While getting some basic code running to reset the drop targets and eject the holes, I suddenly lost an entire bank of solenoids. Inspecting the board, I eventually figured out that the board had been repaired so many times as I modded it to test different things that one of the traces carrying the solenoid ground had just gotten ripped off completely. At this point it probably had 4 jumpers on it already, and multiple cut traces, plus some of the mosfets had been replaced three times, so I decided it was time to junk that pcb and build a new one.
One of the main issues that required all those modifications early on was my changing requirements for how the inputs would work. First I'd had them active high, then active low, and then I'd had to change which pin they were. Back when that happened, I redesigned the board to add some more configuration points, so each I/O could have a configurable pull up/down, as well as fix some other pain points. I added LED indicators that the fuses were good, test points for the voltages, and combined my 6/6/4 pin connectors into two 8 pin connectors. A big goal on these boards as I design them further is just making the connector count as small as possible, since they needed to get unplugged so often. I'd actually had the new PCBs on hand for months, but hadn't needed to actually use one yet, so I started assembling:
Sadly, I discovered an issue with my design early on: at some point I had mirrored some of the components. For the mosfets, that wasn't too bad; just turn them around, but I'd also mirrored one of my 16 pin chips, which resulted in the horrible hack of mounting the chip upside down:
Sigh. I guess another pass at the design will be needed down the line. It'll work for now though, just hard to mount 
blog comments powered by Disqus