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[Reply #45 on:]

Thanks CrossRoads. Just sent out one for cpu trade and will send another one out for an order later this week. If you've got something, we can trade again

[Reply #46 on:]

I'll look around. Still haven't gotten around to ordering parts to assemble the previous board you sent.

[Reply #47 on:]

Bit of an update to my project.

High Speed Counting is now working HUGE thanks to GrayNomad for working with me on this.
RTC works too.

Bringing a Fluke 725 Process Calibrator home with me from work today to test everything out accurately over the weekend, test the high speed, analog inputs, analog outputs, PWM outputs etc. Should be good

So far, everything is still proving to work as per the design which is amazing.

On to about the 8th 20 hour day in a row now, ready for a sleep in!

James

[Reply #48 on:]

Bit of an update

Fluke Calibrator worked a treat, The Brick works great

Most things tested, however I didnt have equipment to test out the RS485 or XBee however they should work fine.

Shipped of 2 of these prototypes to a gentleman in the UK who purchased them, shipped one off to a local guy who purchased 1, and have the last one yet to make up for a mate which I will be using it on one of his projects.

Attached is a render of the board which I did this weekend for use in the Documentation I am writing for The Brick.

I have a nice guy in the USA building me a website, which will be hosted here www.barkyboards.co.nz which will contain product information, downloads, specs etc. This will be available in due course.

So all in all, this project is a success - now these prototypes just need to be used in anger to make sure they are 'fit for purpose'.



Regards
James

[Reply #49 on:]

So you sold quite a few! Congrats! You got to consider making an HMI sometime. Used in anger, LOL

[Reply #50 on:]

Hi Liudr

Yeah sold 4 prototypes at cost price, just so I could actually get some built and tested.

HMI wise - well the Brick has facilities to plug in a character LCD and mount that into the case, or a 4D Systems touchscreen and mount that into the case. So in theory people could utilise your HMI with little effort, or use a 4.3" touch screen etc from 4D Systems, which has their own programming software - or use it in SGC mode and treat it like a standard graphics LCD and draw stuff on the screen with commands.

I will post a DRAFT version of the documentation I am working on for The Brick shortly. Note, it is still in Draft so may contain information with is wrong or incomplete.

Cheers
James

[Reply #51 on:]

Wow just did a count, there are 232 discrete components on The Brick.

25 IC's
53 Resistors
44 Capacitors
28 Diodes
45 Headers/Sockets of various sorts
+ the rest.



Just for useless but interesting stats - ha.

James

[Reply #52 on:]

Right,

Here is the first draft of the documentation if anyone is interested.

Still in progress.

Cheers
James

[Reply #53 on:]

James
Thanks for posting the documentation. Any thoughts on offering the brick as a commercial product?

[Reply #54 on:]

Hi Tony

Sure have. Just need to get these prototypes tested to iron out any problems that may exist - I havent found any yet on the functionality, but have identified a few improvements I want to make (only minor things).

But yes, I would like to offer this for sale - that is the plan. I have a company in Australia potentially interested, so I will be sending them my prototype once I have it built and have a program in it, so they can have a look/play. I have a smaller version of this designed on paper too called the Brickette, which features an inbuild 4D Systems uLCD-32PT display in the case. Picture attached. But that one wont be prototyped until The Brick is fully sorted etc.

I think these would be a good 'upgrade' for people on here who want to take their arduino to the next level and use it on a machiine etc, as the Arduino isnt really intended for final products - but can be obviously.

Open to suggestions at any stage.

Regards
James

[Reply #55 on:]

Playing around with the RTC and an LCD, thought I would take a snap.

Just created a multi-tabbed program to test out all the features of the board, which is running on it at the moment.
Still far from perfect but getting there.

James

[Reply #56 on:]

Nice! Now if I can see some buttons...

[Reply #57 on:]

Playing around with the RTC and an LCD, thought I would take a snap. ..

Its Alive :-)

[Reply #58 on:]

And lookin' good too.

So that's a proof-of-life photo, with a newspaper so we can verify the date

______
Rob

[Reply #59 on:]

Haha - awesome

Currently reading a high speed input from my Frequency Generator of 1.3Mhz (1.32790Mhz actually)
Thats as high as I can produce with this generator.
Dont know if the freq generator is the accurate one or if The Brick is the accurate one, but they are reading very close.
The Brick is reading 1328437 and the Freq Generator is 1327902, which is a difference of 535Hz at that range, about a 0.0004% difference

I think I can live with that.

Logging it to SD Card, displaying it on the LCD and transmitting it over Bluetooth to the Laptop - not bad, not bad