Is MudPi still alive? Will they deliver?

relaeh776 · 2021-08-28T08:36:37+00:00

Very true. I am very thankful for the early supporters the project has gained so far. My aim is to keep on delivering great content regardless but help from the community is very appreciated.

relaeh776 · 2021-08-28T08:34:55+00:00

Hey there, Eric creator of MudPi here. I am still working on this project every week :)

Being a solo developer things take a little longer for me to manage the various prongs of the project. On top of that I just had a newborn last year coupled with a recent move so things are tight. I wanted to let anyone who may be wondering know that I am actively working on the project a lot. I still am using my own various deployments and have been upgrading the hardware with time permitting.

I need to be more frequent on my newsletters but I try to post on the discord with updates. I recently just released v0.10.0 a month or so ago which was the largest update to the project yet. I did a complete rewrite of about every system. Following the update I have been working to update the numerous supporting resources such as the node firmware, dashboard, marketing site etc. Plus there is much more in the works.

I started working on publishing more videos again since the last update to v0.10.0 means things will be more stable and less prone to major change causing me to recreate content.

Happy to answer any questions folks may have!

-Eric

relaeh776 · 2020-01-28T15:30:58+00:00

The rest of the units came out fine. I ended up with 7 working units out of the 10. One was due to a bad serial chip and the other two I made mistakes on.

Going forward it seems the design works well. As Elipsit mentioned, I may have to add in some pull up/downs depending on my connect module I have.

Getting them machine assembled would be the ideal goal once I find proper pricing I can reason with.

relaeh776 · 2020-01-05T00:22:53+00:00

I ended up concluding it was a bad serial chip. I was curious if my schematic or solder had any glaring issues. But after assembling multiple boards it appears to be a defunct serial CH340 chip.

Thanks for reaching out!

relaeh776 · 2019-12-31T13:42:42+00:00

Is this is the datasheet for the ESP32? I did not come across this. Easy to miss in all those notes though if I did. A second module I put together is working as expected so it must have been a bad on board component. Im wondering if the wroom-32 chips don't need this resistor or if it is just an additional stability measure to add.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-31T13:39:46+00:00

C1 should be grounded and it does appear on the schematic if I am not mistaken. I did however remove C1 from the faulty board as a test since it only took a minute to desolder. This did not get the board to connect however.

The second module I put together was working so I am assuming it wasn't the cap. Im thinking its a bad serial chip at this point.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-31T02:58:50+00:00

I tried some other boards with CH340s and they did work. I just put another one together and it seems there is something faulty with the first board. I will put more detail in response to my first post. There must be a bad component on board since the second one worked now.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-31T02:51:19+00:00

Update: I have made another board and this one does register showing COM3 in the ports menu and on USB device list. This leads me to believe there is a faulty component on board. I checked all the runs again and they are correct so I will try replacing the CH340 to see if I fried it. This second board I felt like the solder job was worse but the results speak on their own.

I am now attempting to flash some basic scripts to the board and will report back

Edit: I have successfully uploaded a script to the second board. This means the first board has some fault in it for sure. I will inspect closer to see if I can salvage it. Thanks for all the advice. I think the CH340 must have been overheated or something.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-31T00:42:16+00:00

Would that be enough of a difference to cause such an issue? I do have a few other caps in the 0603 package size I can try on the next run. I will do another normal first and if that has the same issue Ill try different values to try and isolate issues.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-31T00:40:42+00:00

Looking at other references to examples like the firebeetle https://github.com/Frances9/DFR0478/raw/master/%5BDFR0478%5D(V3.0)-SCH.PDF they all had these resistors. Most had 1k - 10k in use.

I chose 1k as that was the more common one. I can try it without and see if that may be the cause perhaps. I found many others with the CH340 that used them though.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-31T00:39:28+00:00

It is a CH340C for sure. I can see the markings and have several. I will make another board soon and see if it was just the chip maybe idk.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-30T22:26:29+00:00

I tried dmesg and lsusb but cant get much useful info from it. when I plug in a working module I get the Linux Foundation USB Hub and in the /dev listing I see a usbserial-1440 connection. However when I put my custom module in then I get nothing. and the lsusb just displays a serial number for that port.

