[psas-avionics] Happy new year! Anyone interested in configuring a RasPi setup with Screenly?

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

First of all, happy new year! It's going to be a kickass 2019, looking
forward to launching rockets and building satellites.

Second: we now have a brand new screen at the front of the rocket room
with a RasPi B+ 3 mounted on the VESA screws. I'd like to set it up so
that it's really, really easy to update, including to add movies. There
are many ways to set this up, but apparently "screenly" is a good way to
do to this, and comes with a RasPi image that "just works".

There's network coordination with the CAT, and figuring out what the
best way to link it to a Google Drive or Google Slides presentation.

Anyone interested? Let me know!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Chris miller: please read!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi Chris!

Do you have a DevSat? If you're not actively using it, could you please
return it to the rocket room as soon as you can?

Thanks!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Digikey order going out today; let me know if you need anything!

[Andrew Greenberg]

-- 
---
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Electrical and Computer Engineering
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[psas-avionics] Friday, noon: Meeting with Prof. Bothun from U of O on the CirrusFluxCam

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi! If you have anything to do with, or are interested in the
CirrusFluxCam science payload from the U of O, please join us in the
rocket room (now EB91) this Friday 7/28 at noon.

Thanks, and see you there!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Probably meeting with Prof. Greg Bothun on Friday 7/28

[Andrew Greenberg]

We're not sure what time yet, but if you're on the CirrusFluxCam team,
please definitely be there!

We're meeting in the rocket room...

Thanks,

Andrew


 Forwarded Message 
Subject:Re: Meeting 7/28?
Date:   Fri, 21 Jul 2017 16:21:18 -0700
From:   Prof. G. Bothun <big...@gmail.com>
To: Andrew Greenberg <a...@ece.pdx.edu>



yes I think so

On Fri, Jul 21, 2017 at 3:59 PM, Andrew Greenberg <a...@ece.pdx.edu
<mailto:a...@ece.pdx.edu>> wrote:

Hi Greg!

Any possibility you could come up and meet with us next Friday, July
28th? We're available any time after 11:00am and before 6:00pm.

Thanks!

Andrew

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---




-- 

*Greg Bothun*
*Professor of Physics,
University of Oregon*
*
*
*
*
This message sent from devices that can't spell

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Re: [psas-avionics] Possible Launch Opportunity for ORESAT

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

We just got our first ask for launch readiness!

> NASA’s Launch Services Program (LSP) has a possible slot available a
> currently manifested ELaNa mission.  Hardware delivery would be July
> 2018 and the orbit for this mission is an inclination of 93 degrees and
> a perigee altitude ~450km.

Our target readiness date is Q3 2019, so we politely said "not yet!".

Exciting! :)

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] 1:00pm Friday ClueCall(tm) with NanoRacks, our future integrator! (also: homework)

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

Friday at 1:00pm we have a Webex call with NanoRacks, the company that
will most likely huck OreSat off the ISS. If you can't join us in the
rocket room, please join online (link info in the google calendar entry).

You have homework!

BEFORE the Friday call, please read all four NanoRack ICDs (prepended
with "NR") that are located in the "CubeSat Design Specifications" in
the OreSat shared drive. We'll be discussing these on the call.

Talk to you then!

Andrew

-- 
-------
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[psas-avionics] OreSat (solar) update

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

We had a, uh, "working" meeting today. A lot was done:

- Kenny, Adam and Haneef stuffed 7 more OreSat Solar PCBs. 4/8 stuffed
boards now work; mysterious shorts are in the other 4. We'll hunt them
down this week.

- We shipped off four PCBs to Alta Devices; they'll be putting on solar
modules this week. If they do it before Wednesday, then they'll be
showing off our boards at the 2017 CubeSat Workshops in San Luis Obispo, CA!

- K now has a working board and is bringing up the LTC2990.

-  Evan and Haneef organized all of our components, which are now
obsessively grouped by type (power ICs, digital ICs, diodes, etc) and
sometimes by package (resistors and capacitors).

- Phillip (ECE labs) lent us a bunch of old lab equipment, including
DMMs, power supplies, and another tek scope, so we now have an actual
electronics lab bench for OreSat!

- Paul showed off his first DevSat prototype. A few will hopefully show
up on Tuesday -- it's time to get coding!

I'll post these to the meeting notes, but I thought I'd email it out, too.

Andrew




-- 
-------
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a...@ece.pdx.edu  C: 503.708.7711
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[psas-avionics] OreSat conference call Friday 1:00pm with NASA folks on CSLI timeline

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

Conference call this Friday at 1:00pm. We'll take it on speakerphone
from the new rocket room, but if you can't be there, I have a call in #.

We'll be talking about CSLI timeline and expectations, so if you're an
OreSat lead, please try and make it!

Thanks!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] EAGLE workshop this Saturday

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

There's another EAGLE workshop this Saturday. 9am - noon is the intro
workshop, 1 - 4pm is the intermediate.

https://github.com/psu-epl/psu-epl.github.com/wiki/Workshops

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] LTC3 boards ordered!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi LTC3-ers,

Boards are ordered! Finally!

Andrew

-- 
---
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Re: [psas-avionics] FlatSat Support Boards for OreSat

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi Glenn!

>   * As appropriate each subsystem board would have it's own custom
> "FlatSat Support Breakout" board (FSB) board.

Yes, I think this is a given. The ability to break out a board is
important. To that end, I'm toying with the idea of a standard debug
connector that attaches to the FSB. Probably a bad idea, actually, since
all the boards are different, but... we'll chat about it Friday.

>   * The FSB should allow the subsystem to be tested independently...

Yep.

>   * The FSB should should allow us take the subsystem in a fully running
> state into testing environments such as Thermal-Vacuum, Vibration,
> RF, various bench tests, etc, without interfering with the test.

That's a very good point.

>   * The FSB should not introduce any side effects to the FlatSat when
> connected into it.

Yes, and good luck to us with that :)

We'll discuss this in depth on Friday, and try to come up with our first
"FSB" requirements for the solar boards and the upcoming battery cards.

Andrew

-- 
-------
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[psas-avionics] PSAS Digi-Key order going out today - need anything?

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

Digi-Key order is going out tonight for the solar modules. If you need
anything for rockets or satellites, please let me know before late evening.

Thanks,

Andrew

-- 
---
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Re: [psas-avionics] OreSat meeting on hangouts today!

[Andrew Greenberg]

> Does that mean no physical meeting at all? Or just optional?

Oh, sorry, just optional: I believe Austin will be in the rocket room.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] OreSat meeting on hangouts today!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

The 2pm OreSat meeting is going to be via hangouts for those of us who
don't want to brave the ice.

http://psas.pdx.edu/hangout

Talk to you then,

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Embedded Linux Conference (ELC) in Portland, next month!!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

I'm not sure how we didn't see this before, but the Embedded Linux
Conference is being held in PDX this year, on February 17th. They have
decent rates for academics and hobbyists. It's a pretty interesting
conference, with lots of big names.

http://events.linuxfoundation.org/events/embedded-linux-conference

We were mentioned in all but name at one of the keynotes last year,
which was fun.

