Page 935 – Electronics-Lab.com

A Tutorial For Launching Your First Balloon

Posted on 26 October, 201526 October, 2015 by mixos

Here is a nice tutorial about launching you first ballon into space. Also tracking device information is provided. Source is available here:

There are a lot of reasons to put together a weather balloon launch. Its a great project for a STEM /STEAM class, it requires planning, electronics and programming, and teamwork. It has a lot of great classroom applications, giving a tangible demo of aerodynamics, physics, meteorology, geology, and more. Additionally its a great way to get amateur radio into the classroom and get a new generation into this great hobby. Outside of classrooms there is citizen science to be had, gathering your own data of atmospheric conditions or testing devices in space like conditions. And finally there are the amazing photos and videos that can be made only with weather balloons. Above all launching weather balloons is a lot of fun and a great challenge.

A Tutorial For Launching Your First Balloon – [Link]

The MCP9600 Thermocouple interface

Posted on 26 October, 2015 by mixos

by Martin Cooke @ elektormagazine.com:

The MCP9600 from Microchip is a single chip solution to convert thermocouple output EMF to degrees Celsius. The chip includes integrated cold-junction compensation and corrects thermocouple non-linearity for the eight most popular types of thermocouple.

User-programmable registers in the MCP9600 allow the chip to be configured for various applications including a low-power mode for battery operation and adjustable digital filter characteristics for fast-changing transient temperature sensing. There are also four programmable temperature alert outputs which can be used to detect multiple temperature zones.

The MCP9600 Thermocouple interface – [Link]

DIY Tweeting Weather Station

Posted on 26 October, 2015 by mixos

by Jonathanrjpereira @ instructables.com:

Ever wanted to monitor your city’s Current Weather Conditions, Carbon Footprint, Noise and Pollution levels? Do you want be a Climate Change Crusader or set-up your own Tweeting Weather Station and share your local weather conditions with the world?

Meet Tweeting Weather IoT Station aka TWIST – a DIY, Open-Source Environmental Monitoring and Meteorological Data Acquisition Platform. The purpose of TWIST is so that individuals and communities can collect data of what’s actually happening in their environment and share this data on social media such as Twitter.

DIY Tweeting Weather Station – [Link]

Attiny85 EMF detector

Posted on 26 October, 2015 by mixos

by masteruan @ instructables.com:

This is a simple tutorial to create an EMF detector. You can use Arduino for this job, but is better use a microcontroller called Attiny85. It is possible program it throe the Arduino interface.

Attiny85 EMF detector – [Link]

Arduino with GSM and PIR Sensor

Posted on 26 October, 201526 October, 2015 by mixos

by motheeb @ instructables.com:

This lesson will allow you to use SMS to control an LED along with using Arduino to make automatic calls to your phone in case it sensed movements in your room. You will be able to listen to the voices there and act upon emergency.

Arduino with GSM and PIR Sensor – [Link]

Rad tolerant megaAVR MCU for space & avionics applications

Posted on 26 October, 2015 by mixos

by Graham Prophet @ edn-europe.com:

Atmel ATmegaS128 AVR microcontrollers are now produced in space-grade quality, including latch-up immunity, ceramic packaging and extended temperature range for next-generation of space applications.

AtmegaS128 – the first µC Rad Tolerant device for Atmel – delivers full wafer lot traceability, 64-lead ceramic package (CQFP), space screening, space qualification according to QML and ESCC flow and total ionising dose up to 30 krad (300 Gy Si) for space applications. The ATMegaS128 is “latch up” immune thanks to a dedicated silicon process: SEL LET > 62.5Mev at 125°C, 8 MHz/3.3V. SEU to heavy ions is estimated to 10-3 error/device/day for Low Earth Orbit applications.

Rad tolerant megaAVR MCU for space & avionics applications – [Link]

SDM3055 FW Upgrade, YZXstudio Black USB Power Monitor

Posted on 26 October, 201523 May, 2021 by mixos

In this video:

mjlorton tests the latest firmware from Siglent for the SDM3055 bench multimeter
A quick overview of the Fluke TiS10 (vs Ti90) thermal camera
A look at the YZXstudio Black USB Power Monitor (with optional bluetooth module) that Frank Tong sells on his eBay store

SDM3055 FW Upgrade, YZXstudio Black USB Power Monitor – [Link]

App Note: Heat sink mounting guide

Posted on 26 October, 2015 by mixos

Fairchild Semiconductor’s app note on proper heat sink mounting to achieve lower thermal resistance between the package and its heat sink. Link here (PDF)

This document provides guidelines for mounting heat sinks for the proper thermal management of power semiconductor devices in field applications. This document describes heat sink mounting methods, considerations, contact thermal resistance, and mounting torque for various packages

App Note: Heat sink mounting guide – [Link]

Hyper-local Weather Dashboard: Wunderground + Pi Sense HAT

Posted on 26 October, 2015 by mixos

by InitialState @ github.com:

Let’s face it, we humans talk about the weather a lot ⛅. The average person talks about the weather four times a day, for an average of 8 minutes and 21 seconds. Do the math and that totals 10 months of your life that you will spend yapping about the weather. The weather ranks as the #1 go-to topic for conversation starters and uncomfortable silence breakers. If we are going to talk about it that much, we might as well take our weather street cred to a whole new level. This super-fun and easy project will leverage the Internet of Things (IoT) and a Raspberry Pi to do just that.

Hyper-local Weather Dashboard: Wunderground + Pi Sense HAT – [Link]

DIY Capacitance Meter

Posted on 24 October, 2015 by mixos

electro-labs.com published another great project based on Atmega328P:

We are building another opensource SoloPCB project which is very enjoyable to build and use. In our electronics works, we frequently need to know the actual value of a capacitor. As you know, small sized SMD capacitors have no markings showing their values. Or there are lots of fake electrolytic capacitors which are rated much lower than their stated values. Sometimes the capacitors have large tolerances and we want to choose the best fit for our circuit. What we need is an accurate capacitance meter.

This is a capacitance meter which can measure capacitors rated from picofarads to millifarads. The principle of operation is simple. Just apply voltage to the capacitor and measure the elapsed time to charge it. The circuit is based on Atmega328P and it is Arduino IDE compatible. It includes the voltage regulators which output 5V and 3.3V from 9V input. A Nokia 5110 LCD is used to display the measured information. Thanks to the 4mm banana jacks, various kinds of probes can be used such as SMD probe, crocodile probe etc.

DIY Capacitance Meter – [Link]