This is a recording dual-deploy altimeter for high power model rocketry
with integrated GPS and telemetry link.
-These are photos of our current version,
-which includes an integrated GPS receiver and patch antenna:
+Production units are available from the
+[Garbee and Garbee](http://auric.gag.com) web
+store. TeleMetrum starter kits are also now available from
+[Apogee Components](http://www.apogeerockets.com/Altus_Metrum_GPS.asp).
-<a href="v0.2/cimg5164-cropped.jpg"> <img src="v0.2/cimg5164-thumb.jpg"></a>
-<a href="v0.2/cimg5171-cropped.jpg"> <img src="v0.2/cimg5171-thumb.jpg"></a>
+For the latest TeleMetrum firmware and related ground station software, please
+visit the [AltOS](../AltOS) page on this site.
-And this is a photo of our original board with serial port for off-board GPS,
-without the big off-board 1000uF cap from the original ejection circuit:
+These are photos of our current production version, which includes an
+integrated GPS receiver with active patch antenna:
-<a href="v0.1/loadedpair.jpg"> <img src="v0.1/loadedpair-thumb.jpg"></a>
+<a href="v1.0/cimg5972-crop.jpg"> <img src="v1.0/cimg5972-thumb.jpg"></a>
+<a href="v1.0/cimg5974-crop.jpg"> <img src="v1.0/cimg5974-thumb.jpg"></a>
## Motivation ##
One weekend while attending a conference together, we got to wondering if
we couldn't adapt one to use as a downlink for the
-[AltusMetrum](../AltusMetrum/) altimeter board in addition to direction
+[OpenAlt](../OpenAlt/) altimeter board in addition to direction
finding after flight. That caused us to start thinking about other things
in the design we might want to tweak, and before long we were working on the
design of a new tracker board derived from the BeeLine design.
* SPI interface
* other parts in this Atmel DataFlash series can optionally be used
* [SkyTraq](http://www.skytraq.com.tw/) Venus634FLPx GPS receiver
- * on-board passive patch antenna
- * U.FL connector with 3.3V DC for optional external amplified antenna
+ * on-board [Taoglas AP.17A.01](http://www.taoglas.com/antennas/GPS_Antennas/Internal_GPS_-_Active_Patch_Modules/)
+ single-stage active patch antenna
+ * U.FL connector with 3.3V DC can be re-purposed for optional external amplified antennas
* async serial interface
* [Freescale MP3H6115A](http://www.freescale.com/webapp/search.partparamdetail.framework?PART_NUMBER=MP3H6115A6U) pressure sensor
* [Freescale MMA2202EG](http://www.freescale.com/webapp/search.partparamdetail.framework?PART_NUMBER=MMA2202EG) 50g accelerometer. Can use 40-200g variants!
* The hardware is licensed under the [TAPR](http://www.tapr.org) [Open Hardware License](http://www.tapr.org/ohl.html)
* The software is licensed [GPL version 2](http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html)
-### v0.1 Differences ###
+## [Production History](../production) ##
-* 2.5 x 1 inch board with all parts mounted on one side
-* 4-pin PicoBlade serial port connector for attachment of external GPS module
-* USB connector projected approximately 3mm over the edge of the board
-* Debug connector used 4 IC socket pins on 100 mil centers
-* no companion board interface
-* [Microchip 25LC1024](http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en520389) CMOS serial EEPROM instead of DataFlash
- * 128k x 8
- * SPI interface
-* [Microchip MCP9700A](http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en027103) discrete temperature sensor
- * eliminated in v0.2 to free GPIO line for companion interface
-* used 1000uF electrolytic capacitor charged to 5V for pyro supply
-* two LEDs instead of one attached to CPU
- * eliminated second LED to free GPIO line for companion interface
+## [Flight Logs](flightlogs) ##
-## [Production History](production) ##
+## Artifacts ##
-## [Flight Logs](flightlogs) ##
+There is a single manual for TeleMetrum and all other Altus Metrum products,
+which is available in [html](../AltOS/doc/altusmetrum.html) and
+[pdf](../AltOS/doc/altusmetrum.pdf) formats.
+
+The hardware design current gEDA files are available from
+[git.gag.com](http://git.gag.com) in the project
+[hw/telemetrum](http://git.gag.com/?p=hw/telemetrum;a=summary).
