Eggfinder Quantum Troubleshooting

Time to grab a beer and meditate.

WiFi works great.
Connected ematches to test.
Top page starts off disarmed (good).
Drogue shows a red off (no continuity?)
Main shows silver on (even though I haven't armed?)
Arming code just beeps, but stays disarmed.
Go to test page.
Try testing main. Counts down, but doesn't fire.
Try testing drogue. Counts down and DOES fire even though main page showed red off.

I need to flash to v 1.02. Only saw something relevant there about a false off for the main, but mine showed on, so that's not an issue.

Save me, beer!

Yep, built two Eggtimers successfully, but that was enough for me. Sold 'em. Headaches and self-doubt just not worth it. Commercial alts for me.

I like the challenge. Plus I love the feature set.

Send Cris an email at [email protected]. I've always found him quick to reply. He will help you get things squared away.

mccordmw said:

Time to grab a beer and meditate.

WiFi works great.
Connected ematches to test.
Top page starts off disarmed (good).
Drogue shows a red off (no continuity?)
Main shows silver on (even though I haven't armed?)
Arming code just beeps, but stays disarmed.
Go to test page.
Try testing main. Counts down, but doesn't fire.
Try testing drogue. Counts down and DOES fire even though main page showed red off.

I need to flash to v 1.02. Only saw something relevant there about a false off for the main, but mine showed on, so that's not an issue.

Save me, beer!

Click to expand...

What do you have the channels set at in the Global Settings page, and on the individual channels' pages?

Here's what it's set up as. No ematches are connected when looking at this setup.

Put in ematches and got this screen.



Typing the code won't arm it. Just beeps 3 times.

Ooh. The optoisolator that is on the left looks like one connection might not have been soldered. Might that be involved in main deployment? Regardless, I'll touch it up. Spot checking, I don't see any crossover solders.

I touched up the leg on the optoisolator that looked poorly connected. On test, both the main and drogue will now fire. However, on the main page, the drogue still showed a red OFF, and I was unable to arm with the codes. I'll try flashing the chip to v1.02. I thought that bug was in main status display which prevented arming.

After test firing, the main channel did properly now show a red OFF status due to the loss of continuity from the fired ematch.

Woo. Looks like it's fixed. I carefully looked at all the contacts in the optoisolators. There was one more leg on the center optoisolator that looked like it had a good blob of solder, but it appeared to be entirely on top without contacting the pad. I touched that up carefully. The main page now shows all statuses as ON for continuity. The arming code also worked. It successfully armed.

Then I checked the flight data. Shows No LDA (as I would expect) for flight #1.

Tests pop both main and drogue ematches.

Arming makes it beep once briefly when the data is sent.
Then 3 long beeps.
About 5 or seconds later, it starts a 1 second heartbeat beeping while armed. I supposed that's an alert that the system is armed.

I need to refresh the page to see the disarm option. Once doing that, the code returns the system to disarmed status and it then just beeps once a minute when it send the updated arming code.

Seem about right to me.

Second difficult soldering project successfully done.

Soldering those optoisolators are really tough! Even after inspecting post-solder, turns out I still had two incomplete connections. It took using a 20x jeweler's glasses kit and very close inspection to get them right. Can't stress enough how careful you gotta be at this step. The rest isn't too tough.

I wish those optoisolators had normal J-leads instead of the stubby ones that they have, I don't know why Fairchild chose to make them like that. Even with an automated process it's going to be harder to solder... it's easier for the leads to be bent up away from the board and not make contact. I wish they had a lower profile too, but almost all optoisolators are pretty tall for a SMT part. Your best bet is to flow enough solder on the pad so that it wicks up the leg, then you know you got it.

Built 3. One has an overheating 3.3V regulator chip. The Wifi chip gets warm and the VR (voltage regulator) gets cooking hot. Board inspection is perfect except........... The WiFi chip is flush mounted. I believe that perhaps some solder might have wicked under and followed the masking tape and is shorting a couple of pads. Remedy? Leave a little space between the board and the chip. The third build went like a charm. First was fine too and I had a pile of solder bridges.
I don't usually experience that but recognized them immediately each time I had them. Startup was fine once finished.

To dixontj93060. The EggTimer has a very basic interface. If one doesn't feel comfortable it will be daunting. I do find that the instructions are quite clear but one has to take the time to read them and practice at the bench.
I for one think the programming interface for the commercial Raven is extremely daunting and the instructions are spotty for doing anything other than a simple dual deploy. Rudimentary airstarting/staging with a Raven? Good luck if
one doesn't have a mentor to directly help out. If one wants to do that with an EggTimer, the information (easy to understand) is in the manual if one wishes to take the time to read it. Again, one thing about the EggTimer is the rudimentary
interface that one needs to practice with. If one wants totally care-free, stick to a rudimentary DD device that is commercially available. Kurt

That's why I did the Quantum, had a lot of people that didn't like the interface. WiFi/browser is SO easy to deal with... plus the processor has 32x the amount of flash program memory than the "Classic" Eggtimer, there will be more enhancements coming in the future that I could never do with the Eggtimer because there's no flash left.

cerving said:

I wish those optoisolators had normal J-leads instead of the stubby ones that they have, I don't know why Fairchild chose to make them like that. Even with an automated process it's going to be harder to solder... it's easier for the leads to be bent up away from the board and not make contact. I wish they had a lower profile too, but almost all optoisolators are pretty tall for a SMT part. Your best bet is to flow enough solder on the pad so that it wicks up the leg, then you know you got it.

Click to expand...

I read this instructable site on micro-soldering.

https://www.instructables.com/id/hand-soldering-teeny-tiny-chips!/?ALLSTEPS

There's a good step there that would help with these optoisolators. First, flip the optoisolator and tin the bottoms of the small J-leads. Then heat the pads to attach. I'll bet that would make life much easier with soldering these on. Good tip to pass on.

mccordmw said:

I read this instructable site on micro-soldering.

https://www.instructables.com/id/hand-soldering-teeny-tiny-chips!/?ALLSTEPS

There's a good step there that would help with these optoisolators. First, flip the optoisolator and tin the bottoms of the small J-leads. Then heat the pads to attach. I'll bet that would make life much easier with soldering these on. Good tip to pass on.

Click to expand...

Or tin the pad of one of them first, tack down and have at it with the rest. Kurt

Some parts just aren't meant to be hand-soldered, but j-leaded SOIC's don't fall into that category. 3mm-square parts with all bottom-facing pads do, however... that's why I pre-mount the baro sensors. In theory you COULD hand solder them if the PC board's pads were oversized and you tinned both the pads on the part and on the board, but you'd be lucky to get all of the pads soldered completely, and there's pretty much no way to inspect the solder joints. The reflow oven works almost 100% of the time... I haven't got a board back yet with a bad baro sensor connection.

Sorry, but I have to say the idea of "quantum troubleshooting" is an interesting one. I guess we all do that, try to stop problems before they happen, or don't.