System Blue order status (10.3.2020)

[Rom44]

I would also be interested.

[MackJsy]

Hi,
I've had a look at the cover your area to register, however my country isn't in the list!
Jersey - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey
Country code
Alpha2 : JE
Alpha3 : JEY

Regards
Mack

[KoSmO]

I want to order Blue model


Wysłane z iPhone za pomocą Tapatalk

[Chris56000]

I've just registered on Check My Area and I am currently ranked "9991 of 9993".

Am I correctly registered as an interest for a System Blue, and can you tell me how much I need to save in order to buy the kit when I get the invitation to order please?

I am a trained Electronics Repair Engineer with over 40 years experience and I have no problems with surface–mount assembly/repair and rework!

Do enclosures come ready cut/machined and labelled?

My location is Walsall, West Midlands, United Kingdom

Chris Williams

[mendip_defender]

I've just registered on Check My Area and I am currently ranked "9991 of 9993".

Am I correctly registered as an interest for a System Blue, and can you tell me how much I need to save in order to buy the kit when I get the invitation to order please?

I am a trained Electronics Repair Engineer with over 40 years experience and I have no problems with surface–mount assembly/repair and rework!

Do enclosures come ready cut/machined and labelled?

My location is Walsall, West Midlands, United Kingdom

Chris Williams

It may take some time are there are some issues getting some of the parts for the boards and the cost of producing them has shot up as well.

For an idea of the kit see how I setup mine.

https://blog.jackstringer.co.uk/misc/202...lightning/

[gadis]

Dear all,

here are the layout files for system red:

https://www.blitzortung.org/Compendium/L...SystemRed/

There are currently extreme bottlenecks in procuring the components for the blue system. We will therefore not be able to offer circuit boards for System Blue again until the third quarter of this year at the earliest.

/Egon

Hello, I want to do System red with a friend.
The provided files do not have complete paths. Can you share the finished Eagle files? Will you then add my system red to the map?

[tonuonu]

Hello everyone, sorry for problems with ordering hardware.

With permission of Egon I have few brand new boards for sale. I try to keep this simple to myself - price to be paid 300 EUR to my IBAN account and I can ship them inside EU only worldwide (except sanctioned countries like Russia). I can issue 0% VAT invoice if needed. Please write to my mail tonusamuel@icloud.com, not here. 

Egon asked me to take care of hardware ordering and test batch of 10pcs of boards been fabricated and most of them used internally. I include photo of one of these boards. It has minor differences to previous versions which should not affect functionality you need. Each board has less or more manual soldering. This is due to fact that factory often lacks components and I simply order them separately and solder myself. All boards have latest stable firmware (currently 9.4) installed and most likely are already registered as a station to test if they actually work. But you simply can re-register them under your account.
In case of any quality issue it will be my responsibility to solve.

   

Ferrite antennas can be bought from https://www.ferrite-rod-antennas.de/ separately. 

EDIT: Whoever sends me private messages - usually your own messages are disabled. This is forum default and I cannot respond you. Also please note I been asking to write to e-mail.

I have ten more boards arrived and I have to finish some soldering and testing them. But now I mostly have 10 more.

   Tõnu

[cutty]

...
I have ten more boards arrived and I have to finish some soldering and testing them. But now I mostly have 10 more.

   Tõnu

Ok.  Let's Update this hardware thing .
Tonu was thoughtful enough to provide me with one of these boards for eval and feedback, a Blue sys based on the Blue 19.5 production, calling itself 19.7, but recognized currently as a 19.5 by the Blue Servers... This system is definitely one to consider... if/when it's actually available for order.... this particular version looks good on initial testing, without active data as yet...  It has not received or sent its "First Light" er... "First Lightning". That will come as soon as I can fabricate 'wheelies' for it, and get H fields online.  E probe will wait till last...



NOTES -- FYI
This controller board came with some very nice 'feet' attached, clear silicone. Good idea. Stands the board off ±4mm
A. C519, C520 -- 1000µF/16v-- these suckers are ±20mm tall.
Board's Feet + tall caps greatly influenced my case build concerns.
Required  case height of about 36mm high for my material....and DEFINITELY added to expense of installing the
(B) 'optional' SMA jacks and adequate adapters to extend through cover.
My single M-to-F adapters need to have another M-F stacked on top, and since they're so blamed hard to find, my extras won't be here for another week or two... I mean, M-F RP versions are all over the place, but 'standard' M-F... at really reasonable costs...??? don't really want to talk about it.
That won't affect most folks, since that's an option, but I really like having that O-Scope handy...

