--- /dev/null
+[[!tag tags/rockets]]
+Keith and I have been plugging away for the last couple weeks
+turning on and testing the various
+bits of [TeleMetrum](http://altusmetrum.org/TeleMetrum),
+and I can now very happily report that we have all the hardware
+working! Amazingly, we got almost everything right in the
+hardware design. Only two things need to be changed.
+
+We need to be able to control the chip select line on the the SPI
+non-volatile memory chip, which means we need one more GPIO line to it
+from the processor. To free up a line, we gave up the ability to put
+the accelerometer in to self test mode. Two trace cuts and two jumpers
+to the current board implement this change.
+
+The last thing we got working just this evening was the ability to sense
+the presence of an ejection charge igniter. We need another resistor in
+each of the two sense circuits to form a voltage divider so that we don't
+overload the ADC input. Not sure how we missed that in our many design
+reviews! Oh well. To ensure robust ignition of the electric matches
+we prefer to use for ejection charges, we charge a 1000uF cap to a voltage
+higher than our ADC inputs can handle. Fixing this problem on the current
+boards requires changing the values of two resistors, then tacking extra
+resistor to one end of each of the existing ones and then wiring the other
+ends of the new resistors to ground. Since the resistors in question are
+all 0402 surface mount parts, this is a royal pain... but with my finest
+dental-pick soldering iron tip, and working under the inspection
+microscope, it is indeed possible.
+
+Alternatively, if the ability to sense igniter continuity isn't important,
+just leaving off R14 and R15 at least prevents the 3.3V processor from going
+whacko due to having 5V applied to two ADC inputs!
+
+I'm really impressed at how well these first two boards reflow soldered in the
+electric skillet in my basement came out. Getting the right amount of solder
+paste on the board is something I'm likely to get better at with practice,
+but so far we've only had a few (very obvious during inspection) shorts to
+clean up, and a couple poorly soldered pins. All in all, I couldn't be
+happier with how this has gone... and I'm really looking forward to flying
+one of these boards sometime soon as an auxiliarly payload to gather some
+initial flight data!