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ArduStation Assembly Instructions

Posted by Jordi Muñoz on June 25, 2009 at 2:00pm


What you will need:
-ArduStation Kit
-Soldering Iron:

-Solder:

-Flush/diagonal cutters:

Recommended:
-Low Profile Multimeter:

-Disordering Tool:



-This is what you will find inside the ArduStation components antistatic bag (LCD is included of course):


-Lets start soldering the non polarized capacitors (.1uF), when you are done place the xBee headers:


-After you placed the xBee headers, place any xBee module you have available to hold the headers in the right angle, then solder:


-Continue with the Atmega328 socket and the buzzer, watch out with the buzzer polarity!:


-Now place the protection diode (check the white strip) and the power regulator, be careful both have polarity too:


-Lets continue with the potentiometers, one is for the contrast with the number "103" or 10Kohms (UP) and the other with the long pins is for the backlight LED, with the number "502" or 5Kohms (down).


-An extra picture:


-Now solder the first 100uF polarized capacitors, check out the white strip (negative).


-Now solder the second 100uF polarized capacitors, check out the white strip (negative).


-No solder the 16Mhz Resonator (orange/brown one), is not polarized, the reset button and the power jack (easy):



Now we need to solder the LED's, but i have chosen very bright LED's in order to see something under the sun, but they are clear, so no way to see the color and one of the was inverted polarity (the long pin is the negative). A solution for that is using a the multimeter, just choose the continuity option or diode test (both will work):

This trick works great for SMD LED, for normal LED will not be so effective but it will work. Anyway just place the multimeter probes in the LED and see in with side the LED turns on and check the color also the LED side that the multimeter red probe is touching is the positive polarity of the LED. In the back of the board you can check the positive polarity of the LED holes:


-After you solder the LED's in the right way, is time to solder the funniest part, the buttons:


-Turn the board and place the Atmega328 carefully (the little half-circle divot on the chip should be on the side with the little half-circle in the socket; ignore the position of the red dot on the chip, which is not meaningful). The processors comes with bootloader pre-loaded:


-Now just solder the LCD (you can use female headers so you can remove the LCD anytime) and the FTDI port. You are ready to connect it. Note: You can't upload code when the xBee is connected.


-When you are ready, just upload the ArduStaion demo code here. It should work with ArduPilot and show you real time telemetry as indicated:


-By pressing the buttons left and right you can change the screen data.


You can find the latest code here:
http://code.google.com/p/ardu-station/
The example is commented and you adapt this system to any of your projects!

Enjoy!
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Comments

  • T3
    steve kloppenburg July 16, 2009 at 12:16pm
    is there any way to make this work with a audio line from my video tx (if I have a modem on the plane of course)

    I only need one a one way stream of info.
  • Reto July 6, 2009 at 8:44pm
    Hey Jordi: if you'd still be in Switzerland, my shipping costs would be lower ;-)
  • Peter Meister July 6, 2009 at 8:25pm
    Your instruction GUIDES ROCK !!! Jordi....Thanks for all the work on these...
  • Earl July 6, 2009 at 8:07pm
    For programming via XBee ....
    Ahh....there is a 2 pin header to be put in just below (flat part) of the transistor....oops...
    Am I right ?
    Earl
  • Earl July 6, 2009 at 7:45pm
    Jordi,
    Been busy here, but want to say thanks for the station. I use it @ 57600 baud. Works great. Can't wait foe an enclosure!
    Earl
  • Andrew July 5, 2009 at 9:02am
    just orderd mine i cant wait guys thanks sooo much
  • Developer
    Jordi Muñoz July 2, 2009 at 3:51pm
    Reto, i use to "live" in Switzerland for about a year =) and yes you can hook up something in the I2C port, actually i already populated that pull up resistors for you. =)
  • Reto July 2, 2009 at 1:26pm
    @Thomas: It's not an obligation, seems to me. Just adapt the code to have it at whichever max baud rate you'd like. I had the "chance" to go for the Locosys LS20031 which requires the NMEA parsing. Chris and Jordi set it to 38400 by default in the 2.2.3 code, although it also this chipset also works great at 57600 too.
  • Reto July 2, 2009 at 1:16pm
    I forgot to mention that we live in an interesting world. Living in Switzerland (ya know the tiny mountain country with cows and chocolate rivers, ... and drowning banks), I ordered from DIYdrones online shop in the US on June 25th, got a bag of components in the mail 7 days (only seven!) later at noon, have a UAV ground station up and running after supper, and can report back to the DIYdrones world in the evening! If this is like the future we face, I'm glad to go for it! Hey, keep going, guys. DIYdrones is a hell of a hobby palace!
  • Admin
    Thomas J Coyle III July 2, 2009 at 1:15pm
    Reto,

    If you are using Ardupilot ver 2.2.X, then I thought that the XBee baud rate had to be set to 57600 baud for telemetry?

    Regards,
    TCIII
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