SmartSocket
SmartMeter DL PCB boards arrived
The circuit boards of the second generation of the SmartMeter arrived yesterday. Just in time after 10 workdays. They all appear to be in perfect order, but actually not so cheap for two prototype circuit boards (€245 for two PCBs) . I prefer to have perfectly working boards than a few bucks cheaper, and not being sure if everything is correct. That’s why I ordered them at EuroPrint Eger which is widely known as the highest quality PCB manufacturer in Hungary. They also managed the cutouts for me, and could do a black finish of the soldermask. It looks like pretty cool. Enough talking, time for pictures: › Continue reading
Introducing Our Mobile Lab
The SmartMeter Board was a really important stage of the project, but it is only a part of the Big Picture. Using it, we could set up a precision measurement station to measure the parameters of electrical devices operating in our living areas: at home, work, coffee shops (not that), and even at hospital. We started nowadays to crawl the physical world into a big database like Google does on the Internet. Our aim is to build up a complete parameter database of our commonly used devices. We can measure now a various set of parameters, which could help us understanding the wide variety of electric device behaviour.
SmartMeter – tested
The RevA01 version of the SmartMeter Circuit Board has been produced and assembled. Finally, after a delay, we could make the complete tests at a BUTE Lab and it looked promising. All voltages, high current vias and wires, op-amps, high precision resistors, heat sink solutions, the Jack and BNC outputs work. We tried to measure a high power hair dryer and got appropriate signal samples (and even the board didn’t blow out). We only had trouble with the 5V DC power socket because of a false connected pin. So a few correction were needed, but I could say we were lucky.
Some pics about the measurement session (sorry for the quality, I made them with my phone):
SmartMeter – finished!
I’m finished with routing the circuit board. It was created with Cadence Orcad. The first prototype PCB has just been assembled and we’re currently testing it for any errors. My PCB layout is below, it’s double-sided and has four layers to keep the analog signals clear. As you can see the nets on the bottom are more wider than others, because they have to take a current flow up to 10A. The nets near by the op-amps are a bit wider to spread the heat, too.
SmartMeter – design goals
In the SmartSocket project we are in a quite early stage. In that we have to proof to ourselves that the concept’s aims could be achieved. This proof is important to be done as early as possible and it’s aim is twofold. In one hand you could prevent high costs (if you have to realize later that the concept is a dead end) and with a proof in your pocket you could be sure enough of your idea when costs get increasing.
Our project is basically about an algorithm which will be implemented to an embedded device, so in the basic research stage we should create a basic, minimal-featured algorithm, running on a PC. It should truly proof to the project members and the financier that one time we could bring it to effect. So what to do?
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