Showing posts with label electronics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label electronics. Show all posts

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Building an Arduino Shield and Proto Board for the nRF24L01 Transceiver

The nRF24L01+ Transceiver is a great low cost way to add wireless capability to any project. But the down side of the nRF24L01+ is it can be a hassle to prototype with. In this video we look at how to build an Arduino shield and a mini proto board for the nRF24L01+. You can also purchase the shield and mini proto board covered in the video at forcetronics.com.



To Access the Eagle PCB files:
//*****************************Arduino Code for Transmitter***********************
//This sketch is from a tutorial video on the ForceTronics YouTube Channel. The tutorial discusses how to build a 
//shield and a prototyping board for the nRF24L01 Transceiver Module.
//the code was leverage from Ping pair example at http://tmrh20.github.io/RF24/pingpair_ack_8ino-example.html
//This sketch is free to the public to use and modify at your own risk

#include <SPI.h> //Call SPI library so you can communicate with the nRF24L01+
#include <nRF24L01.h> //nRF2401 libarary found at https://github.com/tmrh20/RF24/
#include <RF24.h> //nRF2401 libarary found at https://github.com/tmrh20/RF24/

const int pinCE = 9; //This pin is used to set the nRF24 to standby (0) or active mode (1)
const int pinCSN = 10; //This pin is used to tell the nRF24 whether the SPI communication is a command or message to send out
RF24 wirelessSPI(pinCE, pinCSN); // Create your nRF24 object or wireless SPI connection
const uint64_t pAddress = 0xB00B1E5000LL;   // Radio pipe addresses for the 2 nodes to communicate.

void setup()  
{
  Serial.begin(57600);   //start serial to communicate process
  wirelessSPI.begin();            //Start the nRF24 module
  wirelessSPI.setAutoAck(1);                    // Ensure autoACK is enabled so rec sends ack packet to let you know it got the transmit packet payload
  wirelessSPI.setRetries(5,15);                 // Sets up retries and timing for packets that were not ack'd, current settings: smallest time between retries, max no. of retries
  wirelessSPI.openWritingPipe(pAddress);        // pipe address that we will communicate over, must be the same for each nRF24 module
  wirelessSPI.stopListening();
}

void loop()  
{
   byte t = analogRead(0);//note that we can cast the ADC value to a byte because we know the temp sensor is not going to return a value higher than 255
   if (!wirelessSPI.write(&t, 1 )){  //if the send fails let the user know over serial monitor
       Serial.println("packet delivery failed");      
   }
    delay(1000);
}

//*****************************Arduino Code for Receiver***********************
//This sketch is from a tutorial video on the ForceTronics YouTube Channel. The tutorial discusses how to build a 
//shield and a prototyping board for the nRF24L01 Transceiver Module.
//the code was leverage from Ping pair example at http://tmrh20.github.io/RF24/pingpair_ack_8ino-example.html
//This sketch is free to the public to use and modify at your own risk

#include <SPI.h> //Call SPI library so you can communicate with the nRF24L01+
#include <nRF24L01.h> //nRF2401 libarary found at https://github.com/tmrh20/RF24/
#include <RF24.h> //nRF2401 libarary found at https://github.com/tmrh20/RF24/

const int pinCE = 9; //This pin is used to set the nRF24 to standby (0) or active mode (1)
const int pinCSN = 10; //This pin is used to tell the nRF24 whether the SPI communication is a command or message to send out
byte bVal; //used to store ADC value payload from transmit module, the ADC value will be < 256 so it will fit in a byte
RF24 wirelessSPI(pinCE, pinCSN); // Declare object from nRF24 library (Create your wireless SPI) 
const uint64_t pAddress = 0xB00B1E5000LL;  //Create a pipe addresses for the 2 nodes to communicate over, the "LL" is for LongLong type

void setup()   
{
  Serial.begin(57600);  //start serial to communicate process
  wirelessSPI.begin();  //Start the nRF24 module
  wirelessSPI.setAutoAck(1);                    // Ensure autoACK is enabled, this means rec send acknowledge packet to tell xmit that it got the packet with no problems
  wirelessSPI.openReadingPipe(1,pAddress);      //open pipe o for recieving meassages with pipe address
  wirelessSPI.startListening();                 // Start listening for messages
}

