"Build It Yourself" Log

konokaiden

This is going to be where I discuss everything that I did, or needed to do, in a way that I see as both transparent and easy to understand.

konokaiden

First, I had several tabs open:
(1) the downloads page
https://chordata.cc/downloads/

(2) the wiki
https://wiki.chordata.cc/wiki/User_Manual

(3) the forum
https://forum.chordata.cc/

konokaiden

Now, once this is mentioned, you'll have some idea of where to find everything from here on out. From the wiki, I got Halloween Bob's order forms (Excel Docs) since I am in America. It is just easier and cheap enough to get the parts from just two manufacturers. What I failed to realize is that his stuff was partly out of date, so the boards I ordered were version 2.3 while the parts list was for version 2.2 (those files came from the wiki I think as KiCAD projects, or else they are on the forum). If you're not aware, there are some important differences, so I rewrote the files and added comments like "holes T1-T6 are just for testing, and no actual parts go there". So if you're a noob like me, it should be easy to understand as far as EXACTLY what you need.

Also to note, there are multiple tabs on the Excel file, so if you find that something is incomplete, you may just be looking in the wrong place. Everything I used can be found here: https://wiki.chordata.cc/wiki/Build_Chordata
(my edits are pending, so once it's approved, you'll see it.) This includes everything from the current Notochord image to the BOM/Parts list and Gerber files. I ordered the boards from https://jlcpcb.com/. Make sure to get a stencil if you want to do this the easier way.

This easier way is soldering via heating up solder paste. This is the exact paste I got from a local Lowes:

And then you need a heating station. I used one of these:

konokaiden

Then your boards come in looking like:

If you want help with the actual soldering process, feel free to watch these:

And for the few parts you need to use through-hole techniques for, I got one of these kits:

It's got the tools you need, plus you can get a little practice in.

And here's a video about how to do it:

Here's a separate link to get to what all I'm using until the pending stuff is complete:
https://www.mediafire.com/file/ct20z664rzf1327/Project_Chordata.rar/file

And after you get all of the parts put on, the KCeptors look like:

You'll probably notice that the light has 2 anode pads and 2 cathode pads, but the circuit board only has one of each. I just soldered one of each in their designated places, because it doesn't particularly hang off the board, and if the solder is good, it's pretty securely on there. Plus the electron flow will still make it's proper circuit. And I just noticed that this picture was back before I had finished them (I didn't have enough R6 and R8 for all of the boards because of the update from version 2.2 to 2.3, so I had to make a third order to have enough of each part). If someone really cares about seeing the exact final product, I can post a picture of the complete KCeptor from the top view.

And the Hub looks more or less the same, just with a lot of stuff on it. If someone wants a picture of it, I can add that later.

*After this, I need to make sure my flashed SD card (the image is provided in my packet) is actually working...
*I need to make the wires.
*I am 3D printing cases for each circuit board, so I'm getting the sizes and final shape finished up right now. It has wings for velcro to go through, a top and bottom that you can epoxy together in designated places, and before doing so, you can place the board inside it.
*I will be spraying the plastic enclosures (while empty) with an anti-static spray so that static doesn't get inside of them due to atmospheric issues or movement.

**All of these updates will be explained once I've done them.

daylanKifky

Hello @konokaiden thanks for this great contribution. Your experience will be of great help for other building the system at home!

I approved your contributions to the wiki, or at least the one I was able to find. We get lots of spam in the wiki and is hard to tell the real contributions from the others. If you make more changes please use a registered user, so we can filter them easily.

daylanKifky

by the way, I renamed this thread to something I felt would be easier to find for people looking for info on the subject. Feel free to change it again i you want, just keep in mind how would you look for information about this subject if you were a newcomer

konokaiden

daylanKifky

I went ahead and renamed it something that I would look for as a newcomer. I think it's less technical in wording, and therefore easier to understand/easier to find, for a broader audience. As for the wiki, I did just add one thing because Ive still only completed the physical electronics. I've been busy with school and with the holidays, so I haven't gotten to the wiring or software yet beyond what I've already done. I won't log that until I've done it from start to finish, that way people know that what I'm saying is actually how I did it so that it works in the end. That way they don't run into "I tried it this way and then it failed, so I had to do this other thing", because I tend to do walkthroughs piece by piece. So if there are any mistakes, I will follow that too by mistake because those weren't removed. So I want to make sure my thing works before saying "this is how you do it".