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] No OreSat meeting today; We'll start again next week!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

No official OreSat meeting today! We'll start again next week. Enjoy the
weekend and happy new year!

Andrew

-- 
---
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Electrical and Computer Engineering
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[psas-avionics] No CubeSat meeting tomorrow!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey everyone,

No CubeSat meeting tomorrow because of the SnowPocalypse. See you next
Tuesday!

Andrew

-- 
---
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Electrical and Computer Engineering
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[psas-avionics] Last minute notice: Solar cell call on Google Hangout @ 2pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

Just found out we're on for a 2pm hangout with Alta Devices. Come
hangout if you want; please send questions to me via chat rather than
slowing down the conversation, we're going to try to keep this brief!

http://psas.pdx.edu/hangout/

Thanks,

Andrew

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---
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[psas-avionics] Open source nerds: your microcontroller has arrived

[Andrew Greenberg]

Our friends at Crowd Supply are hosting an open source RISC-V core
microcontroller with actually decent peripherals. You can get chips, and
dev boards, if you want! We'll probably not ever use them in PSAS land,
but sheesh that's cool, custom open source microcontrollers!

https://www.crowdsupply.com/onchip/open-v

Andrew

-- 
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Re: [psas-avionics] Mission sequence of events needed for IARU Coordination Request

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi Glenn!

Please start a spreadsheet in the 2016 CSLI Application folder with
these events. We'll add times as we dig them up; they're all relatively
arbitrary, but we can find examples on the web of CubeSat project timelines.

Put up the spreadsheet, I'll fill in my best guesses, and then leave it
for you or others to research the rest.

Andrew

On 11/16/2016 03:10 PM, Glenn LeBrasseur wrote:
> For the IARU Coordination Request, I need to provide a mission sequence
> of events / duration of events description. What I have here may be a
> little more detailed than required, but I am thinking of something like
> the following. Could someone chime in here to be sure I am not just
> making this whole thing up. :)
> 
> Events  (Need to assign some kind of time or duration to these as well.
> This should probably be in a spreadsheet for our design / use.)
> 
> [Launch]
> 
>   Handoff to NASA and coordinate with JSpOC
>   NanoRacks ISS deployment
> 
> [Orbit Insertion]
>   NORAD / JSpOC gives us Keplerian sets (group of objects to identify)
>   Power on
>   Telemetry antenna deploy (other items deployed also to minimize
> complexity?)
>   Telemetry discovered
>   Telemetry correlated with Object ID, and given to JSpOC
> 
> [Orbital Operations]
>   Detumble
>   System checkout
>   Specific attitude established
>   Science Mission 1 - Oregon image taken
>   Science Mission 2 - DxWiFi tested with image download
>   Science Mission 3 - Cloud  image taken and downloaded
>   etc...
> 
> [Deorbit]
>   Just wait a while (< 25 years)
> 
> 
> - Glenn
> 
> 
> -- 
> Glenn Noel LeBrasseur
> glenn.lebrass...@gmail.com <mailto:glenn.lebrass...@gmail.com>
> 

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Fwd: Getting access to the A20 flight computer board

[Andrew Greenberg]

Sorry, apparently mailman strips out CC's:

Jamey Sharp <ja...@minilop.net>

Andrew

 Forwarded Message 
Subject: Getting access to the A20 flight computer board
Date: Sat, 22 Oct 2016 15:02:52 -0700
From: Andrew Greenberg <a...@ece.pdx.edu>
To: psas-avionics <psas-avion...@psas.pdx.edu>
CC: Jamey Sharp <ja...@minilop.net>

Hi everyone!

Anyone who wants to get ssh access to the A20 flight computer board
we're proposing for LV3 & OreSat, please email Jamey (CC'd above) your
preferred username and an SSH public key.

Thanks,

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] LGR v2.0 is ready for FAB: please review!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

Just pushed changes to LGR v2 and associated libraries. It's got
everything a Glenn could want ;)

https://github.com/oresat/low-gain-radio

Glenn, Jake, please double check the new BOM and the components I chose
given the switch to 0402s. Also, a few specific questions:

https://github.com/oresat/low-gain-radio/issues/18

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Hey ECE students - go support PSU IEEE!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi all,

PSAS was started as a student branch chapter of the IEEE "Aerospace And
Electronics Systems Society" (AESS), before we were all famous and
everything. So if you're a current ECE student, let me encourage you to
go join IEEE (and maybe even the AESS, too). You'll get good magazines,
access to some cool professional meetings and events at PSU, and it's cheap.

Big kickoff meeting Friday before the OreSat meeting, you should go if
you can!

> Greetings and Salutations,
>
> The PSU branch of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics
> Engineers (IEEE) will be holding an introductory meeting this
> *Friday**at 12pm in FAB 86-01* to inform students of the opportunities
> and benefits that membership gives.
>
> Opportunities include,
>
> -Scholarships
> -Research Fellowships
> -Grants
> -Professional Development
> -Personal Networking
>
> The PSU IEEE chapter will work to create an atmosphere where students
> can network for study, collaborate on projects, engage in friendly
> competitions, have access to industry tours, attend professional
> development conferences, resume building workshops, and to build
> lifelong relationships with their peers.
>
> You get out of life what you put in to life and this is an opportunity
> to do more than the average student.
>
> Pizza will be provided and students are encouraged to bring questions,
> concerns and friends.
>
> Hope to see you there and I look forward to working with you all in
> the future!
>
> /=
> -Robert Rutherford
> -PSU IEEE Chapter Chair
> -r...@pdx.edu 
> ---


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[psas-avionics] Space Electronics Workshop, More Info

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi avionics folks!

Just a reminder that people on this list who are working on or are
interested in hardware should show up this weekend!

- Bug me with questions
- Don't forget to RSVP (to me directly, not the list please).
- Above all, show up this Saturday morning at 10:00am in FAB 86-01!

Krunal is a passionate, entertaining guy who is one of the lead avionics
engineers at Planetary Resources. It should be a really good learning
experience.

Thanks, and see you there!

Andrew
-- 
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Re: [psas-avionics] Strong opinion on 0603 vs 0402 for LGR, and future boards?

[Andrew Greenberg]

> Are there any places where we need to be concerned about wattage?

Yep! There are two cases that we won't switch packages: one where
wattage is a problem (so far, no cases of this on the LGR board) and one
where the capacitance value is too high for an 0402 (anything greater
than about 1 uF). In these (and other cases I'm sure I missed) we'll
leave the larger packages. Other than that, the "jelly bean" parts can
be switched to 0402.

OK, everyone seems to agree it's a "go", so now OreSat's default package
size is now 0402. I think this makes sense.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Strong opinion on 0603 vs 0402 for LGR, and future boards?

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey everyone,

Glenn added a reflectometer to the LGR, and in doing so, he introduced a
bunch of 0402 components to an existing 0603 board. I've been itching to
move to 0402 just because it gives so much more room for routing, and
it's something I think we should move towards, especially for future
boards. The SDR GPS boards, for example, already use mostly 0402.