void loop()  
{   
   //loop until all of the payload data is recieved, for this example loop should only run once
    while(wirelessSPI.available()){ 
     wirelessSPI.read( &bVal, 1 ); //read one byte of data and store it in bVal variable
     Serial.print("Temperature at transmitter is "); 
     Serial.print(calculateTempF(calculateArduinoVolt(bVal))); //convert the ADC value to a voltage value and than to a temperature value in F
     Serial.println(" F");
    }
 
  delay(200);    
}

//this function calculates temp in F from TMP36 temp sensor
float calculateTempF(float v1) { 
 float temp = 0;
 //calculate temp in C, .75 volts is 25 C. 10mV per degree
 if (v1 < .75) { temp = 25 - ((.75-v1)/.01); } //if below 25 C
 else if (v1 == .75) {temp = 25; }
 else { temp = 25 + ((v1 -.75)/.01); } //if above 25
 //convert to F
 temp =((temp*9)/5) + 32;
 return temp;
}

//This function takes an Arduino analog pin reading and converts it to a voltage value
float calculateArduinoVolt(int val) {
 float volt = (float)val * (5.0 / 1023.0); //convert ADC value to voltage
 return volt;
}



Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Contracting and Consulting Services for Open Source Hardware Design

This video provides an overview of ForceTronics LLC's contracting and consulting services. Whether you are a maker, entrepreneur, or a startup Forcetronics Contracting and Consulting Services can help turn your idea into reality leveraging the power of open source hardware.






If you are interested contact me on twitter or email:
  • Twitter: @ForceTronics
  • Email: forcetronics@gmail.com
Put “Contracting Services” or “Consulting Services” in the subject line



Tuesday, June 2, 2015

Building Your Own AVR / Arduino Internet of Things (IoT) Development Board Part 1

In this 5 part video series we will build our own AVR / Arduino Internet of Things (IoT) development board. We will go from a design concept to prototyping our design to PCB layout of our design all the way to a tested and finished development board.


Example parts order for this project (please note that this does not include all the parts)






Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Building an Android App to Communicate with the RN-42 Bluetooth Module

In this video we will build an Android App to communicate with the RN-42 Bluetooth module. The RN-42 is connected to Arduino Uno and the Android App we build turns on and off an LED connected to the Arduino. Below the video you will find the Arduino code and a link to download the Android App code (MIT Inventor 2 was used to build the Android App). Enjoy!



Link to download App Inventor 2 code (.aia file):
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/26591541/AndroidBTExample.aia

Arduino Code:
/*
  This sketch is part of a tutorial for connecting to and communicating with an HC-06 or an RN-42 bluetooth module using a custom Android App. 
  The bluetooth modules are connected to an Arduino and the Arduino is connected to an LED. The Android app is used to wirelessly turn on and
  off the LED using  bluetooth. 

  This code is in the public domain.
 */

// Pin 7 has a LED connected to it
int led = 7;

// the setup routine runs once when you press reset:
void setup() {
  
  Serial.begin(9600);
  // initialize the digital pin as an output and set it low initially
  pinMode(led, OUTPUT);
  digitalWrite(led, LOW);
}

// the loop routine runs over and over again forever:
void loop() {
  delay(30);
  String t; //create an empty string to store messages from Android
  while(Serial.available()) { //keep reading bytes while they are still more in the buffer
    t += (char)Serial.read(); //read byte, convert to char, and append it to string
  }
  
  if(t.length()) { //if string is not empty do the following
    if(t == "on") { //if the string is equal to "on" then turn LED on
      digitalWrite(led, HIGH); //Set digital pin to high to turn LED on
      Serial.write("LED is on"); //Tell the Android app that the LED was turned on
    }
    else if (t == "off") { 
      digitalWrite(led, LOW);  
      Serial.write("LED is off");
    } // turn the LED off by making the voltage LOW
  }
}