But yeah, I added my stuff to the wiki because that's all the current software/BOH/Gerbers for the 2.3 after I updated the manufacturer and parts, as well as added entries for the other locations on the circuit which actually aren't used. I want people to look at my stuff and have all the information, rather than having to also seek out logs and entire project histories to find out that "oh, TP5 is just a test point and nothing goes in that hole". So this log will be like "if you see pictures or videos, this is the section you need to read, and you'll do everything correctly if you follow this. Nothing goes unexplained or corrected later."

As far as what I need to move forward, I'm working through the wiring with my electrical engineer stepfather, so he can explain that all to me and help me with it. But the software still puzzles me. In order to get notochord working, do I need to do the SSH thing? That's what I'm looking at now in order to get things working, but I'm not sure how to see that Notochord is running, or how to edit it and rename the bones, which I need to do for my applications. Even if you can't explain that process here, I'd appreciate if you link the article on the wiki or other location where it is discussed.

konokaiden

I would like to suggest making https://wiki.chordata.cc/wiki/User_Manual/1._Chordata_parts/1.1._Microcomputer
significantly more prominant. There is one line in this one section which tells you the user name and password for notochord, and the entire rest of the wiki gives the wrong idea about having access to some command line or the Chordata-net login combo. I've spent about a day and a half installing the raspberry pi OS, reflashing the notochord, etc because I had no idea how to get the Pi working and ready for me to use any commands.

I also have basically no idea how to use it as "plug and play", where you give it power and it sends signals to the computer about position and orientation. So if those sections could be made more prominent, that would be much appreciated... But I think "how to set up wifi" is prominent enough, I had no trouble figuring that part of the process up, and the SSH thing is another one I found easily enough, so it is fine. It's just the details about starting the system for the first time, as well as starting the recording, seem to be hard to find.

konokaiden

Also, a couple of important questions - when setting up the wifi, I did method 1, and checked it, but only got back the physical address for the ethernet (dc.sb.34.542.532 something like that) rather than the usual set of numbers (193.168.0.0). I then tried deleting the Chordata-net entry and just have my wifi in there, but that fried the thing, so I'm once again setting that card up from scratch.

I'm going to try using just method 2, but do you know if raspberry pi 4 has a slightly different procedure to find out your IP address?

konokaiden

Did some playing around in the shell, turns out ifconfig has a lot of subcommands. So I first had to correct the # in my password for the network, because the key for \ is the # in that. And if you want to type quotes, you need to hit @ instead of " because those two are swapped in the shell.

But anyway, after a bit of reading from the makers of Linux, via the shell and the "help" and "info ifconfig" commands, I discovered "ifconfig -a" which told me that I had three connections total. I had "eth0" which was my ethernet, I had "lo" which was my Wifi, and it had an IP address in the format I was looking for, and I had "wlan0" which is once again, my ethernet.

So if this is obvious to the team, it isn't mentioned at all in the wiki, but it seems like "ifconfig wlan0" will always return the ethernet connection even if you add your own wifi and even if you remove the default network, and you will never get the IP address. But there's another issue.

My "lo" connection was given the status "loopback", so I can imagine a universe in which wlan0 is the active network connection, and anything in loopback status is not set to wlan0. But there is no menu which allows me to set the active connection from ethernet to Wifi, so I don't know if the Wifi is working or not. Considering the fact that I tried to access the IP address that was given via PUTTy, and it wouldn't, I suppose that means "loopback = not working".

Any help that anyone can give would be nice. Or just information about all of this.

daylanKifky

Hi!
the loopback connection is a virtual connection which exists even if the physical ones are down. its IP will normally be 127.0.0.1 and it's used to reference the same machine where a communication was originated

The "eth0" should be your wired ethernet connection and the "wlan0" the WIFI one.
In order to enable or disable an interface you can use the commands ifup and ifdown.
For example to disable the WIFI you can go:

ifdown wlan0

After that the ifconfig status should be DISABLED for the wifi.

In order to assert a particular connection is working you can try pinging it from another computer like:

ping <ip_address>

if you get a response it means the connection is reachable from the outside

konokaiden But there is no menu which allows me to set the active connection from ethernet to Wifi,

There's no problem with having both connections active, you will get two different ip addresses and should be able to communicate with each one of them.

konokaiden I first had to correct the # in my password for the network, because the key for \ is the # in that. And if you want to type quotes, you need to hit @ instead of " because those two are swapped in the shell.

