Wooden USB KEY

March 29, 2008 at 5:06 pm

I wonder if I should sell these guys???

Wooden USB Key

I had a broken and bent USB key and I had wood so guess what I did?
The original key wasn’t able to hold the PCB board within the case anymore, so whenever I pulled the key out of a USB drive the plastic housing would come off but the key would stay on. The USB connector was also bent from normal wear and tear.

I readjusted the connector and touched up the solder joints before measuring and laying out the PCB. I started out with a piece of mahogany that was approximately an 1/8^th of an inch thick and then I measured the width of the USB key so I would know how much stock I would need.

After cutting out a strip of the mahogany stock I cut that strip in half so I would have a top piece and a bottom piece. I decided to start with the bottom half first since it seemed easier, I scribed the outline of the USB key onto both pieces of mahogany.

Notice how the top side has the connector protruding upwards, we will have to account of that when cutting the top side. But otherwise the bottom is pretty straight forward. I used a 2 chisels and a block plane to complete this part of the project. The width of this particular PCB was 12mm wide, if you have metric chisels perfect if not you don’t really need to worry it’s just a little extra work.

After the fitting process I mixed up some quick cure 5 minute epoxy and spread it on the PCB board, note that once you do this you will not be able to remove the board from the wood ever again. Also note that the epoxy will not interfere with the functionality of the USB key, epoxy is used to encapsulate chips all of the time especially when a chip isn’t meant to be seen or removed (black epoxy is used in this case).

I finished the piece with a few coats of gel polyurethane. Also feel free to experiment with veneers since wood stock is so small there shouldn’t be any trouble with veneering. Here is the finished product.

Walnut Floating shelves

March 30, 2008 at 5:35 pm

These floating shelves are held up with an aluminum angle bracket, most of the load is intended to be near the angle bracket and not at the edges of the shelf, I highly doubt that much downward force can be applied to the edges of the shelf. If the shelf is intended on being a book shelf I stress that full angle supports beneath the shelves should be used.

The shelves are made of 1″ thick Walnut stock about 8 inches wide and 24″ long. There are two relief cutes for an aluminum angle bracket to fit into. The angle bracket is 3/4″ by 3/4″ and 1/8″ thick.

There are 3 counter sunk holes in the top of the shelf used to fasten the bracket to the shelf. There are also 3 holes in the bracket used to fasten the system to the wall. You can see the picture of the brass screw that fastens the shelf to the angle bracket.

http://woodworker.com/cgi-bin/FULLPRES.exe?PARTNUM=843-924&search=Finishes%20-%20Stains – takes some time to wait for the page to load, but they do have a great selection of J.E Moser’s dyes.

http://www.woodcraft.com/family.aspx?familyid=760 – the woodcraft page

This is a close up shot of the angle bracket and a lobster.

This is a shot of another floating shelf I made to hold up a telephone, I found some refinished exotic wood flooring in the garbage and decided to salvage it and turn it into a small shelf.

Quick Peek at Thomas Moser of Boston

March 27, 2008 at 4:24 pm

I paid a quick little visit to the Thomas Moser site in Boston.
Unfortunately I didn’t take a picture of the chair I want to buy someday.
I pretty much snuck around the store snapping pictures without flash, I didn’t want to raise any eyebrows snapping tons of pictures with flash and what not.

And to my expectations the chairs are as comfortable as they look, especially the lounge chairs and even the bar stools!
Every piece of furniture had a nice warm hand rubbed oil finish. The pieces were predominately cherry, great color and grain matching; I did see one walnut dining set. It kind of looks as if most of the furniture is built out of the same tree because the color all seemed too consistent, which is a hard feat to accomplish unless you have boards from the same tree.

The backless chairs you see in the picture below are pretty cool, but if you aren’t that wide it feels as though you might slip through. That was my only real complaint otherwise everything was as I expected, I only wish I could purchase a few of those chairs.

