Successful Test Fire!

This was the set-up, not very child or pet friendly!

Early yesterday morning I set it off on a suitable Bisque programme and it ran for most of the day, it finally finished around 10pm;  It worked very well and I was very pleased with it.  Some of the results can be seen here.

I had to do a few code tweaks the night before, as the actual firing code had never been properly tested since all the new code was added.

So I'll carry on trying to get the very last bits completed.

Lots of Soldering Fun!

(18th Oct.) I've just spent a few hours tonight soldering up some components to the other boards;  I've been waiting over a month for some of the parts from China - which still haven't arrived!  so, I just jumped in and soldered the stock parts I had in my component boxes.

Software Sneek-peek!

Tonight I managed to tidy up and finish some more bits on the software side;  mainly working on the installer and the Temperature Profile Editor code, and a bit of work on some graphics.

The installer will install all the necessary files to create your own temperature profiles and send them to the controller over Bluetooth.

The Temperature Profile Editor allows you to create a single multi-segmented profile really easily, then you can save it;  once you have as many as you need - you can then mix'n'match your own set and upload them to the controller via the Send from the menu options.

The UI still has a few little quirks but it should be stable enough for an alpha version.

Below shows the log viewer. It seems to load the logs fine but I still need to write a short bit of code to pull them out from the controller and then save them to file but that shouldn't take very long.

Round-up August Progress Update!

I've been mostly working on the PC software side and things seem to be going well.   I managed to get the hardware detection working; it wasn't as nicely implemented as I had wished for, but it works, and I could always update the code later.

Most of today was spent on the "upload" code;  this allows the user to send firing profiles directly to the controller;  one part had me stumped for a good while until I managed to resolve it.

The only bit of code to complete now is the code to combine or merge multiple profiles into a single programme set;  but once that's complete the software should have all the features required for practical use.



I've ordered another batch of components to populate some more boards; so when they arrive I can get my soldering iron fired-up and ready to go! ;-)

I was planning on doing a demo of the controller but things didn't go as quick as I had hoped;  so - I just left it;  but I'm still hoping to do some once the final PC software is complete.

Temperature Profile Editor

Over the weekend I worked on tidying up the temperature profile editor; this allows for multi-segmented temperature profiles to created, modified and saved etc.

At the moment I'm working on some code to auto-detect the attached Kiln Controller so profiles can be seamlessly uploaded to it via Bluetooth;  the ultimate aim is to make the creation and upload of firing schedules to the controller as simple as possible.

I've also completed the log viewer, as that was just very basic code before.  I do plan to add to this at a later stage but for a version 1,  it should work fine.

Powered on!

Well, after a long day of debugging it's finally all powered up;  the PCB board required some inter-connects on the back, this was because of some mistakes in the PCB layout.   At the moment I have it running continuously, and I plan to leave it running for at least a good few days.

Almost all soldered up.

I ended up going to my local Maplins for the 3 pots I was missing;  I don't like going there unless I really have to, as it quite expensive for parts.  

Tonight I'll carefully power it up and set it up,  and then run some diagnostic tests.  I'll have to get the header strip connector for the Bluetooth module next week.

PCB's Arrived!!!

(Pic Above, Left) The boards arrived this afternoon!! and I've already "hand" placed a few components to see if they fitted correctly; I think all is good, so far at least!
















(23rd July) At 7am this morning I soldered up one of the boards before work;  I'm missing some parts though; 1 connector for the Bluetooth module and 3 pots; so I'll need to order those when I get chance.

(Pic Below) I was fairly happy with my soldering, except that I need to get some thinner solder wire as mine is too thick,  I've found the board requires a more delicate solder feed approach in order to achieve the right amount of solder for each connection.

PCB's ordered!

This evening I ordered a dozen PCB boards; although I checked and re-checked the files before I sent them,  I can only at best - hope that everything will work out right first time;   they should take around 2-3 weeks to be delivered.  Each PCB will measure approx 4" x 4"  and once they arrive I should have enough parts to make up at least a couple of complete boards, and maybe a few partial ones.

PCB Version!

I finally bit the bullet and tried my hand at PCB layout design. It took a while to get the hang of it; but in the end I managed to get the controller PCB layout done!   I need to verify the layout before I get them actually produced,  just in case there might be foot-print errors.

One of the biggest jobs I found in doing a PCB layout is the parts have to be from a consistent source otherwise some parts might not fit the PCB foot-prints; so instead of sourcing all bits from Ebay,  i'm looking at a more stable electronics component supplier like Digikey etc;   I'll still source some parts from Ebay, but just not all.

One of the reason why I decided to do the PCB was because I've never done a proper PCB before so it was a great learning experience for me;  and it also means the controller will be available to a lot more people who perhaps don't have either the time / skill or tools to create one themselves.

(19th June 2013)
A few parts have arrived, these came from Ebay; the most critical foot-print parts are still en-route from Digikey.  these include the battery holder and the fuse holder.

In the meantime I'm looking at finalizing the PC kiln controller software and I also need to get the documentation PDF completed - more updates as I make more progress!

Short time-lapse build clip

Whilst waiting to purchase some components I thought I'd add a small time-lapse clip to show part of the build process of one the boards which went into the new prototype.  I should of really captured the whole build but I had problems with my camera!

Feature List

• Ramp / Soak temperatures up to 1300c.

• Space for approx 500 programmes and each programme can have up to 255 segments.

• Uses 1 x K-Type thermocouple.

• The programmes are created on the PC then sent to the controller remotely via Bluetooth.

• 32K of log memory;  logs are created for each successful firing. The data can then be pulled from the controller via Bluetooth for display into a graph.

Almost in the box!

This weekend I managed to shoe-horn both boards into the box; It pretty much didn't fit because of the clock backup battery holder was a vertical one; also the RS232 module was proud. So after some re-soldering and a fair bit of messing about, it all went in!   Because of the sheer lack of space, I removed the fan, and the additional power rocker switch;  so to power it on, you just use the key switch.

I removed the access to the RS232 feature via the menu's and instead made it accessible via the boot-up sequence; in doing this I've freed up some valuable code space.

Top wire is the k-type thermocouple socket,  on the right are 4 wires. Two are for the 15-30v dc unregulated power supply, the other two are for the kiln element switching ( ie. to either a SSR or mechanical relay)  The key-switch (left) will turn on the controller.  The 4 buttons are to navigate the controller menu's. The button assignments are UP, DOWN, ENTER and EXIT.



Next on the list is live testing and documentation.


Will this be released as opensource?
I've been asked this quite a lot but the answer sadly is no;  but I do plan to make the chips available with full plans and instructions.

Opensource is really the way to go but in this case it won't help me grow this as a kiln controller solution;  I have great plans for this, and I believe I've only scratched the surface of what can be achieved. 

Coming up in the next blog posts will be more testing news;  and later on, a show'n'tell!

Prototype V2 Finished

Version 2 prototype is finished!!!  and it's in a version that will fit into a box and be wired up to the kiln.   Tomorrow I will check the temperature readings with my temperature simulator before it gets fitted on the kiln and setup for live testing.   I'm pretty sure it should pass ok as the kiln control code hasn't really been changed since the original breadboard prototype firing; the only change was to make it read the programme data directly from the 64k flash memory; most of the changes were fixing bugs and adding the RS232 code.

I think the important thing is that the design is pretty much fixed and it looks like it might well be a suitable release version if all goes well.