Announcing the Teensy Saber open source sound board

[gmcivor]

I even replaced the powerboost and shorted the black wires together and still heated up... Is it something in the male connector that is faulty then? I don't see what else it could be...

[profezzorn]

Did you measure the output from the power booster?
Does the booster work by itself, or does it only heat up when you hook it up to the teensy?

If it only heats up when you hook it up to the teensy, I would very much suspect that you've hooked up the booster backwards to the
teensy. (It should be hooked up + to + and - to -)

If it heats up with nothing else hooked up, you either have a short, or you've hooked up the battery backwards.

[gmcivor]

The booster does not work by itself it heats up with or without the teensy. And I checked I have the red connected to red and black connected to black. I assume I have a short. I have the black wire hooked to the flat side of the battery. The red wire is hooked to the side with the indent.

So I am assuming I have a short.. But where is the question..
 I connected the ground lead of my multimeter to the negative on the battery. The positive on the to in + on the input and i read about 4v. I put the positive on the vcc on the output of the booster and I read about 3.7v

Regards,

GMcIvor 

[profezzorn]

The booster does not work by itself it heats up with or without the teensy. And I checked I have the red connected to red and black connected to black. I assume I have a short. I have the black wire hooked to the flat side of the battery. The red wire is hooked to the side with the indent.

So I am assuming I have a short.. But where is the question..
 I connected the ground lead of my multimeter to the negative on the battery. The positive on the to in + on the input and i read about 4v. I put the positive on the vcc on the output of the booster and I read about 3.7v

Regards,

GMcIvor

It certainly sounds like s a short, but if the booster heats up without the teensy, how is that possible?

The nice thing about shorts is that you can find them with a multimeter by simply measuring resistance.
If the resistance between + and - (or gnd and vcc) is less than an ohm, then you have a short.
One thing I've learned from building boards is that is a really good idea to measure the resistance between + and - before you plug in a battery. If the resistance is low, *something* is going to get hot...

[gmcivor]

The booster does not work by itself it heats up with or without the teensy. And I checked I have the red connected to red and black connected to black. I assume I have a short. I have the black wire hooked to the flat side of the battery. The red wire is hooked to the side with the indent.

So I am assuming I have a short.. But where is the question..
 I connected the ground lead of my multimeter to the negative on the battery. The positive on the to in + on the input and i read about 4v. I put the positive on the vcc on the output of the booster and I read about 3.7v

Regards,

GMcIvor

It certainly sounds like s a short, but if the booster heats up without the teensy, how is that possible?

The nice thing about shorts is that you can find them with a multimeter by simply measuring resistance.
If the resistance between + and - (or gnd and vcc) is less than an ohm, then you have a short.
One thing I've learned from building boards is that is a really good idea to measure the resistance between + and - before you plug in a battery. If the resistance is low, *something* is going to get hot...

your guess is as good as mine. I will use the multimeter to see if I can find the short. if not I will buy some connectors and rebuilt that side of the circuit.

Thanks for the help. Hopefully I can find the problem soon. I want this thing to finally work :)

regards,

GMcIvor 

[gmcivor]

Alright, So doing some investigating I think it may be the female aviation connector. Everything is soldered to its own pin, but no matter what resisting setting I choose when I place it on the ground pin and the power pin it goes from 1 ohm to almost 0. So I am assuming something is touching inside the connector? Unless it is farther down the line.

Regards,

GMcIvor

[profezzorn]

Sounds like good progress.
If you think the connector is fault, cut it off or de-solder it and measure it again to make sure that's where the problem is.
The female connector side can be a bit tricky, I like to fill up the housing with hot glue after I've tested everything to make
sure everything stays in place...

[gmcivor]

Sounds like good progress.
If you think the connector is fault, cut it off or de-solder it and measure it again to make sure that's where the problem is.
The female connector side can be a bit tricky, I like to fill up the housing with hot glue after I've tested everything to make
sure everything stays in place...

Well I thought I had it for a second. I un soldered all the connectors from the battery and the fets from the aviation connector. When I checked between the positive and the ground coming from input on the booster it when from 1 to 15 ohm. Then I tried a different connection and now it goes to 0 when I try the previous connection. I also measure the voltage coming from the battery. coming from the fets and the power cable it shows 4.2v. Which means full charge, or close too.