Creating I2C Commands Using IO-3232B

January 11, 2008 at 2:52 pm

This post will guide you through the process required to stimulate an I2C device using an IO-3232B. First we will set up the hardware and then create the control commands in software. In this experiment I’ll be using a 12 bit DAC as the device to be tested. We want to test the functionality of the DAC making sure it responds to the commands generated by the IO.

Texas instruments-7571 DAC Features:

Micropower Operation: 140 µA @ 5 V
Power-On Reset to Zero
+2.7-V to +5.5-V Power Supply
Specified Monotonic by Design
Settling Time: 10 µs to ±0.003%FS
I²C Interface up to 3.4 Mbps
On-Chip Output Buffer Amplifier, Rail-to-Rail Operation
Double-Buffered Input Register
Address Support for up to Two DAC7571s
Small 6-Lead SOT Package
Operation From -40°C to 105°C

Rigging up the hardware:
The first thing you want to do is get the chip onto a board that can break out the pins allowing you to stimulate and probe them. I used a schmart board ( discrete surface mount #2 ) to mount this SOT23-6 part, and then I added header pins to SDA and SCL. Pin A0 needs to be tied to ground since this is the only I2C device and the selector doesn’t need to be used.

The only pins that need to be connected to the IO3232 are SDA (serial data input) and SCL (serial clock input) to channel 8 and channel 0 respectively. Vout will need to be connected to a digital storage oscilloscope, to view the change in voltage as you send commands to the DAC.

Slave Address : 0×98

MSB 3 to 0 is Data 11 to 8
LSB 7 to 0 is Data 7 to 0

Start command occurs when SDA goes low while SCL is high.
Stop command occrurs when SDA goes high while SCL is high.

Data transmitted on the serial line will happen every 9 clock cycles, and data transitions occur durring low clock signals. 8 cycles are needed to transmit the data and 1 is needed for the ACK / NACK response.

My Vdd is 3.3V so the maximum voltage output is 3.3
Vout = 3.3V x ( Data / 4096 )

Setting up the Software:
When you start the IO software you will be greeted with this window.

I like to remove the default data to make the screen less “busy”.
First go to Main toolbar [View] -> [Clear Data Buffer]

In order to create an I2C pattern you need to create a new group consisting of 2 channels from differing banks.
By right clicking in the channel name column you can select “Insert group”.

A pop-up window will appear allowing you to enter the group name, I suggest using a descriptive naming system to make your work easier to follow.

After clicking [ok] the display style window will pop up, you can leave it at normal but I suggest using Hex or Binary. Hex will display the group value as a hexidecimal and binary as binary. Say channel 0 is 1 and channel 1 is 0 the group value will read 1 if in hex.

Selecting [ok] will bring up the group setup window. If you look in the [ Channels in group ] box you will see a list of 8 channels from bank 1. Select and delete every channel from the group except for channel 0.

If you look to the left you will see a [Channels] box select Bank 2 Channel 8 and append it to the group. You should only have 2 channels in the group, and each channel should be from a different bank.

The reason for the differing bank is that the data channel needs a break in the output to allow for the I2C DAC to respond with an ACK or NACK, while the clock channel needs to have uninterrupted data out.

Once a bank is selected for output on any one channel the whole bank is set to output for the duration of that channel’s output, this means you can’t output and listen at the same time on the same bank.

The last thing you need to do is select the [ I2C mode ] from the mode box.

This window will let you know what channel is what so make sure you connect the right channel to each line.

Select [ Edit Pat ] on the main window.

The pattern generator window will open

create a box encompassing channel 0 through 8 the width doesn’t really matter right now because you can always make the box wider or narrower.

look for the function pull down box.

Select [ I2C ]

I2C wizard allows you to enter your commands.

Once all commands have been entered press [Save]

The pattern generator editor will display the command you entered.

The cursors allow you to break the pattern apart showing you where each command starts and ends

Vout : 0.00 V start

Vout : 1.76v

Vout : 3.25v

Car 4 Port USB Charger

Some time ago my TomTom charger for the car cigarrette lighter port blew, a melted plastic bubble bulging from the side of the housing and the unbroken fuse was a dead give away. Instead of buying another one I thought it would be good to make a usb charger for the cigarrette lighter port that can charge anything that already has a usb cable for a laptop or computer, and why not charge more than one item at a time since those Y-adapters they sell at radio shack are so bulky and annoying.