Any strong opinions? It'll take about 20 minutes to switch the whole
board to 0402, I'm tempted. Any strong reasons not to, and make that our
standard?

Pros:
- Way better passives packing for future boards
- Vaguely better RF performance, maybe
- Standardizes on a single size to have around

Cons:
- Harder to hand place, but definitely doable.

Would love to hear thoughts!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Low Gain Radio: please switch to branch v2_0

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone working on the LGR:

Please `git checkout v2_0` for all future work on the LGR. K informs us
that we suck, because v1_2 was the last produced board. My fault, I
thought it was v1_1. And he claims we made enough changes in the LGR to
call it v2, so OK.

For those interested, here's the link:

https://github.com/oresat/low-gain-radio

Thanks!

Andrew

-- 
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[psas-avionics] Go for Antenna Propagation measurements at NW EMC Monday at 8:00am!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

NW EMC has donated 8 hours of chamber time to us to help test our
antennas for OreSat! They've scheduled us (last minute) for this Monday
morning, 8:00am - 12:00pm. If you've never been to a microwave anechoic
chamber, this is something you really, really want to come see. Our goal
will be to capture polar plots of the 70 cm canted turnstyle antenna,
the 70cm dipoles, and the COTS 2.4 GHz  helical antenna.

We'll be meeting in the rocket room at 7:00am, and leaving at 7:30am
SHARP. If you want to meet us there, meet us at 7:50am (or earlier).

Also, please RSVP (directly to me) since we can't have more than about 10.

Thanks!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] EAGLE sillyness: anyone want to make a PSAS logo in EAGLE?

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

It'd be nice to have a PSAS logo as an EAGLE library part. Anyone want
to do this? It's probably a pain. Logos are here:

https://github.com/psas/publicity/tree/gh-pages/Logos

... and you can just email me the library.

Thanks!

Andrew

PS. Please let everyone know you're doing it so we don't get multiple
folks wasting their time. Thanks!

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Stuffing 3 Marionette open source DAQ boards tomorrow at 10am in the LID

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

We're stuffing 3 PCBs tomorrow in the LID (FAB 84) from 10am to about 2pm. Come 
help if you can!

See  http://marionette-daq.github.io/ for more info.

Andrew
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[psas-avionics] CS0 discussion on google hangout starting now!

[Andrew Greenberg]

If you want to talk satellite communications systems, join us!

https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_/calendar/cHNhcy5yb2NrZXRzQGdtYWlsLmNvbQ.1a2aoo0031tunv1p0qc44padrs?authuser=0

Andrew

-- 
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[psas-avionics] LInk to google doc on CS's "C3" system

[Andrew Greenberg]

For CS0 discussion:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ELELUv-HSHRtFvs3BXFFiAcqVcY44a7KBtNuRL87WuY/edit?usp=sharing

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Cubesat C3 radio meeting: tomorrow (Friday 8/21) 2 - 5pm, in the rocket room

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

Sorry for the late notice: Glenn and I are meeting tomorrow to discuss
the CubeSat's C3 radio system - the low data rate, low power VHF/UHF/?
radio system. Please come join us! On the agenda:

- Frequency bands we can use
- Modulation techniques
- Packet prototcols, FEC, etc.
- Existing radio ICs we could use, possibly with built in uCs

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Digi-Key order today!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

We need to order some replacement camera cables for our Raspberry Pi
cammeras... so if anyone either:

1) Has a spare cable or two?

or

2) Needs anything from Digi-Key.

... please let me know!

:)

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Running super late for hack day; 3pm!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

Sorry for the delay - we're moving our company today and we're running
late. I'll be there around 3pm!

Andrew

-- 
---
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Re: [psas-avionics] jGPSv3 boards all work!

[Andrew Greenberg]

 After reflowing the Low Noise Amplifier on boards #2 and #3, we get
 Venus lock and data that correlates from the MAX2769.

Yeha! That's great! Just to be clear: HackRF satellite broadcast
correlation, or actual GPS satellite correlation?

On Tuesday, let's officially switch to GPS board #2 and put #3 and #1 in
storage as a flight spare.

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Hack day today: 1pm - 5pm in the rocket room / LID

[Andrew Greenberg]

On the agenda: more GPS hacking, set up the three monitors on the FDT
table (VESA mounts are in!).

See you then!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Digikey order at end of day today

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

I'm doing a digikey order at the end of today. The order already
includes jGPS regulator and TeleDongle parts - is there anything else
anyone needs? Let me know by 4:00pm.

Thanks,

Andrew

-- 
---
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Re: [psas-avionics] Venus GPS chips in; Friday build day!

[Andrew Greenberg]

 Hey, we built stuff today. 

Where we is mostly Kenny. Yay Kenny!

 * Stuffed
 * Baked
 * Cleaned
 * Connectored
 * Smoke-tested

Awesome!

 * We are short one voltage regulator for the CPLD, so board #3 won't
 really be complete until that part is ordered.

Now on order, but won't order until Monday. Anyone else need anything
from Digikey?

 * I tried holding Boot Select high and resetting the Venus 838, but
 didn't get the amber light of life on either board.

Did it turn on when you left it low? Keeping boot select low should boot
from ROM and so it should automatically start up and spit out NMEA
messages. Did that mode work?

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Venus GPS chips in; Friday build day!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

The Venus838 GPS receiver ICs are in, which means we're now ready to
stuff our two remaining jGPS receivers. We'll do this Friday at 1pm,
starting in the rocket room and moving to the LID. hopefully see you there!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Amateur (ham) radio license group, study session, and test!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

Have you ever wanted to get your amateur radio license? PSAS is a heavy
user of amateur radio equipment, if you've ever want to operate it,
you'll need your amateur radio license.


## Study Session Friday 7/3 at 4:00pm in the LID

Glenn is going to answer questions and point out things you should know.
Meet in the LID (AKA the EPL), in the conference room in the back of the
LID.

## License Test Sunday 7/5 at 7:00pm in Milwaukie

As a group, we decided to go to a amateur license test on Sunday July
5th in SE Portland (South in Milwaukie):

http://www.arrl.org/exam_sessions/milwaukie-or-97222-56

## Studying

To study, you'll want to get a physical or electronic copy of look
who's talking now or some other intro to amateur radio. Some other
resources for you are:

From the American Radio Relay League (ARRL):

http://www.arrl.org/getting-your-technician-license
http://www.arrl.org/tech-question-pool
http://www.arrl.org/find-an-amateur-radio-license-exam-session

And from the FCC, CFR Title 47 Part 97 describes the Amateur Radio Service:

http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/waisidx_08/47cfr97_08.html



Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Change of plans for hack day today

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

We *were* going to work on the FDT at Gavin's house, but I still don't
have a good way of getting it from PSU to his house, so let's reschedule
that until we can borrow Dave's truck or get a van.

Also, Kenny is out of town, and I'm busy until this evening, and I
haven't heard from other people. So I'm cancelling today's hack day
and/or rescheduling until this evening, say 6pm. If you can make it this
evening, please email me directly and we'll coordinate... if no one else
can make it this evening, I'll skip and get things done from home.