+
+Work on the next version proceeds on the master branch, with occasional
+temporary branches created when Bdale is making some major / speculative
+change. The 'v0.2' and 'v0.1' branches document what we're actually flying
+right now on the two respective PCB revisions. The 'ground' branch has a
+cut-down schematic used to generate the BOM for partially loading v0.1 boards
+to used on the ground. We call the on-the-ground
+version '[TeleDongle](../TeleDongle)', and newer versions have their own PCB
+design.
+
+For those who don't have ready access to the gEDA suite, here are pdf snapshots
+of the files for Production PCB version 1.0 in more easily readable form.
+
+* [schematic](v1.0/telemetrum.pdf)
+* [pcb artwork](v1.0/telemetrum.pcb.pdf)
+* [bill of materials](v1.0/partslist.csv)
+
+We consider our [AltOS](../AltOS) firmware completely reliable, and routinely
+fly TeleMetrum with no backup. Rockets with TeleMetrum boards
+have exceeded 50g acceleration, been well above Mach 1, and reached altitudes
+greater than 25k feet AGL with great results. Keith's second generation
+ground station program called altosui works on Windows, Mac, and Linux systems
+and logs telemetry to disk, displays current and max values for key parameters
+during flight, and even includes voice synthesis during the flight so that
+our eyes can stay on the rockets! After flight, altosui can extract the
+complete flight log from TeleMetrum, can display plots of the data from either
+the telemetry received by radio or the onboard flight log, can output a kml
+file for use with [Google Earth](http://earth.google.com), and can also
+output all the flight data as a csv file for easy import to spreadsheet
+programs or other analysis tools allowing you to perform whatever
+custom analysis you can envision! More details on the software,
+including full source code and pre-built packages
+can be found on the [AltOS](../AltOS) page on this site.
+
+## Future Plans ##
+
+TeleMetrum v1.0 meets all of our expectations. We anticipate another
+production run of boards soon, which will include minor design tweeks mostly
+to work around component availability issues.
## Problems ##
place parts! Without an inspection microscope, loading and testing these
boards might be impossible.
-* The v0.1 artwork had three issues, two of which required physical rework
- on each board. All of these issues were fixed in v0.2.
-
- * the USB connector footprint was placed wrong, so that the
- connector hung out over the edge of the board instead of being
- flush.
- * we needed chip select on the SPI memory. To fix that, we gave up the
- ability to put the accelerometer into self-test mode and used that
- GPIO line to pull chip select on the memory, which required two
- cuts and two jumpers.
- * the igniter sense circuits each needed a second resistor to
- complete the voltage divider so our 3.3V CPU ADC could read the
- 5V ejection voltage. This was fixed by changing two resistor
- values, and tacking two additional resistors onto the board
- with jumpers to ground.
+* The addition of on-board GPS in v0.2 means that the total power consumption
+ can exceed the rate at which we draw power from the USB interface,
+ particularly when the GPS is in cold start mode. This means a battery must
+ be attached during operation, and also that the battery will only charge
+ effectively from USB when the board is turned off.
-## Artifacts ##
+## History ##
-The hardware design current gEDA files are available from
-[git.gag.com](http://git.gag.com) in the project
-[hw/telemetrum](http://git.gag.com/?p=hw/telemetrum;a=summary).
+### v0.2 ###
-Work on the next version proceeds on the master branch, with occasional
-temporary branches created when Bdale is making some major / speculative
-change. The 'v0.2' and 'v0.1' branches document what we're actually flying
-right now on the two respective PCB revisions. The 'ground' branch has a
-cut-down schematic used to generate the BOM for partially loading v0.1 boards
-to used on the ground. We call the on-the-ground version 'TeleDongle'.
+These are photos of our second version, which included the integrated Venus
+GPS receiver, but with a passive patch antenna that turned out to have
+disappointing performance due to our many PCB geometry constraints. It also
+used a voltage regulator with less capacity which we felt was marginal for
+supporting the companion boards we have planned:
-For those who don't have ready access to the gEDA suite, here are pdf snapshots
-of files in more easily readable form.