The core of the unit lies in the regulator seen below. I used a leftover TI 78SR105 5.0V DC three terminal integrated switching regulator (ISR) which has internal short circuit and over-temperature protection as well as good line and load regulation. The max current is 1.5A. Another solution would be TI’s PT78ST105U which runs about half the price of the one below.

Here is a picture of the circuit fully populated, as you can see it’s a very simple straight forward layout.

Weave and solder a ground and power line into the board, the two lines will provide the link between the lighter adapter and your board. I can’t stress enough that you weave the wires in and out of atleast 1 hole to take the load off of the solder joint, otherwise you risk having either line snapping when you tug on the lighter adapter. Before soldering on the adapter make sure to thread each wire with some shrink wrap tubing to protect the solder joint after you’re finished soldering. The wires that will be joined must be twisted together to add a mechanical bond and strength beyond that of the solder.

Below is the circuit in action, you can see the cigarette lighter adapter fitting into the exact socket found in your car. If everything works properly you will see the unit provide 5V DC through the USB cable. Now that it provides the proper voltage out I decided to add a few things to make the board more user friendly, first a LED is used to indicate that the board is being powered, and a PPTC to save the day if there is an over current. Remember that on a poper USB bus you aren’t supposed to be drawing more than 500mA per device to protect the USB controller and motherboard. Your PC will generally let you know when your power consumption is more than it would like and prevent the unit at risk from functioning.

Poly-Switch RXE 0.9A or 0.5A – part number RXE090-ND aka polymeric positive temperature coefficient device(PPTC) used to protect against over current faults. The device is a non-linear thermistor, the resistance changes with the change in temperature, so the PPTC will revert back to a conductive state after the current has been removed and the temperature decreases to an acceptable level. This is similar to you flipping the switch on a household circuit breaker.

Being that the PPTC is like a resettable fuse it’s good to add it to the design even though there is protection on the regulator. You won’t have to dig a fuse out of the circuit board or mashup the fuse housing. Another good thing is that you don’t have to fish around your car for a fuse when there is over current event.

Do consider this PPTC solution is not a guaranteed never fail method, the activation time tested was somewhere in the range of 1-5 seconds depending on size and in many designs that is unacceptable and will lead to certain damage to your board, this is where instant blow fuses are necessary to better insure the safy of your ciruit.

89′ Toyota Camry Cooling System Overhaul

January 15, 2008

With the cooling system in need of a transplant it was no wonder this car started overheating.
This is just a rough description of what I did to change out and test components in the cooling system.

This procedure was found on a toyota manual you can find it online or ebay so review the documents then consult an authorized toyota dealer before proceeding. Make sure you have the proper respirator, eye, ear and hand protection if you plan on fixing your car.

This is a list of the items on the inspection list

Thermostat
Thermostat gasket
Water inlet pipe gaskets
Radiator
Radiator hoses
Transmission fluid hoses
Water inlet pipe
Temperature control sensor
Pipe clips
Dielectric grease
Transmission fluid
Coolant
Brass brushes
High temperature silicone
Resistors
Array of metric sockets and wrenches
Liquid pan
Fan relays

00′ Honda Accord EGR Cleaning and Maintenance

January 14, 2008 at 1:13 am

Idling has been rough lately, the check engine light came on once a few weeks ago, along with idle start up problems leading to the car seizing right after the ignition is turned on. A few issues could be causing my problem either the IACV (idle air control valve) or EGR (exhaust gas recirculation system) or maybe something else. So I decided to clean out the EGR valve first and take a look at the EGR sensor while I was at it.

This procedure was found on a honda manual you can probably find them online or ebay so review the documents then consult an authorized honda dealer before doing anything. Honda also added a polysubstrate tube to prevent further coke build up in the EGR system and did some tapered drilling. Make sure you have the proper respirator, eye, ear and hand protection as well since you’ll be dealing with solvents and a vacuum. One last item Honda will just fix the problem if it’s in warranty so again consult honda.