Thanks!

Andrew


-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] jGPS NOW COLLECTS RAW GPS DATA!!!11!!

[Andrew Greenberg]

w00t!!! After struggling mightily for a long time, we finally figured
out all the correct settings for the MAX2769 GPS receiver IC and now we
are getting actual raw GPS IQ data!!

We're now mounting the v3 board onto the rocket!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] When making a SDR GPS receiver with two inputs...

[Andrew Greenberg]

... make sure you use the *correct* input.

Yes: the root cause of not being able to be locked on real GPS
satellites is that we were feeding the *wrong* LNA on the MAX2769 into
the MAX's ADC. The wrong LNA went to an used pin on the MAX2769, so of
course we weren't even getting the RF from the satellites.

What is AMAZING is that when we were using the HackRF to simulate a GPS
satellite, we could still correlate to the signal given no RF path
besides a floating pin... which led us down a lot of wrong paths for
figuring out the problem.

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Digi-Key order today

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey! Need anything for the rocket from Digi-Key? I'm ordering today. Let
me know by 5pm!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Update

[Andrew Greenberg]

Glenn, Devin and I met today to talk communications. We'll be meeting
each Friday after noon for those interested in chatting about comm for
rockets, balloons and satellites.

After some discussion, we decided that we're sticking with 2m for ground
comms for the foreseeable future. We took the Jpole out of the giant
plastic tube, and that makes it smaller and easier to mount to the
antenna pole.

Kenny got the entire FDT/LTC/FC network stack up and running. After some
stupid configuration problems with the ubiquiti POE-to-wifi adapter, it
now just all works. We even power cycled it and made sure it came up
sanely. Go Kenny!

Next: more work on Sunday. See you then!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Saturday and Sunday Hack Days

[Andrew Greenberg]

It's a busy weekend, but it's only T-1 month until launch!!

# GPS Hacking: Saturday noon - 5pm? in the LID

One more try to figure out the bits coming out of the MAX2769. Hey
Devin, could you meet Jamey, Theo and the rest of the crew at noon to
help them with the VNA? Turns out the 1.57542 GHz carrier frequency was
totally helpful, we'd like to do it again.


# Avionics hacking: Sunday, 10am - 4pm?

Venus GPS configuration, network configuration, maybe try the first of
the communication tests if the GPS is up and running.


Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Quick update from Tuesday: mostly working jGPS v3 board!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey!

Quick update on the jGPS board from Tuesday:

- We found a bunch of stupid things that we fixed, including:
   -  an incorrectly wired capacitor that caused power supply bouncing
  on 1.8V
   - Several mis-valued components in the BOM, most egregiously the
 CPLD variant which we had to swap out.

- We fired up the board, programmed the STM32, boot up the Ethernet
  connection, and then streamed NMEA data from the Venus638 COTS GPS
  receiver. GREAT NEWS here - after about a minute of walking outside,
  it locked! So our RF system doesn't totally suck, which is great.

- That said, we're having serious issues with the SkyTraq Venus638. It
  turns out we don't understand this chip, or it's buggy, or their
  Windows-based programming software sucks, or most likely some
  combination of these three things. Switching to binary mode, the chip
  stopped responding so now we have to figure out how to unbrick it.

Next up:

- Get the MAX2769 up and running.
- Verifying the data path from CPLD to STM to Ethernet.
- De-brick the Venus638.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] I'm out today agenda

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

Well, I suck, I can't make it in today. :( For those there, the big
things to focus on are:

- Flight director's table
   - More work on bringing up the NUC.
   - Philip, did those things get ordered?
   - Gavin is planning on getting the wheels on the FDT this week.
   - Identifying the UPS we'll need.
- GPS antenna
   - Devin fixed the GPS antenna on Tuesday! Let's try it out and
 see if we can get GPS lock on the current GPS system.
   - We should get the v3 jGPS boards back this week, so I'll
 order components tonight.
- Network
   - Steaming tests for the digital video

... and all of the other issues
(https://github.com/psas/Launch-12/issues) for Launch 12!

See you Tuesday!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] GPS update

[Andrew Greenberg]

The Good News:

- Design review went great tonight. Thanks everyone for attending! I
tried sending the board to OSHPark, but their EAGLE file processor
choked on the board, so I'm waiting to hear back from them. Hey, Jenner,
help! :)

The Bad News:

Just for fun, Devin hooked up the avionics module's GPS antenna to the
VNA in the LID. Well, lo and behold, the resonant frequency of that
patch is now at 1.7 GHz . This TOTALLY sucks, because it means our
antenna is too short. We cut down the antenna many moons ago, but
apparently it has drifted up in frequency and now there's no easy way to
fix it.

Luckily, there are two spare GPS antenna PCBs left from back when we did
the last run in 2011. Devin and I are going to meet Sunday morning and
try and make a new one. We'll test it out and make sure it works well,
and then when we're confident it's OK, we'll replace the antenna on the
module.

Feel free to join us and help out Sunday morning! We'll be in the LID
starting around 10am or so (I'll email the list as we get going that
morning).

Take care,

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Last minute: KiCad workshop today, 1 - 5pm, at ^H

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

Just found out that Dorkbot and Jared are sponsoring a KiCad workshop at
Control-H today. Eventually (2016?) PSAS will switch to KiCad since it's
open source and doesn't have layer / schematic restrictions like EAGLE.
Probably worth your while, if you can make it!

http://www.kicad-pcb.org/

Andrew

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---
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[psas-avionics] GPS v3 board is done!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey! The v3 GPS board is done. Please pull and give me feedback as soon
as you can, I'd love to ship this out ASAP.

https://github.com/psas/gps-rf-board

Things to think about:

- Split in ground/power planes - cute or stupid?
- What else is missing from the board?
- Probably not enough test points?

Next: make the BOM, and get ready to send this off!

Andrew

-- 
---
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Re: [psas-avionics] GPS v3 board is done!

[Andrew Greenberg]

 Can we do a design review on Tuesday?

We can, but honestly I'd like to fire it off before then. That said, if
I hear nothing but crickets I'll wait until Tuesday.

Andrew

-- 
---
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Re: [psas-avionics] 2 minute hate on the MAX2769

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey!

 Didn't seem *too* bad? 4 x 16 bit serial streams with all the I0's, 
 I1's, Q0's, and finally Q1's? A few timing signals too?

We're just angry because we thought (rather naively, I think) we could
turn this into something we could clock in via SPI or a USART. After
struggling with Maxim's horrible documentation and finally seeing the
output stream, we racked our brains with some simple to deal with the
way they serialized the data, and then realized we were going to need a
CPLD anyway.

 So sample slower, and alias down into another nyquist zone.

Yeah, OK, I clearly need to understand this better. I know you can do
this, but I'm really not sure if how I'd do it is right.

 OK, hold it. IF at 2.048 MHz? What happens when you sample a 2.048
 MHz sine wave at 4.096 MHz (draw a diagram to help visualize)?

