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).
+store. TeleMetrum starter kits are also available from
+[Apogee Components](http://www.apogeerockets.com/Altus_Metrum_GPS.asp)
+and [Australian Rocketry](http://www.ausrocketry.com/shop/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=111&products_id=4302).
For the latest TeleMetrum firmware and related ground station software, please
visit the [AltOS](../AltOS) page on this site.
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.
+of the files for Production PCB version 1.1 in more easily readable form.
* [schematic](v1.1/telemetrum.pdf)
* [pcb artwork](v1.1/telemetrum.pcb.pdf)
Rockets we know of flying 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
+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, includes voice synthesis during the flight so that
our eyes can stay on the rockets, and even includes live display of rocket
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.
+can be found on the [AltOS](../AltOS) page on this site. Feel free to
+download the software and try it before purchasing our hardware!
## Future Plans ##
-TeleMetrum v1.1 meets all of our expectations, except for one mis-placed
-trace also present in v1.0. The error makes use of a separate pyro battery
-less trivial than intended. We'll fix that for a future production run.
+TeleMetrum v1.2 is back from our assembler and the first batch are being
+prepared for sale, hopefully by Christmas day. The significant user-visible
+change is that we've moved to a 70g accelerometer by default, due to poor
+availability of the part we previously used due to damage to the Freescale
+facility in Sendai caused by the Japan earthquake / tsunami. Full details
+will be posted here when they're available to order.
## Problems ##
place parts! Without an inspection microscope, loading and testing these
boards might be impossible.
-* The addition of on-board GPS in v0.2 means that the total power consumption
+* The addition of on-board GPS in v0.2 and later boards 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.
-## History ##
+## [History of TeleMetrum](history) ##
-### v1.0 ###
-
-These are photos of our third version, which was the basis of our first
-production build. These were sold between April and December 2010, and
-performed very well.
-
-<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>
-
-The differences between v1.0 and v1.1 were small:
-
-* different flash memory part due to supplier availability problems
-* updated reset circuit to improve reliability at temperature extremes
-* changed the GPS antenna footprint to eliminate the large through-hole
- originally intended for use with a passive patch
-* irq line eliminated from the companion port
-* an additional resistor divider added to allow sampling the 5V supply
-
-The schematics and PCB artwork for this version are on the v1.0 branch in
-our git repository, here are pdf copies for easy reference:
-
-* [schematic](v1.0/telemetrum.pdf)
-* [pcb artwork](v1.0/telemetrum.pcb.pdf)
-* [bill of materials](v1.0/partslist.csv)
-
-
-### v0.2 ###
-
-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:
-
-<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
-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:
-
- * [schematic](v0.2/telemetrum.pdf)
- * [pcb artwork](v0.2/telemetrum.pcb.pdf)
- * [bill of materials](v0.2/partslist.csv)
-
-### v0.1 ###
-
-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>
-
-The differences between v0.1 and later boards were substantial:
-
-* 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