I believe these are all the items I needed to perform the clean

Carburetor Choke Cleaner
New Gasket for Throttle body to Air intake manifold
12 and 13mm 3/8 sockets
Torque wrench capable of 22N-m or more.
3/8 socket wrench
8mm drill bit
Small wire Brushes
Compressed air
Blue painters tape
Shop vacuum cleaner
Bags for the parts
Nitrile gloves
Large tin can to capture solvent

First I removed all of the plastic covers to expose the intake manifold and the throttle body.

This is the joint between the intake manifold and the throttle body, I left all of these connections intact.

Crank the top two nuts off of the throttle body connection and then work on the bottom bolts, I used a 12mm socket and wrench to take care of this. The wrench is necessary for the bottom bolts being that they are harder to access.
Once removed bag up all of the parts and label the bag. Remove 6 bolts and 3 nuts to release the intake manifold.

This is the EGR sensor peaking out from under two wires.

Another shot of the EGR in the lower left.

Once the intake manifold has been released I removed the brake booster vacuum hose and brake vacuum hose from the intake manifold. I made sure to label and number the hoses just incase they decided to stray from that general area.

The green throttle body gasket needs to be scraped off and replaced, as soon as the other two connections are removed from the intake manifold

After lifting the manifold up another gasket was exposed I just left this one in place.

I disconnected the IAT sensor as well as the last hose on the other end of the manifold see next two pictures.

This is a shot with everything removed.

I used blue tape to seal up all the holes except for the EGR. I didn’t want to clean the residue left by duct tape so I just used blue tape. I have a vacuum hose in place to remove loose debris, after using an 8mm bit to slowly clean out the hole. I inspected the hole and I was barely able to get the bit into the hole meaning that is was indeed clogged.

I unbolted the removable portion of the manifold and saved all the gaskets and bolt in a bag.

After disassembling the unit I shot carburetor cleaner in the EGR port and kept clearing more and more of the coke with the 8mm bit. I poured all the excess solvent out into a large tin, after inspecting the solvent I noticed that there was a considerable amount of coke coming out with the solvent. I repeated this process numerous times and use a brass brush to clean out the larger holes. I worked in a well ventilated area with a mask too keep myself safe.

I let the manifold sit around for a little to let the solvent evaporate and then used a vac to accelerate the drying process by increasing air flow.

Back to the EGR, I disconnected the cable and then proceeded to remove the two bottom nuts. I inspected the EGR valve leading from the intake area to the bottom of the EGR sensor and noticed that there was some coke build up so I shot some carburetor cleaner into the top port and then the bottom. I had to squeeze a shop towel into the bottom hole to wick away the solvent and then used a can of compressed air to help the solvent evaporate.

The 3rd and 4th picture down show the rectangular EGR ports at the base of the intake manifold and the base of the EGR sensor.

After inspecting and cleaning I put the EGR sensor back, if the hole was very clogged I would have had to buy a new sensor.

I put the manifold back together and added the gasket at the end. Put the manifold back on with out the bolts, but make sure it seats well with the throttle body, then reconnect all of the tubes and connectors.

When I bolted the manifold back on I had to do it with a with a special sequence with 22N-m of torque, so you don’t crack the manifold or the base. A torque wrench is necessary for the job because I didn’t want to over tighten the bolts. 22N-m is also required for the trottle body connection.
_3_ 1 _ 5
9____ __ 7 8
_6_ 4_ 2

If you were curious as to how the air flows through through the intake manifold to the EGR it goes through the throttle body to the intake manifold
and through this little hole you see at the edge of the blue tape.

It’ll flow through the hole by the blue tape through the one below in between the two protruding bolts, and follow a chamber “J” shaped

this chamber ends at the EGR valve base

each of the holes mentioned need to be cleaned out, the one in the throttle body, the one leading to the chamber and the chamber itself, try using a thin pipe cleaner and a lot of patience, it’s really important to clean out that chamber and the one that’s connected to the throttle body(picture with blue tape). If you are unsure if the EGR is still good you can always buy the EGR kit from honda, it’ll come with all the gaskets you need as well as the EGR to perform the fix. (Part number 06175-P8C-A01) it should run about 100 dollars + tax. btw it’s cheaper to buy the kit than the egr itself since the egr is almost 300 dollars.