This is where I wave my hands around in frustration: I totally agree,
this shouldn't work, but then why does everyone else who uses the
MAX2769 uses these settings!!? And I guess it works? It's possible
they're not letting us know what settings they *actually* use in the
real world but this is the default setting, and what others claim to
use.

 Pick your sample frequency to be at least 2 x (IF freq + 1 sided
 bandwidth).

That makes sense to me. I'd love to pick your brains a bit more... maybe
*way* *after* your defense :)

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] 2 minute hate on the MAX2769

[Andrew Greenberg]

While laying out the third version of the jGPS board, it suddenly
occurred to me: we chose the MAX2769 because we were goaded into
thinking that the serial output was actually... well, serial. And not
some weird strange bizarre useless thing, as it really is. Since it's
not usefully serial, we're switching the MAX2769 to parallel mode,
throwing the output at a CPLD, and then putting SPI'ing it into the STMF407.

So: if we're doing the MAX in parallel mode, why not look at *other* RF
front end ICs, and use them? I found two:

The ST STA5630. This one looks great, but is useless because there's no
useful datasheets on this chip. So, no.

The Skyworks SE4150L [1] is just the old SiGe SE4150L made now by
Skyworks. It's a dumb and easy chip to use: no SPI, no configuration to
speak of, and it only outputs 2 bit Mag/Sign data. So we lose a couple
of bits, but we now have no weird configuration problems. But it has a
serious problem for us: the IF is 4.092 MHz, and the sample rate is
16.384 MHz. So that's 32.768 Mbps, which is a whole lot of data, and is
 25 Mbps of the usual SPI limits. On the other hand, at those rates we
get real bandwidth.

Currently on the MAX2769 [2], our IF is 2.048 MHz, the sample rate is
4.096 MHz at 4 bits, so our bitrate is 16.384 Mbps.

In a nutshell:

- SE4150L = less bits, more data, more bandwidth, simple
- MAX2769 = more bits, less data, less bandwidth, complicated

Anyone have anything to say about this? I'd appreciate thoughts on this!

Thanks!

Andrew

[1] http://www.skyworksinc.com/Products.aspx?CategoryID=562
[2]
http://www.maximintegrated.com/en/products/comms/wireless-rf/MAX2769.html

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Discreet logic project, take two

[Andrew Greenberg]

OK, so, it turned out EAGLE had all the parts in the library so I just
couldn't help myself: the GPS to SPI board is now a complete schematic,
all it needs is 1) to test it (this might not work!) and 2) lay it out
and route it in the EPL.

https://github.com/psas/gps-rf-board/raw/master/gps-to-spi.sch

Again, this is a good ECE271 level project.

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Discreet logic ECE271-level project for someone!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

We're using a 44 pin Xilinx CPLD to interface a MAX2769 GPS receiver to
an STM32F407 microcontroller. Specifically, it takes:

- 4 parallel bits from the GPS which change at 4.096 MHz
- A 16.384 MHz clock from the GPS
- A 25 MHz clock from the STM32

... and then outputs the 4 bits as a 8 bit 25 Mbps SPI to the STM32. K
is working on the Verilog, and it's probably going to work out just great.

The funny part is that Jamey and I thought about it a bit, and realized
you could do it in 5x 16 pin discreet logic chips. You, or your discreet
logic obsessed friends, are welcome to give this a try! I'll even buy
the chips for you.

Terrible picture attached.

Anyone want to try? Let me know!

Andrew

-- 
---
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Portland State University
http://www.ece.pdx.edu/
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[psas-avionics] ECE students, please read!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

We're asking the IEEE Oregon Section for funds for PSAS tomorrow! It's
part of our crowd funding campaign. They've just asked us for a list of
all of our members who are IEEE student members. So:

1) If you're a current ECE student and an IEEE member, please email me
directly ASAP and let me know.

2) If you're an ECE student and you're NOT an IEEE member, please
consider signing up today (it's only $32 and it's worth it), and then
email me that you did: http://www.ieee.org/go/join_student

Deadline is tomorrow morning, so please, please let me know!

Thanks,

Andrew

-- 
---
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Re: [psas-avionics] GPSv2rf#2 board stuffed!

[Andrew Greenberg]

YAY KENNY!

 Missing a few components: ...

We should have most of those. Weird that we don't. I'll try swinging by
Sunday with more parts!

 I stuffed C25 and C62 with 10v 100nF caps even though Eagle says they
 should be 50v.

Yeah, that's actually bad, because we'll see 18V pretty regularly on
that line. Let's switch those out.

Andrew

-- 
---
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a...@ece.pdx.edu  C: 503.708.7711
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[psas-avionics] No official hack day today

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey!

No official hack day today. We're officially relaxing after our success
last weekend. I know some people are coming in anyway, so if you're
ready to start work again, head on down to the rocket room!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] FINAL INTEGRATION TEST SESSION!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

Everything is going pretty well for launch. We're going to do a final
systems integration / test / etc session from 2pm until latish tonight.
The more we get done now and test, the less we have to do in the desert.

See you soon!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Thursday rocket work

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

Lots of things getting done left and right. More tomorrow:

9:00am - 10:00am: buttoning up the rocket for flight (EPL).

2:00pm - 5:00pm: More button up, and quick comm test outside the EB,
just to test GPS lock + Wifi (Theo, I'll need your help for this, can
you make it by 2:30pm?)

7:00pm - late: Software and last minute hardware stuff!

... then Friday we pack for launch!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] New, more sane RasPi now out (Model B+)

[Andrew Greenberg]

So apparently the RasPi people heard me bitching all the way from Portland:

http://www.element14.com/community/community/raspberry-pi/raspberry-pi-bplus?ICID=rpimain-topban-BPlus

... it addresses most of all the kvetching I've done on the Model B. We
won't upgrade for this launch, obviously, but possibly for future
launches if we stick with RasPi digital video.

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] PCB-edge mounted SMA connectors

[Andrew Greenberg]

If anyone has board-edge mounted SMA female connectors, please bring
them in today: we need at least two more than we have for the GPS splitter.

Thanks!

Andrew

-- 
---
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Electrical and Computer Engineering
Portland State University
http://www.ece.pdx.edu/
a...@ece.pdx.edu  C: 503.708.7711
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Re: [psas-avionics] PCB-edge mounted SMA connectors

[Andrew Greenberg]

 Like this?
 
 http://www.alliedelec.com/search/productdetail.aspx?SKU=70090267

Yes! Like that! Although it's a .032 board, so the 142-0701-881 would
be better, but we can totally make that work.

 I'm headed your way, not really to help, but to hack on my own urgent
 projects. But I can toss a few in my bag, if you promise to launch them.
 :) Which room will you be in?

Cool! Thanks! We'll be in that main rocket room, FAB 84, or in the EPL,
FAB 60-10. PSU is closed today, so call me on my cell phone to be let
in, 503-708-7711.

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Update!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey! Things Got Done today.

- TrackMaster 3000 (TM3K) has been resurrected, and is now running with
the new Atheros USB Wifi adapter, updated RasPi packages and network
configuration, and is powered off of POE.

- LTC setup procedures were worked on, and may even be right.