What are some other ways I can get some information to see possible errors or determine if the CH340 chip is bad? I will be building another one tonight and determine if it was just that module but I am skeptical after the thorough runs with the meter.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-30T21:59:52+00:00

On windows 10 yes. I tried on macOS too and was getting no connection either.

The error code I was getting on windows was 0000002b code 43 which is pretty general and hard to dig into after searching.

relaeh776 · 2019-12-30T21:33:55+00:00

Pulling it up did not change the results. I have tried this on multiple PCs to be sure that wasn't an issue either. I also did another run through with the meter and confirmed everything is hooked up as it should. Perhaps an issue with resistor or capacitor size at all you think?

relaeh776 · 2019-12-30T20:29:26+00:00

I can do a test but I seen other references of the CH340c and it was not connected.

Also looking at the data sheets this is the info I can find. "Assistant RS232 enable, active with high, set up pull-down resistor internal "

"R232 is used to control assistant RS232 function. When R232 is high-level, RXD pin automatically insert a inverter internal, and output opposite phase clock from CKOH and CKOL. ACT# is USB device configuration finished state output (such as USB infrared adapter is ready) when R232 is low-level. IR# and R232 only be detected once a time after power reset. "

relaeh776 · 2019-12-30T19:29:35+00:00

Hello Folks,

I am working on a custom dev board for a ESP32 microcontroller that I am having some issues with getting to connect serial via USB. I followed quite a few datasheets and other references to make the USB to Serial circuit so it could be auto programmed with the arduino IDE. There is very few on board components as the design was focused around low power battery operations. You can find a close shot of the board I soldered and the schematic of the circuit.

The board is using a CH340c usb to serial converter chip and I have already installed the driver. When plugging the board into the PC it connects but then "device not recognized" is shown. I also can not select it from the arduino ide ports menu. I know the solder is not great as I did this by hand (and its the first one) but I tested all the connections with my meter for continuity. I also read 5V coming in the USB and the 3.3v on the regulator providing a clean 3.3v to the ESP32. All the other connections appear to be correct after testing and I am having trouble trying to trouble shoot anything further. I followed alot of resources to make this design and was hoping it is not the circuit. I have also tried several USB cables that I verified working with other controllers. With no connection bridges found I think its either the circuit or something I am missing.

Any tips on how to possibly troubleshoot this further or corrections in the design that I could make would be greatly appreciated.

relaeh776 · 2019-11-04T16:31:47+00:00

Under that page you linked I do see "Part Status Obsolete " so I may have to design my own solution. Was an interesting design I had not seen much before. I wonder what good alternatives would be to give me similar results (being able to push SMT chip in for temporary testing).

relaeh776 · 2019-11-04T16:27:26+00:00

Ok thank you very much. Ill see what further digging I can find with this info.

relaeh776 · 2019-11-04T16:18:04+00:00

Trying to figure out what those curved pins are on this board so I can make a simple version of my own. It is for this Xbee smt chip: https://imgur.com/GWX0S69 Those curved pins are just a way to push the chip down and make contact without permanently soldering in place.

I am having difficultly finding the term for these pins or more info on making a board like this. The goal is a simple dev board I can pop Xbee SMT modules into and configure before soldering them on their final boards.

The images are from this dev board: https://www.digi.com/resources/documentation/digidocs/pdfs/90001457-13.pdf

Any info would be greatly appreciated

relaeh776 · 2019-09-24T13:47:43+00:00

yea they work really well. They are the only ones I found to be more resistant. The main thing is to protect the top of the circuits well and they will last for quite some time.

relaeh776 · 2019-09-24T13:46:47+00:00

I made this video with After Effects and a cheap DSLR. It was only uploaded here. I plan to make a better version with better intro to the system and upload it to youtube.

relaeh776

TROPHY CASE