C. Serial and swd blocks are now optional? (not installed) Not a bad idea, leaving them off. Add 'em if you want 'em

D. Reset/Boot buttons weren't installed...???

E. No E probe connector block.  NOW, the Eprobe block has been a bit problematic for some over the various versions, and the 'on-board' probe size and design appears changed from what I had on my original 19.1 pre-release... I'm saving this.. don't have time for it right now... hmmm..

F. And of course, those optional digital filter ics are not included.

FIRST Impression nit-picking...
...This board uses the 'deprecated', troublesome, and much maligned USB-MINI connector for USB Power.  I suspect that may be upgraded???
...The height of C519-C520 ... no big deal for most of us... those are quite necessary on the 5V usb power input.
...Puzzled why the reset/boot switches were omitted....
...Query the use of 'open' RJ45 jacks on Controller and H preamp... Contamination? Noise?  Do appear to be shield grounded, however.
...Coax connectors come with a 'ground' tab.  Now, knowing how some minds function, if there's a tab, must be necessary to connect something to it.  NOT SO... These are common SYSTEM grounds, NOT EARTH.  Your 5V usb power supply  theoretically has no 'earth' connection, isolated output. We've gone to great lengths to isolate earth loops, noise, etc... on System BLUE, even keeping the Analog Chain on a virtual rail, once signals enter the controller... no EARTH ground should be necessary! That may even be unsafe, if running Eprobe outside! The E probe coax shield is ALSO system common... DON'T take it to Earth! Leave the system 'above earth'! 
This is exactly why we say 'use UN-Shielded' RJ-45 cable from Controller IP to your network/ router/modem, whatever.  Don't bring ground references into conflict.  USE SHIELDED cable from controller to H preamp... backs up the SYSTEM common to help improve S/N conditions....

...yeah, I realize that is REALLY nit-picking, but in general, us old timers on BT know how confusing some of this might be... we've been down those roads, and designed the tee shirts.


Soon to join it's ancestors on the Blitz Wall...



Cheers!
Mike

[mwaters]

Very good, Mike and Tõnu! :-)

Are these boards going to be available mostly populated, as Egon's boards were?

[tonuonu]

I been populating everything I can, so I can actually check if board works or not. 

Those tall capacitors - Can simply omitted. Boards work well for me without them and  I shipped first boards without them. Later I started to worry about possible edge cases when devices work in extreme cold and decided to add them just in case. Ones installed are very high quality automotive capacitors which are rated 10,000 hours at 105 degrees celsius. Anyway boards are known to work without them well. My own boards do not have them.

In general when something is not installed, I considered it as "not needed". For example why one needs reset button? When I took this hardware project, I knew that building these boards was too expensive and I was looking for anything I can remove without losing functions I considered necessary. Me with some other people run big amount of detectors and we care about price and simplicity. Things like oscilloscope buffers we prefer to save on. 

Never used serial option and SWD is also not needed because I flash initial firmware in via USB now. In electronics all these sockets, buttons etc are expensive and tend to contribute big share to total cost. 

E-probe connector is missing because it is expensive and unnecessary (again based on my subjective opinion). Antenna is embedded into board and it just works.  Meanwhile I kept such option available. I would instead recommend solder wire to board for cost reasons if such wire is needed. Cutty understands analog electronics better than I do, so i hope he corrects me.

My work is related to improving existing design, making it cheaper to produce. Reducing number of different components reduces assembly costs. Some things need to be changed. Micro USB connectors are more reliable and cheaper than Mini-USB we have until now. 

Because of massive amount of tiny changes every new revision of board is ordered in 2pcs. Then it takes time to receive them, test them, then unknown amount of four letter words I order new batch of 2pcs, test them etc. Not willing to build high expectations, so I keep mute about progress. All I want to say, I work on all this. Not only boards but on anything I can do about project. Everything takes some time and money. Been also looking on ways to build cheaper antennas, casing which would fit my usual needs etc. Armed with experience running dozens of devices for years I hope to build newer, slightly improved version for public use in future.

[cutty]

I been populating everything I can, so I can actually check if board works or not. 

Those tall capacitors - .........

In general when something is not installed, I considered it as "not needed". .............
Never used serial option and SWD is also not needed because I flash initial firmware in via USB now. In electronics all these sockets, buttons etc are expensive and tend to contribute big share to total cost. 

E-probe connector is missing because it is expensive and unnecessary (again based on my subjective opinion). Antenna is embedded into board and it just works.  .,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
My work is related to improving existing design, making it cheaper to produce. Reducing number of different components reduces assembly costs. Some things need to be changed. Micro USB connectors are more reliable and cheaper than Mini-USB we have until now. 