- We have the FC command path working:

   Laptop - OpenWRT - LTC - Ethernet over Umbilical cable - FC

- We have the telemetry path working:

   FC - WiFi - TM3K - Raspi - OpenWRT - Laptop

- And we even got the first serial ADC data bits out of the GPS board.
There's still a lot to do here, but at least we know we're barking up
the right tree.

Andrew

-- 
---
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Portland State University
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[psas-avionics] Avionics update, hack day tomorrow

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey! I always mean to send an update of what happened during the latest
hack day, and then never do, because we're always rushing out the door.
Things are getting done left and right, so instead of what happened
yesterday, here's a quick status update:



Flight computer: We swapped out the old Adventech Atom-based PCI-104
module with the new one. The old one was dropping USB connections left
and right. We've tried fixing it to no avail - we think it's probably a
lifted ball, which we can't reliably fix. We may try to reflow the Atom
BGA in the future when we have more time. In the mean time, the new one
works fine, but we have no good backup.

Rocketnet Hub: Both rocketnet hubs are ready for flight, with firmware
done. Kenny did the modifications, and he did an elegant hack on  the
umbilical connector so we now have a real launch detect (well, more
exactly, an umbilical connected sense line).

Battery Board and pack: We have one complete, tested, and working pack
and board. The pack we put together had large cell differences, and the
charge balancing was working too slowly, so we hand balanced them
yesterday and all cells are now within 50 mV of each other. We have
enough cells and spare batteries boards to make a backup pack, which
will be a low priority task before launch.

Umbilical cable: We've finally moved to the 8 pin umbilical cable. Gavin
finished the rocket cart's debug cable, which works like a charm.
Waiting for an OSH Park run for the flight umbilical, since the launch
detect board requires a modified umbilical (18 pin) rocketnet connector.

IMU board: Done as far as we know, including firmware. No backup.

Roll Control board: Done as far as we know, including firmware. No backup.

WiFi: Done as far as we know. Backups of everything except the 2.4 GHz
power amp.

Raspberry Pi video: The v1 carrier and PCB worked, but didn't have the
correct hole placement and the 3D printed carrier was huge. Jeremy
re-measured the holes and connector placement, and redesigned the
carrier. The new carrier has been printed, and the PCB is being sent off
to OSH Park this weekend. We still don't have firmware that responds to
IP commands and streams video. We have spare RPi boards and cameras
available, if someone would like to take this on!

GPS: None of our GPS splitters will fit in the C channel section, so
we're purchasing a new tiny splitter for $200. :( The Hemisphere GPS's
new carrier board is being sent to OSH Park this weekend, and the
various RG316 cables still need to be made. That said, all of this looks
like it'll be mostly done in 1.5 weeks. The Jenner GPS is up and running
over Ethernet, but we're having a lot of problems getting the MAX2769 to
respond to SPI commands.



Hack day tomorrow, noon to 5pm or so. On the agenda:

- STM32 firmware to get the MAX2769 to sit up and bark.
- Cleanup and reinstall the battery.
- New umbilical cable
- Umbilical cable connection to the LTC
- Send off all OSH Park boards.
-

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Much progress! So fast!

[Andrew Greenberg]

### GPS

The GPS board works-sh! There was a lot of shorts we cleaned up on the
LQFP and the various QFNs. Then we found out that the supply output
Tantalum cap was reversed and was shorting the SPS. We removed that and
replaced it with the something vaguely equivalent. Then we switched
around some LEDs that were backwards, and now it seems to work. Theo and
K even programmed it with Chibios and blinky RGB LEDs and everything. No
Ethernet yet, but we're working on it.

### WiFi

The adorable right angle pigtails we purchased for the WiFi PA totally
don't fit. They're too tall to fit in the RF channel by about 2 mm. :(
We have two options: replace the SMT SMA connectors on the PA with right
angle ones, or we ditch the 2.5 mm black anodized carrier and put the
PCB right on the C channel. We've asked RFLinx, the maker of the PA, for
a drawing of the PCB holes. If we get that, then I'm voting for the
latter. Less weight, too!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Doing a McMaster Carr order today...

[Andrew Greenberg]

... anyone need anything?

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Hack day drop tower test

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

Hack day today, noon to 5pm. We're ready for the drop tower test, so
hopefully we'll be doing that early this afternoon!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] All parts ordered, everywhere, for everything

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

I just ordered all of the parts. If you asked me for it, I probably just
ordered it.

Digikey parts are arriving tomorrow morning (yay digikey!) and I'll
bring them in as soon as they arrive. I wouldn't count on them arriving
before 11am.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Quick update hackday Friday

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

Two quick updates:

Theo and Nathan fixed a slew of firmware/software issues, so we are
officially ready for the drop tower high-g test this Friday, assuming
the drop tower folks are around. We have a bunch of beautiful data on
the power we consume, and battery voltages and currents and whatnot...
it's really, really awesome to finally have this all working.

Gavin wrote, in less than like two hours, a full GUI/Labjack application
that runs the CE hydraulic crusher. We ran it this morning, and it
shockingly just worked. Of course, it's terrifyingly powerful and
weirdly configured (Ground is center and +5 is *down*!) but it works.
The ME capstone will be crushing full size modules in the next day or so.

Finally, hack day Friday where we plan on dropping the avionics system
in the PSU drop tower. Wish us luck!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Avionics hack day tomorrow (Friday), noon - 5pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

Avionics hack day tomorrow, noon to 5pm, in FAB 84. On the agenda is:

- Cable lacing and taping/packing the avionics system for a drop test in
the tower.
- Dropping the avionics system, if we have time and the drop tower
people are available.
- Software/firmware stuff!

See you then,

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Avionics hack day, noon - 5pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

Avionics hack day tomorrow from noon until 5pm. Meet in the rocket room
(84 Lab), and come to the EPL (FAB 60-10) if we're not there. I STILL
didn't order parts for the GPS, so no stuffing the board tomorrow. I
plan on doing a massive parts order on Sunday.

Tomorrow we'll:

- make cabling for the drop tower test (since software is done!)

- start wiring up the new 2.4 GHz WiFi system.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] No hack day today!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

Sorry for the last minute cancellation! Two reasons: the GPS parts won't
make it in today and my pesky day jobs needs fires put out.

Let's plan on a week from today (5/1) to stuff the GPS boards.

See everyone Tuesday,

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Hack day Friday 1pm - 6pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hack day tomorrow (Friday) from 1 - 6pm. In FAB 84 as usual, might also
be in the EPL since we'll be:

- building up the raspberry pie carrier boards (finally)!
- Making more rocketnet cables
- Testing KSZ8999 LED outputs for useful launch detect signals
- Discuss new ideas for umbilical cable and disconnect

See you there/then!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Hack day! FAB 84 from 1 - 6pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone! Hack day tomorrow. The standard: 1 - 6pm in FAB 84 (84 lab).
Agenda items:

- GPS board
- PoE research - worth it?
- Umbilical research - move to 7 pin connector?
- Launch detect using Ethernet status
- Task list for July launch.

See you then!

