Tag Archives: paludarium pcb

Putting Artemis through it paces

Posted on May 20, 2020 by Erik Zandboer| Leave a comment

The hardware is finally in! This post is a geeky tech post as a result 😉 I had some issues soldering an SMT component that was not in stock at the PCB manufacturer… So I needed to solder that manually. After that the rest of the THT components were soldered, and then it was test, update software, test, update software.

Just like the computer render – but this time it is for real! The first prototype is just about ready to go!

Manually soldering a TSSOP28

As I quickly discovered – no fun. The Chinese PCB manufacturer mounted all SMT components, except one: The PCA9685 PWM timer which was out of stock.

So I ordered the chips separately and manually soldered the thing. Using a soldering iron and soldering flux I managed to get the component soldered. Up close it is REALLY ugly, but eh, it works:

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Posted in Automation, Paludarium

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Paludarium 2020: Electronics!

Posted on April 9, 2020 by Erik Zandboer| 2 Comments

I admit… I have failed to post any new blogs on my current Paludarium setup. I posted the construction of the wooden cabinet… And then it stopped. I did however finish the build, and maybe I’ll add a post on that one later. In this post I introduce a new paludarium design, and it is getting ready to be actually build! It is going to be bigger, better, faster, more! ehhh… more automated than EVER.

The problem with these larger projects is that there are SO many bits and pieces to put together. Today I am writing up part one as I am almost ready to push the button on ordering a complete PCB that will contain practically all electronics required for my new Paludarium 2020 build!

Requirements for the electronics

I wanted to be sure I’d create a PCB that has all stuff on board I might be needing, without overdoing things. Still, I ended up with a huge amount of speeds and feeds. Here they are in random order:

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Posted in Automation, Paludarium

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