Mega Breakout board

[petez69]

Hi ALL

I've ordered a bunch of Mega 2560 boards for my setup. I've bought a Mega breakout board from E-Bay to have a fiddle with and I'm wondering what others might have done with breakouts and their Arduinos...

I'm looking to mount them in small wall cabinets and distribute where needed but want to do it in a "tidy fashion"...

Anyone have ideas or pictures of their setup they can share ?

Thanks..Pete

[khriss75]

Hi petez,
in the pictures, my solution:
2 Arduino Board with a screw shields.

Near you can see on left side the driver for relay (UNL2803), on the right, a photocoupler 2N35 for digital input. These boards are homemade.

All is under testing.








Cris

[petez69]

Cris

Thankyou for the pictures... Note you are using USB to connect, I'm going to use Ethernet, will make it a little interesting.

Good luck wit your project, post up more pictures as you go

Pete

[randy]

Hi ALL

I've ordered a bunch of Mega 2560 boards for my setup. I've bought a Mega breakout board from E-Bay to have a fiddle with and I'm wondering what others might have done with breakouts and their Arduinos...

I'm looking to mount them in small wall cabinets and distribute where needed but want to do it in a "tidy fashion"...

Anyone have ideas or pictures of their setup they can share ?

Thanks..Pete

I finally got around to taking some pictures. I use a Sunfounder case to enclose the board so that it is insulated and mounted securely. Then I plug in the shields. I use Velleman shields for RGB PWM and I/O. I have also built two specialized shields on prototype boards and use terminal strips to pin headers for other I/O. Below are some pictures.

Click on any image for a larger version

[petez69]

Hi Randy

That looks good...I see you've had some of the same challenges I've got going through my head as far as header pins (for I/O) to the mega board. I see you've used a silastic.

I've got some bits coming to experiment with myself and I'll post up some pictures as I develop things.

Big direction change here last night, appears the LInux instance of HS went nuts, I think there is some sort of corruption to the HS database. Lost some graphics and then bizzare I/O performance from both test Arduinos. I had the debug on and saw nothing in it so I've put that on hold.

I flashed up HS on Windows last night and connected 1 arduino. I have 2 original Ethernet boards coming, if they are good then I'll get 2 more. I've ordered some POE modules for the ethernet from Banggood so I'll try what you've got setup.

2 things that kinda pushed me back to windows, the Squeezebox plugin and SMS. Gavin is looking to port the SMS plugin to Linux, we've been moving files around and changing syntax but the corruption in HSD got me, I cant afford to have that happen if I happened to be away from home...

Still very much in Beta mode here I'd say v0.10 but its looking real good :-) I've purchased an LCD to play with too..strip RGB lighting for the handrail in the stairs, I've got ideas :-) ;-)

Cheers from the center of Australia !

[Vincenttor]

That looks nice,
i am actually fighting with cadsoft eagle to make a dual layer board.
preferable 100x100m price technically this is the most interesting.

I am making my own boards now with my milling machine but this is far from ideal since it takes allot of time and effort.
Yes its great if they work and are real home made but i would not dare to do dual layer since the alignment for top/bottom is very important regarding drilling holes and soldering trough.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yumdmc0qOxQ
and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRrV9-K8v18


I want to make something like this

But since Eagle is new for me, and i have no technical background /education in electronics or mechanics whatsoever it can be quite difficult to use software not in your own language with terms i have not clue what it is.

Anyone that has experience with cadsoft Eagle ?

[petez69]

Hi mate...

The video's looked very interesting :-) That breakout board you show was going to cost me nearly %100AUD or $65USD, while nice its too expensive. I tried to get a better price from him however it wasnt possible.

I'm going down the path of simply soldering up my own, I've bought a bunch of Opto Isolators and header pins and will solder up some vero board. Anything that can get fried by electricity will be in sockets.

I've done a little with eagle but that was too long ago to be of value...

Cheers..peter

[usLEDsupply]

Here is my latest one (i don't have all the I/O used yet but they will be)
i just laser cut the back board and used plastic board standoffs to mount it

[petez69]

That looks very nice.....this board is your own design ?

[usLEDsupply]

the mounting plate is but the screw shield was like $15 from ebay
if you have access to a laser cutter i can post the file or if you want one i would be glad to cut some out for people

[petez69]

I have a screw shield on order....Tell me the mega is on the underside of the terminal board with the ethernet ontop. Did you have to buy another set of SPI bus pins to get it through ?

[usLEDsupply]

yes the mega is under and yes i had to extend the ISCP header though to the Ethernet board with some "2x3Pin Dual Row 15mm Tall Header Socket Connectors"

[Vincenttor]

@ Pete, indeed i have seen his post.
Actually from a topic that he answered on i got the link to make place a order to make not very expensive dual layer boards.
They cost per 10 or 12 i believe 19 dollars.

I think the materials on the picture, bought from China cost maybe 5 Usd or let's say 8 for a couple of boards to fill them.
Not very expensive all combined so its cheaper to make something yourself then buying this board from the designer for 65USD.

This is why i want to design something myself and send it to that company, soldering the stuff on is the easiest part.
And besides that, its fun if you can create something yourself and it works

Downside of this price is that it has to be within 100x100 mm
https://www.itead.cc/open-pcb/pcb-pr...-10cm-max.html


@usLEDsupply,

how did you do it with a lasercutter if i may ask ?
I have 2 Co2 cutters but i am not able to puncture trough the pcb or am i misunderstanding ?
Looks great btw the board, what size is it ?

I have send you a pm also regarding the DMX i see you are controlling if you don't mind.


Edit: never mind about the laser cutting, i see now its the wooden board to hold the pcb

[usLEDsupply]

yes i have made boards on the CNC but the guy on ebay selling the shield and all the connectors for $15 with free shipping was cheaper then i could get all the parts for let alone the board so i didn't bother making my own shield for this one

i haven't tried making any boards on the laser yet but i don't think it would have much trouble punching through the board but it is 120w so it has some power

[petez69]

Agreed, the mega breakout on e-bay, I couldnt make it for that price so its a good deal. I've bought 1 to try it out, I currently have 4 MEGAs on the bench testing making sure the connecitn is stable.

I've bought a bunch of 4N25 optos and sockets so I plan to isolate the MEGAs as best as I can :-)

Using the Arduino's is looking to be a great way to get I/O happening..

Pete