Andrew
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[psas-avionics] Hack day, kind of, 1pm - 5pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

Sorry for the late notice. We do indeed have a hack day today down in
the rocket room. Unfortunately, I'm running around with my head cut off
today (day jobs, feh) so I'll there on and off.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Battery board update!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Well, FINALLY, the battery board is working. Next on the agenda:
JennerGPS, which I believe has now officially stuck as a name. The
goal is to send this board off to OSH Park by Tuesday.

More details:

So, remember how everything was working - the BQ3060 was even claiming
that it was turning on the MOSFET gates, but for some reason the gates
of the P-Channel MOSFETs never went low? It's like the internal MOSFET
that were supposed to drive the external P-channel MOSFETS weren't working.

Seemingly COMPLETELY UNRELATED is the chemical fuse safety feature on
the BQ3060. If something goes horribly wrong, the BQ3060 can assert the
FUSE pin which blows a chemical fuse - essentially a fuse that can be
blow by a logic signal. That's an output, right? It asserts a signal? So
if you don't use a chemical fuse, you just leave that floating, right?

No. You don't. But you'd never know that, because it's a COMPLETELY
UNDOCUMENTED FACT that the FUSE pin of the BQ3060 must be pulled low
in order for the BQ3060 to be able to assert the MOSFETs. It's like it's
the drain connection to the P-channel MOSFET driver, or something. Found
this out on the TI forums because of course someone else had this
problem. Thanks, TI! :(

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Hack day! 1pm - 5pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone,

Hack day tomorrow (Friday) from 1pm - 5pm. Major agenda items:

- Get the damn battery board to turn on it's FETs
- Digi-Key order for All the Parts.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Friday's hack day: battery board works!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi! We built a new-ish battery pack yesterday, complete with the new
battery board based on the TI BQ3060. It does fuel gauging, and most
importantly, cell balancing.

Nothing exploded, so hooray!

On Tuesday, we'll try and set it's NVRAM parameters and get it talking
to the STM32 on the RocketNet Hub.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Hack day today! 1pm - 5pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Lots on the agenda, although our primary on is to make a new battery
pack and hook our brand new battery board! Then it's on to GPS, if
there's any time left, which there won't be :)

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Hack day tomorrow (Friday), 1:00pm - 5:00pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hack day tomorrow! Focus on GPS board, fixing the RNH brown out problem,
bringing up the battery boards, etc. We'll be either in 84 Lab or the
EPL (FAB 60-10).

See you then!

Andrew
-- 
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Re: [psas-avionics] Open Source Telemetry Transmitter

[Andrew Greenberg]

 I guess this is my cue to go to more meetings...

Yes! This is definitely your cue to come to more meetings :)

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Tomorrow's DxWiFi flight test

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

First of all, I'm really sorry, PSAS email is STILL down. I'm SSH'd in to our 
server artisianally hand-crafting this email 
using jack hammers and vim. Yes, I'm using vim, and you know how much I hate 
vim. So if you need to get a hold of me, please 
use my other email addresses, such as andrew1602 at gmail. I'm not sure when 
mail will be back up, this should have been 
fixed a week ago.

Second of all, tomorrow is going to be complicated, so here's the current plan:

1) Andrew picks up the launch control table from Dave today or ungodly early 
tomorrow morning. The LC table has the Yaesu 
mobile radio and the nice sine wave inverter on it.

2) Sunday morning 8:30am,  Andrew picks up Glenn and his battery pack, 
directional antenna, and cable crimper.

3) Sunday morning 9:00am we meet with Dean and John in the rocket room, make a 
long RG-316 cable (the thin coax cable), make 
sure we're all packed, and head out.

-  Andrew, Dean, and Jenner (and maybe Glenn?) head out to the Troutdale 
airport, meet Teresa, and get all the equipment 
situated in the plane.

- John, Kenny, and others head out to Rocky Butte and get set up. Andrew and 
whoever else join them hopefully before takeoff.

4) Lift off at 11am unless we coordinate it earlier.

- Plane/ground communications: We'll try our standard 2m band (146.43 MHz) for 
communication to the plane, but that might 
(probably?) won't work because of noise, distance, Aluminum fuselages and 
whatnot. Backup plan is SMS. Backup-backup plan is 
to not be able to communicate :)

5) The plane flies pasts Mt. St. Helens and then back, streaming packets the 
whole way.

6) Rocky Butte tries to track, using both the helical (top hat) antenna and 
the BBQ grill if the top hat fails. 
Occasionally we pull GPS packets from the data stream in order to get the 
plane's curent position, so we can adjust tracking 
angle as necessary.

7) We all meet back in the rocket room after the test is done (hopefully around 
2? 3?). Someone said something about this 
sports game on TV that starts in the afternoon? So apparently we should try and 
be done before then ;)

If you have any questions, email me or call me at 503-708-7711.

Thanks, see you tomorrow!

Andrew







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[psas-avionics] Avionics hack day tomorrow (Friday), 1pm - 6pm

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi everyone!

Avionics hack day tomorrow from 1pm to 6pm. We've got quite the agenda:

- Build up the battery boards (!!)
- Get ADIS - FC - RC + telemetry data flow working
- Prep for Sunday's test flight (literally!) of the DxWiFi system
- Show off rockety goodness at the Innovation Showcase at 4pm

See you then!

Andrew


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Re: [psas-avionics] RTx Ethernet code base

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi!

 It seems the projects all use an FTDI serial interface rather than USB
 for shell support.

Nah, we've given up on the FTDI cables. I agree with K: it's 2014, so
our microcontrollers all have built-in USB devices, so just use those.
On the Olimex, it's a USB Mini B and on our future Node6 boards it's a
USB micro B connector.

 Andrew, take note: Ethernet switches- on-board or off-the-shelf?

1) Onboard is way cooler, but *tons* of work. Especially if there's PoE
involved.

2) OTS is bigger, bulkier, more likely to have crappy connectors, but
Just Works(tm). Also, like you say, we can just get PoE switches.

So, it's up to you guys, but I'd recommend (2) with some modifications
to make the OTS hardware more reliable. Modifications should include
cable strapping down connectors, strain relief on cables, dust covers if
necessary, etc.

Andrew

-- 
---
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Re: [psas-avionics] Long range attempt tomorrow?

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey, use the avionics list!

 Dean and I were talking about trying to do the Council Crest to
 Rocky Butte shot tomorrow.

Oh! That was quick! I didn't realize you guys were even ready.

 We can really only do it if we have the equipment (tripods, amps,
 etc) and a few extra hands. 

We're not ready with the equipment.. we were kinda waiting on you guys
to get your scripts down before we grabbed your equipment and strapped
them down to things. Here's the todo list before we go out:

- Decide exactly what and how we want to test things. This should all be
carefully thought about and written down Tuesday evening. Basically, a
pre-lab writeup for what experiments we want to run. This will dictate
what equipment we'll need. We'll also want Richard's input on this.

- Gather up equipment, including tripods.

- Wire up, mostly temporarily, the wifi adapters, power amps, and 2.4
GHz antennas together. Also figure out how we're going to power all
these things for the several hours of testing.