Because of massive amount of tiny changes every new revision of board is ordered in 2pcs. Then it takes time to receive them, test them, then unknown amount of four letter words I order new batch of 2pcs, test them etc. Not willing to build high expectations, so I keep mute about progress. All I want to say, I work on all this. Not only boards but on anything I can do about project. Everything takes some time and money. Been also looking on ways to build cheaper antennas, casing which would fit my usual needs etc. Armed with experience running dozens of devices for years I hope to build newer, slightly improved version for public use in future.

I agree... Those two big caps would help, however, with the wide cross section of power supplies, in my opinion.  Dries reminded me Polymers would be smaller form factor, better ESR etc, if a tad more expensive... we work hard to keep noise, stable operation.  This might be a cross between 'board' expense, and issues these could help resolve.

Oh, RESET is one of the HANDIEST tools I have, won't go into it right now, but...!!!  And there have been several instances where the 'boot' buttons have been the ONLY way to recover a system!

MEANTIME... IT OCCURRED TO ME:
... these last few posts, and the encouraging forward movement of the 'network' and hardware, are moving into a stage of 'redevelopment', and the 'next generation' might require a more 'private' discussion area...
so... I've moved these last few posts into '2023 Developing' restricted internally.... if you're currently authorized (access restricted) you can access it at
https://forum.blitzortung.org/forumdisplay.php?fid=47
We might progress better in 'redefining' new hardware, etc, here.?

[Egon]

I been populating everything I can, so I can actually check if board works or not. 

Those tall capacitors - Can simply omitted. Boards work well for me without them and  I shipped first boards without them. Later I started to worry about possible edge cases when devices work in extreme cold and decided to add them just in case. Ones installed are very high quality automotive capacitors which are rated 10,000 hours at 105 degrees celsius. Anyway boards are known to work without them well. My own boards do not have them.

In general when something is not installed, I considered it as "not needed". For example why one needs reset button? When I took this hardware project, I knew that building these boards was too expensive and I was looking for anything I can remove without losing functions I considered necessary. Me with some other people run big amount of detectors and we care about price and simplicity. Things like oscilloscope buffers we prefer to save on. 

Never used serial option and SWD is also not needed because I flash initial firmware in via USB now. In electronics all these sockets, buttons etc are expensive and tend to contribute big share to total cost. 

E-probe connector is missing because it is expensive and unnecessary (again based on my subjective opinion). Antenna is embedded into board and it just works.  Meanwhile I kept such option available. I would instead recommend solder wire to board for cost reasons if such wire is needed. Cutty understands analog electronics better than I do, so i hope he corrects me.

My work is related to improving existing design, making it cheaper to produce. Reducing number of different components reduces assembly costs. Some things need to be changed. Micro USB connectors are more reliable and cheaper than Mini-USB we have until now. 

Because of massive amount of tiny changes every new revision of board is ordered in 2pcs. Then it takes time to receive them, test them, then unknown amount of four letter words I order new batch of 2pcs, test them etc. Not willing to build high expectations, so I keep mute about progress. All I want to say, I work on all this. Not only boards but on anything I can do about project. Everything takes some time and money. Been also looking on ways to build cheaper antennas, casing which would fit my usual needs etc. Armed with experience running dozens of devices for years I hope to build newer, slightly improved version for public use in future.

Dear all,

I think a reset button is very important to initiate a restart without switching off the power supply for all components.

My first test action on a board is always a reset and observing the LEDs, which should all light up when starting, as well as the beep that should be heard. The price for a button is 5 cents including VAT.

Mini-Taster 12x12 4.3mm LoC

The serial port is also very important. Information about the detector is continuously output there, which can be externally recorded and analysed to find errors.

I also have some concerns about leaving out certain electronic components. For example, the electrolytic capacitors are very important for the stability of the power supply. Under ideal conditions, the board will certainly work without the capacitors. However, it becomes vulnerable to voltage peaks and voltage drops.

I don't think it's a good idea to leave out components by the reason "look, it still works". The resulting problems are not always immediately apparent. With this reasoning, I could also remove a large number of components from my television.

/Egon

[cutty]

see above
Ah, a man after my own heart...

...copied Egon to the new internal board...

[cutty]

SO....
To redirect back to this THREAD'S original topic, ///
ANY posts or queries NOT related to 'Order Status' from here on will either be moved to a more applicable thread, to the new internal restricted  '2023 developing' thread, if applicable, or just deleted...