When I broke down and did the club thermometer project (http://elmer166.blogspot.com/2015/08/club-project-thermometer.html) I realized how straightforward a PCB can be. OK, I am clumsy at it and it takes a few cycles, but the result is very satisfying.
The PIC24FV16KM202 used in the thermometer, and it's sister the PIC24FV32KA302 were something of a revalation. The peripheral complement is absolutely breathtaking, and the peripheral pin select allows for a lot more flexibility than the dsPIC30F family.
I ran into to project where I wanted a little more speed, and tripped across the dsPIC33EV256GM102. Astonishing! 70 MIPS, gobs of memory, PPS like the 24FV, and the family of dsPIC33EVxxGMyzz lets you select memory size, pin count, and network from a family of otherwise identical parts.
I started working on a dsPIC-EL board based on this part, and realized that the pinout was virtually identical to the PIC24FV series. I could choose between dsPIC33EVxxGMx02, PIC24FV16KM202, and PIC24FVxxKAy02 parts by the simple addition of a jumper.
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| dsPIC-EL |
From the work on the dsPIC30F board I recognized that Arduino-style header connectors were a worthwhile addition. With the thermometer project I had also recognized that I could get proto boards custom made for less money and higher quality than I could buy already made. It was a short step to realizing that if I bought the long pin headers used by Arduino shields in quantity, I could have shields for under three bucks.
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| dsPIC-EL with proto shield fitted |
Somewhere around this time I got roped into working with the high school electronics club. The students early on expressed a strong interest in building stuff they could program. This, of course, pushed me into moving along much quicker on the dsPIC-EL, and I can pretty much call it soup now.
Of course, I want to share this development, so all the work is on GitLab, but I have no interest in kitting the thing. The good news is that the boards can be had quite cheaply, and there are really no hard parts (although some parts are a lot cheaper in quantity). If all the parts were purchased in quantity one, I suspect it could be had for around the cost of a PIC-EL. Buying things like connectors in quantity cuts the cost to less than half. The main disadvantage to some of the large quantity parts is lead time.
The dsPIC33EV256GM102 is kind of pricey, but the 32K version without the CAN (which is unlikely to be needed) can be had for less than the price of a PIC24FV, which itself makes 16F and 18F parts look expensive.
So, the main features:
- PIC with pins brought out to Arduino connectors for easy prototyping
- Extra connector to allow ordinary perfboard to be used as a shield
- LCD and buttons on the base board. You always want these, and they have the annoying feature of needing to be on the "top" shield which really limits flexibility if they are on a shield.
- All used pins jumpered so they can be used for prototyping without interference from on-board parts
- A few LEDs thrown in for good measure
- Power from a cell phone charger with an XH connector for batteries or some other external supply
- PICkit connector for programming
- Jumper to allow PIC24FV to be used
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| Schematic |
I don't plan to do another Elmer 160 type class, but I will be guiding the high school club's members through learning the dsPIC, and I will be putting my materials on GitLab, so they will be available to anyone who is interested. Rather than PDF prose, most will be PowerPoint (well, actually LibreOffice). Of course, high school kids pick up things a lot quicker than us old hams, so the material will be quite a bit different.
The key repositories are:
The PCB including Gerbers. The README for this repository includes the schematic and a red/blue image of the board. The BOM in this repository also contains information on sources.
https://gitlab.com/33E-simple/dsPIC-EL-GM
The ProtoShield gerbers
https://gitlab.com/33E-simple/ProtoShield
An LCD library
https://gitlab.com/33EV-GM1/LCD.X
An I2C library
https://gitlab.com/33EV-GM1/I2C.X
Presentations (under development)
https://gitlab.com/33EV-GM1/dsPIC-presentations
Construction instructions (under development)
https://gitlab.com/E-WCC/dsPIC-EL_Build_Instructions
If you want to get boards made, simply upload the zip file containing the Gerbers to
http://makerstudio.cc/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=8&products_id=14
The price is around $16 for 10 boards including shipping. Shipping seems to vary a bit, I assume based on exchange rates. It takes about three weeks for the boards to reach the U.S. I have also used Accutrace in cases where I want boards a little sooner (8 days). Their price of $40 for 10 is quite a bit higher than MakerStudio, but not crazy, and their customer service is tops. Their boards are a little higher quality than the Chinese boards, but you need to look really close to tell the difference.
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