Could you guys please work together with Richard to put a draft of that
writeup on the DxWiFi wiki before Tuesday night? That'd be helpful.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Packed Friday hack day!

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi! We're on for a bunch of stuff on Friday in 84 Lab:

- Rocket Tracks capstone meeting 2-3 pm
- Open source GPS meeting 3-4 pm
- DxWiFi Coax + attenuator test 4-6 pm

See you all then!

Andrew

-- 
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[psas-avionics] Hack day today!

[Andrew Greenberg]

1pm - 5p in the rocket room (FAB 84-16), possibly in the EPL too (FAB
60-10). On the agenda:

- Last checks on the battery board and send off for fab.
- Budgeting for the next few weeks.
- Next steps for this winter.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] No meeting tomorrow (Tuesday 12/31) - have a good New Year's eve!

[Andrew Greenberg]

See you all next week!

Andrew

PS. Look what Nathan made today! We're now officially ready for
attenuation testing for the DxWiFi project:

https://github.com/psas/DxWiFi/tree/master/eagle/USB-WiFi-Box


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[psas-avionics] DxWiFi progress: new wifi adapters seem happy

[Andrew Greenberg]

Merry Christmas! And Happy DxWiFi!

Nathan and I have the new WiFi boards up and running. They enumerate
fine, and after I installed the debian package firmware_atheros, they
seem to come up.

--

For you DxWiFi people, here's the syslog info. I'm not sure why it
thinks I'm in Columbia (CO)?

[61566.336163] usb 1-1: new high-speed USB device number 14 using ehci_hcd
[61566.485021] usb 1-1: New USB device found, idVendor=0cf3, idProduct=9271
[61566.485031] usb 1-1: New USB device strings: Mfr=16, Product=32,
SerialNumber=48
[61566.485038] usb 1-1: Product: WLAN
[61566.485043] usb 1-1: Manufacturer: MVA1021
[61566.485052] usb 1-1: SerialNumber: 12345
[61566.493920] usb 1-1: firmware: agent loaded htc_9271.fw into memory
[61566.788525] usb 1-1: ath9k_htc: Transferred FW: htc_9271.fw, size: 51272
[61567.023641] ath9k_htc 1-1:1.0: ath9k_htc: HTC initialized with 33 credits
[61567.213524] ath9k_htc 1-1:1.0: ath9k_htc: FW Version: 1.3
[61567.213531] ath: EEPROM regdomain: 0x10
[61567.213536] ath: EEPROM indicates we should expect a direct regpair map
[61567.213542] ath: Country alpha2 being used: CO
[61567.213547] ath: Regpair used: 0x10
[61567.218442] ieee80211 phy3: Atheros AR9271 Rev:1
[61567.218455] cfg80211: Calling CRDA for country: CO
[61567.219410] Registered led device: ath9k_htc-phy3
[61567.219420] usb 1-1: ath9k_htc: USB layer initialized
[61567.229196] cfg80211: Regulatory domain changed to country: CO
[61567.229204] cfg80211: (start_freq - end_freq @ bandwidth),
(max_antenna_gain, max_eirp)
[61567.229213] cfg80211: (2402000 KHz - 2472000 KHz @ 4 KHz),
(300 mBi, 2700 mBm)
[61567.229220] cfg80211: (517 KHz - 525 KHz @ 4 KHz),
(300 mBi, 1700 mBm)
[61567.229228] cfg80211: (525 KHz - 533 KHz @ 4 KHz),
(300 mBi, 2300 mBm)
[61567.229236] cfg80211: (5735000 KHz - 5835000 KHz @ 4 KHz),
(300 mBi, 3000 mBm)

--

And lsusb said:

Bus 001 Device 011: ID 0cf3:9271 Atheros Communications, Inc. AR9271 802.11n

--

We're working down in the EPL right now, so if anyone is interested in
coming down and playing with them, feel free!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] New WiFi adapters ordered

[Andrew Greenberg]

I found the cutest, highest receive sensitivity, tiny embedded USB WiFi
adapters evar. They're great, assuming they actually live up to their specs:

http://www.embeddedworks.net/wlan373.html

I ordered two, plus RP_SMA adapters. We'll test them with our attenuator
cables and really see if they're -94 dBm RX sensitivity at 11 MBps..
which would be phenomenal.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] WiFi amplifiers

[Andrew Greenberg]

Called RF Linx today, they can't donate some of their amplifiers, so we
have to buy them. We're out of money, so time to start the serious
fundraising process :-/

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Hack day, 1pm - 5pm in 84 Lab/EPL

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi! We're doing rockety things tomorrow from 1pm to 5pm. We'll start in
the rocket room (84 Lab) and then probably move to EPL. Come on down and
help us build rockety things!

Andrew

-- 
---
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[psas-avionics] Avionics RF day tomorrow

[Andrew Greenberg]

We're meeting Glenn at 2pm today (Sunday) in 84 Lab to discuss the RF
bits of the GPS front ends and long distance WiFi. Join us if you can!

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Quick update from today

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hi! A quick update from today's RF meeting:

1) We discussed the analog part of the MAX2769, and Jenner is moving on
finishing rev 2 of the GPS RF board.

2) Glenn and Jenner are looking into fifth generation cylindrical patch
antennas, now with 100% more circular polarization. We came up with an
awesome design for little RHCP antenna modules that solve a lot of our
problems with the current design.

3) We ran some more numbers on DxWiFi and think we really can hit 500km,
but it really depends a lot on the noise floor of the Wifi adapters. We
outlined a test we can run to determine a card's noise floor, which
hopefully we can run in about a week and a half when Andrew gets some
test equipment in.

God progress! See you all tuesday.

Andrew

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Re: [psas-avionics] Official world record WiFi link is 382 km @ 3 Mbps

[Andrew Greenberg]

 That record is between endpoints almost completely stationary
 relative to each other, though; I'm curious if there's a record for
 the largest speed differential between endpoints.

Ha! I don't think anyone keeps track of that.

I'm sure that we held that record for a number of years - I still think
we were the first group to use WiFi on a rocket, and the first to push
it past Mach 1 - but I doubt we hold it any more. We have a heavy and
slow rocket compared to most amateur L3 rockets, and lots of people are
using WiFi these days given its availability for microcontrollers these
days.

Andrew

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[psas-avionics] Avionics hack day tomorrow (Friday 1pm - 5pm)

[Andrew Greenberg]

Hey all!

Hacking on avionics tomorrow (Friday) from 1pm to 5pm. We'll start in
the rocket room (EB 84-16) and then probably move into the EPL. On the
agenda:

- Mars needs cables! Probably 2x more rocketnet cables. If you have lots
of experience with building tiny cables, we could use you tomorrow!

- We got our teeny tiny adapter boards for the RNH LDO to SPS
conversion. They're totes adorbs, and purple. We'll be very, very
carefully using the hot air rework to put them on the RNH boards.

- RNH firmware and functionality.

- Take a hard look at the bizarre USB errors we're getting from the FC.
It looks like the USB PHY chips may be toast :(

Andrew

-- 
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