All LEDS on Battery side light up and stay lit - unresolved

SpokePOV kit for bikes

Moderators: adafruit_support_bill, adafruit

Please be positive and constructive with your questions and comments.
Locked
User avatar
devtty1
 
Posts: 5
Joined: Sat Jun 19, 2010 8:40 am

All LEDS on Battery side light up and stay lit - unresolved

Post by devtty1 »

Background:
I built 1 of my 3 SpokePOV's and don't want to build the other 2 until I get this one working or better understand what I did wrong.

After soldering all the parts in, it worked with the default images but I had not built the Serial or USB dongle yet so I didn't do any images yet. I tested it out by attaching it to my bike using small zip ties and things seemed to work. I finished for the day.

A day later, after I built the serial dongle, I went to connect the SpokePOV and I couldn't communicate with it. Initially, I never really checked the POV itself but messed with my OS etc ... finally, I looked at the POV and realized that all the lights were on on both sides. All except 3. 2 on the battery side and 1 on the 6 IC side. So I re-soldered those 3 LED's and the 2 on the battery side lit but the 1 on the 6 IC side didn't (6th one down from the red button). I tried several "hard resets" where I took the batteries out and put them back in and the same result each time (All LED's lit except the 6th one down from the red button.

I could slightly bend the board and the 1 unlit LED would flicker and the harder I bent the better it would light.

At this point, I went thru and hit each solder joint with the soldering iron, making sure every joint had a decent looking "bubble". Immediately after this, a hard reset caused the self test and things worked well until I plugged it into the serial dongle (built in the mean-time). At 1st, the software connected but when I tried to load an image, I got the communication failure error. That's when I noticed that the "ALL LED's LIT" problem had come back.

I then went thru every solder joint again with the iron but I've not been able to get anything other than odd behavior. By "odd behavior" I mean this:

I plug in the batteries and all LED's on the URL side will go on but LED's on the 6 IC side will do different things. Sometimes they all (except the 6th one down from the button) come on, sometimes only the bottom 7 or 8 (6 IC side) other times none of them come on.

If I bend the board slightly, bending near the "6th one down from the button" the battery side LED's will go off.

The order that I plug-in the batteries will exhibit different behavior. In all this description, I always connect the battery below the 10 pin interface connection 2nd. If I connect this 1st, the behavior seems to be more consistent. IE, if I connect the battery below the 10 pin interface connection first, the bottom 8 or 16 LEDs on the battery side will light up, and the bottom 8 (sometimes only 1) on the 6 IC side will light up.

Now, I realize I did something wrong, but nothing happened over night. To the best of my knowledge I didn't do anything obvious to the SpokePOV. I didn't drop it, wash it or hook it up to 220v etc....

I did replace the 2 IC's (2313 and the 8 pin IC) with chips from my other kits and get same behavior.

Does anyone have a suggestion of other things I can check?

thank you
Last edited by devtty1 on Tue Jun 29, 2010 6:45 am, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
adafruit_support_bill
 
Posts: 88092
Joined: Sat Feb 07, 2009 10:11 am

Re: All LEDS on Battery side light up and stay lit

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

Some good clear pics of the front & back of the board are the best place to start.
If bending the board causes intermittant behavior, then there is almost certainly a bad solder joint or two.
The order of battery insertion shouldn't make any difference, since the circuit is not complete until the second battery is in.

User avatar
devtty1
 
Posts: 5
Joined: Sat Jun 19, 2010 8:40 am

Re: All LEDS on Battery side light up and stay lit

Post by devtty1 »

Thanks for the info. I will get some pics posted soon.

thank you

User avatar
devtty1
 
Posts: 5
Joined: Sat Jun 19, 2010 8:40 am

Re: All LEDS on Battery side light up and stay lit

Post by devtty1 »

Hi, here are 2 pics. I'm not sure how it will look to you, but I'm able to zoom in on the joints. If I need more/better shots, just let me know.

One note I didn't mention, although please feel free to double check me. I did check the resistor networks to make sure pin 1 is in the box marked with an "X" and I checked the IC's to make sure they are oriented correctly.

in image DSC10007.jpg, between RN2 and RN4, notice that there is a black mark to the side of the hole. This marks the LED that is intermittent.

when I tried to attach the JPG images, it failed saying the image is invalid for uploading. I'll see if I can convert them but in the meantime, here is a link to the same pictures:

Image
http://www.kamiemgabo.com/adafruit/DSCI0006.JPG

Image
http://www.kamiemgabo.com/adafruit/DSCI0007.JPG


I'll try to convert and upload these pics in the mean-time.

User avatar
adafruit_support_bill
 
Posts: 88092
Joined: Sat Feb 07, 2009 10:11 am

Re: All LEDS on Battery side light up and stay lit

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

Soldering looks pretty good. No obvious problems there.

You say that the behavior is somewhat dependent upon the order in which you install the batteries. I notice that the signal trace for your intermittant LED runs under one of the battery terminals. You might take a close look for any possible shorts under the battery terminals. If there is an exposed trace or something, it might make contact when the board flexes.

User avatar
devtty1
 
Posts: 5
Joined: Sat Jun 19, 2010 8:40 am

Re: All LEDS on Battery side light up and stay lit

Post by devtty1 »

I will check that trace from the 6th LED as you suggest and I'll check other battery related traces.

Interesting about my "battery sequence" statement. Last night I went to make a video of that particular behavior for your viewing and discovered that if I lay the SpokePOV on a flat surface and install the batteries, then I no longer get the odd light-up behavior. Indicating that there is something about the placement of my hands when I insert the batteries ... further indicating a cold solder joint or some other type of flaw in my work that shows up as the board flexes.

in the meantime, I'm checking traces. thank you

User avatar
devtty1
 
Posts: 5
Joined: Sat Jun 19, 2010 8:40 am

Re: All LEDS on Battery side light up and stay lit

Post by devtty1 »

I think I better update this thread, especially for anyone who comes across it later.

In summary, I don't know what's wrong with my project. I've checked and re-checked component orientation where it matters (IE, pin 1 to pin 1 for the resistor networks and the IC's), replaced the plug-in-able IC's and I have re-soldered every connection no less than 3 times.

I have eliminated the issue where flexing the board caused the 6th LED to flicker, most likely because of the re-soldering. I took out the battery clips and verified all traces were intact and in the process messed up one of those solder joints by peeling the connection off of the circuit board, but that's my fault. It has nothing to do with adafruit or the quality of the components.

Because so many of these SpokePOV's have been sold/made and this is the only occurrence of this issue in the forum (and also because I've done a couple of adafruit kits), I'm quite certain this issue is the result of my own mess-up. It is not a flaw in the kit.

I will be moving on to my 2nd SpokePOV and will take my time, going slower than the 1st and hopefully won't make the same mistakes I made here. However, i will not be updating this thread unless I am absolutely certain I've discovered the cause, which could happen as I make the 2nd kit.

thanks arduwino for your help.

Locked
Please be positive and constructive with your questions and comments.

Return to “SpokePOV (discontinued)”