Day 8: 555 chip, Oscilloscopes and Potentiometers

Today we worked with the infamous 555 chip and used it to light an LED. The 555 pulses power through the circuit and the LED flashes on and off.

After that I connected it to a potentiometer and the frequency of the flashing either sped up until it seemed to be on 100% of the time or it slowed down until it was 0.

Then I worked on a packet on Oscilloscopes. These things show how pulses of electricity are transfered between the different parts of a circuit. I got it working off of the potentiometer which increased or decreased the frequency by increasing and decreasing the resistance of the circuit.This is my final set up for that packet which includes using the oscilloscope tool called a BNC plug.

Project # 1: Toy Hacking

PROJECT 1

For our first project the objective was to learn various electronics skills and apply them all together in a final test of our skills.

First, I had to find a toy and take it apart to find the motor wires- this would allow us to connect our own wires and pull them out of the toy to be able to control it from our microcontroller.

This is my Toy:

Second, I soldered our wires onto the toy and put the toy back together.

Next, after having worked on several handouts that instructed me on microcontroller, transistor, capacitor and motor control, I set up a circuit on my breadboard that would allow me to fulfill the requirements for the project.

My motors ran forward and backwards, and the board I had originally built for this case would not work because the power would only run one way. Professor mason told me about a thing called an H-bridge, which was pretty much a bunch of transistors and diodes used to be able to allow current to flow forward or backwards into the motor, which in turn allowed my claw to move forwards and backwards from the same connections.

Unfortunately, this would have take a long time to complete and luckily, Mason gave me a Motor Driver Chip, which was exactly the same thing but in a smaller package.

This is my board:

Finally, i had to program my toy to be able to work with input from a sensor, in this case an LDR (Light Dependent Resistor). I programmed my toy to run the motor forwards when the input value from light was above 120 and to go backwards when the input was less than 70. This way, there was a gap in the middle and i could just leave it off if i let only the right amount of light to get in.

This is my toy working under microcontroller command:

Here is a working video of my final project:

Day 7: Catch up

Today I spent all of my time working on the last packet that had to do with communicating between microcontroller and PC and finishing my first project. I finally got my toy claw to work off of my programming and got all the things on the rubric finished and ready to turn in.

Day 6: Microcontrollers and Darlingtons

Today i caught up on dismantling my toy. I unscrewed the top and bottom and figure out that the wires from the motor run from the control unit on the bottom to the claw motors on the top.

After this I went into a packet titled 'Interfacing a Microcontroller,' which pretty much shows us how to mess with transistors including: TIP41, and TIP102 and of course our 2N-3904 transistor from before. One of the activities had us wiring up and programming a christmas light to flash every 1 second. Here is mine:

We also learned about darlingtons, which is the name for the configuration in which two transistors are connected in such a way that they multiply the total gain. This in actuality means that for the same little 5v supply we can create much higher currents.

We then switched to a stronger transistor, but there was no more TIP102's left. =(

Fortunately, Mason had a TIP120 for me, which is better! (According to Mason).

In the end i was able to use my previous breadboard configuration and connect it to the motor on my toy. My picture does not show it all, but the claw was moving up and down depending which way i wired the motor onto the breadboard.

This is my toy:

However, I could not get the claw to move up AND down by itself or with the programming. Mason told me i would have to build an H-bridge or buy another part that does it on its own, both of these use the same idea behind the darlington to amplify power output.

Day 5: Serial Connectors and Microcontrollers

On day 5 we finished up soldering our DB9 connector for use in our next project.

We were introduced to micro controllers and the many possibilities that they bring us. One of the activities on this packet was to get our LED to light up several times using the microcontroller and then shut off after a certain number of blinks:

We also had to program our board to be able to use sensors that would allow or restrict the flow of power from one LED to another, depending on the amount of light it received.

Next we started reading on hacking toys and figuring out how we were going to handle this.

Day 4: Transistors and the Logic Probe

Today in class i finished up what i hadn't from my robot.

After a few parts from the professor and some time and elbow grease, i finally got it running.

This is the finished product:

After that i got to familiarize myself with transistors and the many things they can do. They are similar to relays, but a lot more versatile. This activity had me connecting it to an LED and having two exposed wires. When i touched my fingers (from the same hand) to these wires the LED turned on because my fingers were used as a filler between the connections.

After that was done, i got to work on another of our tools that, according to professor mason, we will be using a lot throughout the class. This was our Logic Probe, which worked similarly to our multimeter, but was a faster way of getting the job done in some cases. This activity had us putting together almost everything we had learned so far to build a simple piece of genius.

This was my finished project.

I did not get around to soldering the last piece for today, but I heard it only took a couple of minutes so hopefully i could have it done tomorrow early.

Day 3: Switches, Relays, and Robots

After finishing my inventory sheet from yesterday, which was missing too many pieces to count...

I started with todays tasks.

We learned about switches and how they allow or deny the flow of current.

I connected 2 switches to an LED and some power, then i flipped one switch and then the other and each time the light turn on or off; this showed they were connected together and they interrupted the flow of power between the power supply and the LED.

We also learned about relays and their ability to switch power output to one LED or the other.

Once we got the LEDs lighting up back and forth and we got the "miniature noisemaker" integrated,

we moved on the the next part.

We started on our robots!

Since a lot of parts were missing from my toolbox, i did not get to finish everything and I had a hard time putting things together.

Eventually time ran out as it always does and i did not get to finish my robot, but i did get the main parts built.

Day 2: Multimeters, Breadboards and Resistors

Today we learned about voltage, current and resistance.

We learned how to use a multimeter and how to properly verify the capacity of resistors through the use of resistor color codes.

We then learned how to properly power an LED and together with our new found knowledge of resistors, we put all these components together on a breadboard.

We learned how to use breadboards and how they are important to the everyday geek- i mean electrician/electronics person.

Breadboards.

No, they are not edible... they are plastic boards with many holes for plugging in electrical components.

We put together a resistor, an LED, and the power supply on the breadboard and tried to get the brightest we could get our LEDs without burning them out.

In the end we were supposed to fill out an inventory sheet on our vex robotics parts for our robot that will be built soon, but I did not have enough time to finish all the way there.

This is my finished breadboard system with a proper capacitor and working LED bulb.

Day 1: Stripping Wires & Soldering

Today in Electronics 10.

Today we learned how to solder and how to work safely in laboratory situations.

We went over an extensive safety manual and took a safety test!

We then watched a clip on introductory soldering.

-A good solder joint is one where the solder looks shiny and covers all of the copper on the opposite side of the board.

-A bad solder joint could be one that is lumpy or big or does not cover the whole copper part. Also it could be one that does not fully cover the lead and/or does not attach itself well to the board.

We were supposed to solder at least 20 leads, i did a bit more just for practice.

Here is my finished product.

Next we practiced stripping wires and welding them to eachother end to end.

This practice was useful for cutting up an old power supply and welding new wires to the power supply.

After this I put some shrink wrap on it and secured the wires to prevent stress.

This is my finished product.