The power wire from the batter is completely isolated it doesn't touch the ground wire anywhere. The ground wire is small from the input on the power boost to the connector. Then I check the main power line and it shorts. I changed power boosts and the connections are separate, I made sure.

one step forward, two steps back...

Regards,

GMcIvor

[profezzorn]

Got POV mode mostly working:



This is a 1.6 second exposure where I wave the saber through the air in an arc using my 144-neopixel strip blade.
Unfortunately it's not fast enough that you can observe the effect without a slow-exposure picture, but it's still kind of cool.
(With dotstar/SPI LEDs it might be fast enough, but I don't really have support for dotstar LEDs...)

Working on some other changes right now, once they are done I will upload new firmware.

Ok, new lightsaber.ino is uploaded to the usual place.
It has a bunch of bugfixes, POV mode and experimental APA102/dotstar support.

[Obi-Ken Wanobi]

Profezzorn... first let me say amazing work on the Teensy Saber project and thanks for all the hard work you've put into the project.

I'm just starting out and am very interested in building a Teensy Saber for myself.  I've had a good amount of experience with Arduino projects and code development but no experience with the Teensy family of boards or SK6812 LED strips.  I have been reading through your Teensy based lightsaber pages as well as read through this entire thread.  I've been working on sourcing all the parts to build a saber and I'm somewhat stuck on the LED strips.  I've searched and found many many options and have gotten quite confused as to what my choice should be.  I've found the Adafruit Mini Skinny NeoPixel 1m LED strips (see Product ID 2969 on the Adafruit site) but these appear to be three times the price of most of the other options (and I'm not sure they are a good choice).  I've found units based on 5050 LEDs and 3535 LEDs and the widths vary from 7 to 10 mm.  Can you (or someone following this thread) provide any recommendations as to the specifics I'm looking for and where to purchase my LED strips from?

[profezzorn]

Generally, any of them will work. These are the ones that I bought:

1M 60 leds 4mm / 144 Pixel 7mm SK6812 SMD 3535 RGB pixel strip light build-in 5V

The most important thing is that the strips you choose have 144 LEDs per meter.
Secondly, the slimmer they are the easier they are to wrap in diffusion material.
It's helpful if they are white, as black strips will absorb some light.
Make sure it's WS2811-compatible. There are other types (Dotstar/APA102/etc.) which will probably not work.

Naigon recommends building ladders out of 5mm straw-hat through-hole neopixels instead, he claims that this is brighter and more even. It should also draw a little bit less power. Most of Naigons posts can be found on another board though.

[Obi-Ken Wanobi]

Generally, any of them will work. These are the ones that I bought:

1M 60 leds 4mm / 144 Pixel 7mm SK6812 SMD 3535 RGB pixel strip light build-in 5V

The most important thing is that the strips you choose have 144 LEDs per meter.
Secondly, the slimmer they are the easier they are to wrap in diffusion material.
It's helpful if they are white, as black strips will absorb some light.
Make sure it's WS2811-compatible. There are other types (Dotstar/APA102/etc.) which will probably not work.

Naigon recommends building ladders out of 5mm straw-hat through-hole neopixels instead, he claims that this is brighter and more even. It should also draw a little bit less power. Most of Naigons posts can be found on another board though.

Thanks so much for the reply and the link.  I believe my Teensy Saber project should start it's build soon. 

So according to the link you provided the LED strip used 3535 LED (3.5mm x 3.5mm)...  is that correct?  This gives you a 7.2mm width instead of the 10mm width of the 5050 LEDs making them easier to wrap in diffuser material.

[Obi-Ken Wanobi]

One more question...

 Your schematic / wiring diagram shows connection to a single LED strip. Am I to assume the two LED strips are wired in parallel?

 Thanks again for your help!

[profezzorn]

One more question...

 Your schematic / wiring diagram shows connection to a single LED strip. Am I to assume the two LED strips are wired in parallel?

 Thanks again for your help!

Yes

[Obi-Ken Wanobi]

Sorry... one more question...

The eBay listing you provided has ended.  I've found several listings for 144 LED/m SK6812 strips that have RGBW (4 in 1) LEDs.  Can these be used with the current Teensy lightsaber code?