+<a href="v0.2/cimg5164-cropped.jpg"> <img src="v0.2/cimg5164-thumb.jpg"></a>
+<a href="v0.2/cimg5171-cropped.jpg"> <img src="v0.2/cimg5171-thumb.jpg"></a>
+
+Other than cleaning up the silkscreen, the differences between v0.2 and our
+current v1.0 boards were really quite small:
+
+* 100ma LDO regulator instead of the current 150ma part
+* no C38 footprint
+* different value for C36 reset capacitor
+
+The schematics and PCB artwork for this version are on the v0.2 branch in
+our git repository, here are pdf copies for easy reference:
-* These are from the v0.2 branch:
* [schematic](v0.2/telemetrum.pdf)
* [pcb artwork](v0.2/telemetrum.pcb.pdf)
* [bill of materials](v0.2/partslist.csv)
-* These are as of the working-v0.1 tag:
- * [schematic](v0.1/telemetrum.pdf)
- * [pcb artwork](v0.1/telemetrum.pcb.pdf)
- * [bill of materials](v0.1/telemetrum.bom)
-Our [AltOS](../AltOS) firmware works well enough that we now routinely fly
-TeleMetrum with no backup. Rockets with v0.1 boards have exceeded 50g
-acceleration, been above Mach 1, and reached altitudes greater
-than 12k feet AGL with great results. Keith's ground station program
-called ao-view logs telemetry to disk, displays current and max values for
-key parameters during flight, and even includes voice synthesis
-during the flight so that our eyes can stay on the rockets! We have post
-flight analysis software that makes it easy to extract data from the board,
-analyze it, and even generate KML files for viewing flights in GoogleEarth!
-More details on the software, including full source code and pre-built packages
-can be found on the [AltOS](../AltOS) page on this site.
+### v0.1 ###
-## Future Plans ##
+And this is a photo of our original board with serial port for off-board GPS,
+without the big off-board 1000uF cap from the original ejection circuit:
+
+<a href="v0.1/loadedpair.jpg"> <img src="v0.1/loadedpair-thumb.jpg"></a>
-As of early February 2010, three prototypes of v0.2 are done and working on
-the bench. We hope to flight test them shortly, then arrange a production
-run in time to make TeleMetrum available in assembled and tested form to
-others in the rocketry hobby who have expressed interest in time for the
-2010 flying season.
+The differences between v0.1 and later boards were substantial:
-Because we understand that not everyone uses Linux, we've started discussing
-the best way to make a cross-platform ground station program for use with
-[AltOS](../AltOS), perhaps in Java...
+* 2.5 x 1 inch board with all parts mounted on one side
+* 4-pin PicoBlade serial port connector for attachment of external GPS module
+* USB connector projected approximately 3mm over the edge of the board
+* Debug connector used 4 IC socket pins on 100 mil centers
+* no companion board interface
+* 50ma LDO regulator on early boards, later boards used a 100ma part
+* [Microchip 25LC1024](http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en520389) CMOS serial EEPROM instead of DataFlash
+ * 128k x 8
+ * SPI interface
+* [Microchip MCP9700A](http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en027103) discrete temperature sensor
+* used 1000uF electrolytic capacitor charged to 5V for pyro supply
+* two LEDs instead of one attached to CPU
+
+The elimination of the discrete temperature sensor and second LED were
+necessary to support the companion board interface added in v0.2.
+
+The v0.1 artwork had three issues, two of which required physical rework
+on each board. All of these issues were fixed in v0.2.
+
+* The USB connector footprint was placed wrong, so that the
+ connector hung out over the edge of the board instead of being
+ flush.
+* We needed chip select on the SPI memory. To fix that, we gave up the
+ ability to put the accelerometer into self-test mode and used that
+ GPIO line to pull chip select on the memory, which required two
+ cuts and two jumpers.
+* The igniter sense circuits each needed a second resistor to
+ complete the voltage divider so our 3.3V CPU ADC could read the
+ 5V ejection voltage. This was fixed by changing two resistor
+ values, and tacking two additional resistors onto the board
+ with jumpers to ground.
+
+The schematics and PCB artwork for this version as of the working-v0.1 tag
+are available here are pdf copies for easy reference:
+
+ * [schematic](v0.1/telemetrum.pdf)
+ * [pcb artwork](v0.1/telemetrum.pcb.pdf)
+ * [bill of materials](v0.1/telemetrum.bom)
projects / web / altusmetrum / blobdiff