Is seems like your physical keyboard layout don't match the one set on the raspberry. By default it comes with a british english layout configured. You should be able to change with

sudo raspi-config

konokaiden

So, I need your help on this then. I have the correct password in the Raspberry Pi, here's the type of encryption my router is in (password is hidden, don't worry).

And yet it is on loopback, and on the right side of wlan0, it gives

wlan0 = bla bla (dc.a6.bla.bla.bla) Ethernet
etc
etc
etc

I can add a picture if it helps, but with it still being on loopback despite having the correct password, I don't really know what to do about this.

konokaiden

daylanKifky

from your screenshot it seems like the WIFI is not connected yet. You will se an inet field on the ifconfig result once you are connected.
The ether field is the device MAC address, a low level address you normally don't have to worry about, all that you need is the current IP address.

I see that you entered the WIFI password using the raspbian desktop interface. Do you get the "connected" status on the WIFI widget on the top-right corner of the screen?

konokaiden

Aha! It was the difference in an underscore and a dash in the ssid name. I can now use putty to enter the notochord.

konokaiden

Okay, now I'm having difficulty with getting the wiring...

I ordered RJ12 6p6c connectors. The first kind I got were accidentally asymmetric, which is not going to work, so I ordered a second set more carefully. Those came in, and still don't fit!

The jacks on my boards are these: https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/w%C3%BCrth-elektronik/615006141121/2627284
A representative at Wurth Electronic said that they are designed to fit RJ25, but everything I see says that RJ25 is the same as RJ12 (plus, even if it was different, it can't be bought as "RJ25"...)

So I need a ways to get wires that fit my connectors..... The ones I have seem like they will fit fine, but they just don't go in and make that normal secure snapping sound. So I'm not sure what's going on or how to get things straightened out...

daylanKifky

konokaiden
could you put a link to the RJ12 headers you bought?

konokaiden

Sure. The first ones I bought were like this, and the asymmetry was a problem:
https://www.showmecables.com/rj12-dec-modular-connector-6p6c-flat-cable-10-pack?gclid=CjwKCAiAgJWABhArEiwAmNVTB5h94ehb-2P8uW48seKwgkdJOfu4iBi0mYHzCo4MPCOXXuNp7HxqrBoCLRAQAvD_BwE

Then I ordered these, and it still didn't fit...
https://www.grainger.com/product/13U661?gclid=CjwKCAiAgJWABhArEiwAmNVTB9k08wPWEnQFB_h5ldtvTJU7dccs5Rx8i6bj015b7KarD_MAggewKRoCKdQQAvD_BwE&cm_mmc=PPC:+Google+PLA&ef_id=CjwKCAiAgJWABhArEiwAmNVTB9k08wPWEnQFB_h5ldtvTJU7dccs5Rx8i6bj015b7KarD_MAggewKRoCKdQQAvD_BwE:G:s&s_kwcid=AL!2966!3!281698275252!!!g!470952775171!&gucid=N:N:PS:Paid:GGL:CSM-2295:4P7A1P:20501231

and because of the limited image, it should be identical to this:
https://www.googleadservices.com/pagead/aclk?sa=L&ai=DChcSEwjQl4bD2qXuAhUzOLMAHb4nBXIYABAJGgJ5bQ&ohost=www.google.com&cid=CAESQeD2GI91JYkA5xEOqgDFcujQf77I0E8-2VQNxznbCablXRb8xaingP4DdnoSh_n0bbMfjvzcPRf2JI4fZY8RT63G&sig=AOD64_2nRGmy_YdbZyVY4qIrLYErTis4Mg&ctype=5&q=&ved=2ahUKEwibuf3C2qXuAhVJwlkKHQGcAK0Q9aACegQIDRBL&adurl=

The first one looks exactly like the one I bought, the second one is the exact entry that I bought, and the third one looks like the second one, except you get more angles to look at it from.

daylanKifky

konokaiden Then I ordered these, and it still didn't fit...

They look like the correct one, but that supplier is not providing a datasheet were to check the measurements.

Have you tried crimping them before trying to fit them in the connector? before crimping the contacts stick out of the plastic body, perhaps that's the problem.

Otherwise try getting the connectors from the same supplier you've got the jack. they put a link to the datasheet on each product page, double check the measurements there