindie.