Battery Vehicle Society

First test drive went well :D Car feels much lighter. I did change the front springs from 315lb to 225lb and the ride height is the same as before. I calculated the whole car weighs 908KG with the rear 100KG heavier than the front. Pretty good I'd say 8) I made a few edits to my firmware and will up...

I've put the KiCad files and Gerbers etc on my webpage.

www.dillonworld.co.uk

Follow the 48 cell battery monitor link.
I'll put up instructions eventually

D

Brilliant idea Greg

Cock ups are never welcome, but it's comforting to know other people make them too!

D

Got it all working tonight :D I was extra careful soldering the two new chips on and I went round the pins of the existing two with some liquid flux and reflowed them with a cleaned soldering iron. That must have been the fault all along! I have checked with the scope to see the square wave heartbea...

Yet again, I have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory :( I got the picaxe master side of things running and working using a heartbeat generated by the signal generator, hunky dory! The Maxim frontend however just kept alarming all the time (no heartbeat, bus held high). I couldn't really get to...

It doesn't balance. The idea is a simple alarm on low cell voltage and stop charging on high cell voltage.

Built up the board, no idea if it works yet

Obligatory picture!
http://dillond1.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/incase.JPG

Should be getting cells early next week so better get cracking.
I've worked out the firmware in my head and will get it done asap, shouldn't
be too demanding.

I've ordered a new board from Eurocircuits in Belgium. Cost will be less than having them done in China and they'll be ready in one week :) I've only ordered one though and you need to order five from China, so like for like it would still be cheaper to use ITead in China. I am happy that HMRC won't...

It was all going too smoothly. The TSSOP-38 package footprint is wrong :cry: I shortened a TSSOP-48 package included in KiCad but the original was the wrong width :evil: This means that my chip sits about 0.1mm inside the footprint and makes it impossible to solder. To say I'm gutted would be an und...

The standalone interface board looks like a really handy thing to have around. Could speed up future project development.
I always meant to do a simple regulated supply board for MCU purposes, just to save breadboarding time.