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[on:]

Im VERY new to actually communicating between things so Im not sure what the technical term would be for what I am attempting to do, but i will describe it as best i can.

I am attempting to control a PLL chip (mc145192) that is installed in an old VHF radio.  I want it to sweep from end to end of the band. 136Mhz-174Mhz.

i have read and mapped the SPI data string for a number of channels.  The channels are sent in 24 bits broken into 4 bit hex values. 

712730 = 136mhz.
712734 = 136.025
712738 = 136.050
71273c = 136.075

The last digit counts by 4 (0,4,8,c) then resets to 0 counting the next digit up one (0,1,2,3) then counting the next one(0-f) then the next (0-f)

So when after 136.075 (71273c) the master would send the following binary sequence(011100010010011100111100) as read on an osciliscope.

I have written a code that simply counts each digit and outputs digit 1-6 separately, but when i attempt to send the data using the SPI library,  each digit is sent in 8 bits instead of 4, 7 = (00000111), 2 = (00000010).

All that said, how would i get an output of 4 bits instead of 8, or is it simply not possible.

Thank you in advance, I know its a lot easier to help someone that knows more of what they are doing and im probably explaining things backwards.

Casey

[Reply #1 on:]

That should be fairly easy. It is only 4 bits to the PLL internally. It can be sent as 3 8-bit values. You can use a shift left 4 bits to move the high nibble into place in each byte. I would use something like this.

Code:

// 3 is the HIGH nibble
byte firstByte = 3;
// shift into place
firstByte = firstByte << 4;
// OR with the LOW nibble
firstByte = firstByte | 5;
// do the same for the rest of the three bytes, then
digitalWrite(SS,LOW);
delayMicroseconds(1);
// send the first two nibbles
SPI.transfer(firstByte);
// send the second two nibbles
SPI.transfer(secondByte);
// send the third two nibbles
SPI.transfer(thirdByte);
// done
digitalWrite(SS,HIGH);

[Reply #2 on:]

SPI hardware clocks out 8 bits with every SPI.transfer( )

If the remapping of the bits does not work out, you could do your own "software SPI" to switch between sending out 8 bits and 6 bits.

[Reply #3 on:]

I recommend you read the data sheet for the part. It gives you the SPI protocol to talk to the part and mentions nothing about having to send it nibbles.

[Reply #4 on:]

As the others said, to send 0x712730 all you have to do is send 0x71 then 0x27 then 0x30.

You don't need to consider them as 4 bits at all.

[Reply #5 on:]

As I have said before,  Im still excessively new to a lot of this.  I can usually figure things out on my own pretty easily, but sometimes its just easier to just ask the dumb question.  So, Thank you for helping me.

[Reply #6 on:]

That's OK, the question wasn't dumb.