All else fails bring it to Honda, at least they’ll warrantee the work.

( GBA )GameBoy Advanced SP – Fuse Repair

January 4, 2008 at 2:30 pm

Once all the screws are removed from the base of the GBA, remove the battery pack and remove the screw inside.
remove the base so you can have access to the circuit board, once this has been done flip the GBA over and open it
like a book and have the ciruit board on the table and the front plastic housing floating in the air as seen in picture 3, this is so you don’t have to remove the board from the rest of the device and have to wrestle with the cable connecting the board
to the screen later on. Remove all the buttons now so they don’t fall out and roll all over the place.

Now you can replace the fuse F2 located on the right side of the board below the A & B button pads and to the right of inductor L4. I replaced the fuse with a .375A 50V fast blowing surface mount fuse (0603 is the size that I used) the GBA shouldn’t use more than .340A during gameplay.

After this is done put all of the buttons back on along with the back plate, before screwing everything in make sure the
buttons have the right bounce when pressing them otherwise you’ll have to remove all the screws and redo this part
because a button got stuck or doesn’t move right.

After checking the buttons put a few screws in and put the battery in, if everything worked out right you should be
able to turn it on and have the GAMEBOY logo come back on. Clean off the screen with a tissue because all of that handling will leave you with tons of smudges. Luckily nintendo thought of putting this fuse in otherwise
who knows what could’ve blown out.

The fuses were purchased at www.digikey.com part number 283-2553-1-ND

For the Tri-wing screwdriver go the ebay route.

Walnut Japanese Sliding Door Cabinet

Tummy Tuck! Fixed my VX Revolution logitech mouse

April 28, 2008 at 9:18 am

jamming scroll no more.!
Someone else actually noticed that my VX mouse scroll wheel scrolled with a bit of sluggishness versus his VX mouse. I shrugged it off and said that I don’t really like the hyper-scrolling and that was that. But as of a week ago my scroll pretty much stopped scrolling I would flick it and it’d go a ¼ turn and this is in hyper scroll mode.

I looked at it as it scrolled and it looked as if the wheel was ok but something was definitely jamming inside, I really didn’t want to open it because it messes up the pads on the base of the mouse. So I looked at the side profile as I tried to spin the mouse and it looked as if the rubber grip was extremely loose, as if it were a tire about to fall off of a rim.

So as the rubber grip was flobbling along I reached under it with an exacto and lifted up, it seemed to tighten up. I think my rubber grip just needs a trim I was worry about the fact that if I cut the strip it’d act like a rubber band and just sling back into the body of the mouse but it didn’t. I had crazy glue ready so I could glue it back to the wheel but guess what, I didn’t need that either.

This is an extremely simple fix.

What you will need for the fix:

1. Flush Cutter

2. Exacto knife

3. maybe glue

I lifted the Rubber grip with the Exacto (make sure to see how much you have to lift the rubber to make it taught I lifted it about 3/32^nd of an inch )and then snipped it straight across with the flush cutters. I highly suggest flush cutters because the cut is straight and flush something I doubt a set of nail clippers or scissors could do. So get it, you’ll be happy with your flush cutters. I cut the rubber and it stayed in place I was surprised it didn’t bounce back. After the first snip I decided to remove a chunk of the rubber 3/32^nd s or 4 grooves worth.

I used the flush cutter and counted 3 to 4 groves and snipped again.

The bottom of the rubber piece has a slot cut out in order to receive the wheel, it’s pretty much a compression fit and didn’t need any glue. After pushing it down I pushed the two ends together making it seem as it was still a whole uncut piece of rubber, and it stayed. If your piece of rubber doesn’t seat properly or stay I suggest using a little glue.

See the slot in the pictures below.