Category Archives: Projects

SUNDAR update

Posted on December 2, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

It has been a while since I last posted and a lot has happened in the meantime. I will not bore you with Thanksgiving celebrations, but I will let you know the last few weekends have not been my own. … Continue reading →

Posted in FIRST LEGO League, SUNDAR | Comments Off

SUNDAR upgrade parts

Posted on October 31, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

I just got in the mail today the parts I ordered for the SUNDAR upgrade. I am a very happy camper. The stepper motor I purchased was a little ‘5V’ 200 step unit from Pololu. To this I added a … Continue reading →

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SUNDAR upgrades

Posted on October 29, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

After I have proven to myself that I have a good chance to get a solar compass to work for AVC, I started to look at improvements. The first would have to be miniaturization. Currently the system is very bulky, … Continue reading →

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It works (SUNDAR)

Posted on October 26, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

I finally got some free time at the same time the sun was visible to take the SUNDAR outside. I took it out on my deck and hoping for the best, turned it on. Here is an output from the … Continue reading →

Posted in SUNDAR | 1 Comment

Out of town

Posted on October 21, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

I got called out of town for a week. Did not get a chance to start testing the SUNDAR. And now by the time I get home it is dark. Testing will have to wait till the weekend. Grrrrr.

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A hope for the SUNDAR

Posted on October 3, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

Last night I started end to end testing of my solar compass. The pre-amp, amplifier, AGC, and digitizer circuits all seem to work. The code for computing Azimuth also seems to work in a lab environment. So far so good. … Continue reading →

Posted in AVC, SUNDAR | Comments Off

SUNDAR Update

Posted on October 1, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

After etching the pre-amp board and populating it with parts, my quick test showed that the device did not work. No smoke, but no amplification either. And then some personal issues came up that I had to take care of. … Continue reading →

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uBlock LEA-6H GPS arrived!

Posted on September 21, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

I placed an order for a uBlock LEA-6H GPS from Hobby King some time ago only to find out it was back ordered. I got my email on a list to let me know when they came in. A few … Continue reading →

Posted in AVC, uBlock LEA-6H | 2 Comments

Drilling and populating the SUNDAR PCB

Posted on September 10, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

Last night I stopped at Harbor Freight and picked up a ‘set’ of solid carbide drills. To call them a set is a silly as each package has 20 random sized bits. But since the packaging is clear, you can … Continue reading →

Posted in FIRST LEGO League, Robotic DVD burner, SUNDAR | 1 Comment

SUNDAR PCB using Press-and-Peel

Posted on September 9, 2013 by Skye Sweeney

I was unwilling to send out the PCB for the SUNDAR radar head to a fab house. I only need one and why spend precious money that I could use elsewhere. So I tried out the Press-and-Peel method for etching … Continue reading →