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What Arduino models do you use in your experiments? Poll is created on Dec 25, 2019

  
  
  
  
  
  

What Arduinos do you use?

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VE1DX
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Posted by: @robo-pi

If you're really good at it you can just go right down the line without skipping over every other pin.  I've done that too.  If things are working smoothly it should go really fast.  If you get to a pin that doesn't seem to want to heat up.  Just clean the tip.  Touch some fresh solder onto the tip, and go at it again.  I typically clean the tip and touch it with fresh solder every 3 or 4 pins.   That seems to work the best for me.   The tip will tend to accumulate old solder and you don't want that.  So clean the tip often you should be just fine.

IMG 4257
IMG 4258

You are a genius with your tips, James! I never soldered anything that small. I didn't try it with the STM32 series or to get the FTDI adapter going yet. I need to convince myself I could follow your instructions, and they were clear. I got it the first time with an Elegoo NANO clone. It's running Blink fine, so I am pretty sure I have it down. Now on to the "blue" and "black" pills.

You said you'd been doing this for years, and your instructions show it. The 4-corners first and "every second pin" were particularly useful. As you said, that guarantees alignment and minimizes overheating.

While this site is mostly Arduino, Pi and Robotics oriented, most members have excellent expertise in the basics of one area or the other. Some day you might have a question I can answer as well as you did mine! Thanks so much.

Paul VE1DX


   
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VE1DX
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IMG 4260

And more thasn just Blink . . . drop in replacement, as it should be!

 

Paul VE1DX


   
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Robo Pi
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I'm glad to hear my suggestions were helpful.   Without realizing it, you have actually inspired me to finally make a wooden stand for my soldering station.  This is something I've been wanting to do, and after our conversation I decided to go out in the wood shop and just build it.  So here it is:

Station (4)

It holds the main unit, and the soldering stand is also firmly attached to the base.   And I also fastened the tip cleaner on top so it is nice and sturdy too.  And lastly I made a dowel rod to hold the solder.   Now instead of having to grab a lot of separate pieces (or look for where they went), I can just grab the entire station in one fell swoop.  It's nice. ? 

Posted by: @ve1dx

Some day you might have a question I can answer as well as you did mine!

I have lots of questions so you'll have lots of opportunities.   You wouldn't happen to know how to calculate the decision boundary for a perceptron from the neural network weights would you?   I've been reading articles on how to do this, but I'm not having much success when it comes down to actually calculating the parameters for drawing the lines.

DroneBot Workshop Robotics Engineer
James


   
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VE1DX
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Posted by: @robo-pi

You wouldn't happen to know how to calculate the decision boundary for a perceptron from the neural network weights would you? 

I think one has to understand the question to answer it!  Seriously, I passed this on to my son who does somewhat complex modelling of the ocean and atmosphere, but he's run off his feet and likely won't respond.  However, hope springs eternal! ?  It may be something he's encountered.

Paul VE1DX


   
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VE1DX
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Posted by: @robo-pi

You wouldn't happen to know how to calculate the decision boundary for a perceptron from the neural network weights would you?   I've been reading articles on how to do this, but I'm not having much success when it comes down to actually calculating the parameters for drawing the lines.

He did respond, but I don't know if it's of any help. "Use a reticulated discriminator to identify the perception limit and then you have to choose a value of alpha (usually 0.5 is used here) and that gives you the result. There's probably more than one way to do it but that is the classic approach. I guess you have to hit the academic papers to sort out how that all works. t's an active area of research so I don't know if this has been distilled down to textbook techniques yet."

https://medium.com/@thomascountz/calculate-the-decision-boundary-of-a-single-perceptron-visualizing-linear-separability-c4d77099ef38

Paul VE1DX


   
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VE1DX
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Posted by: @robo-pi

Without realizing it, you have actually inspired me to finally make a wooden stand for my soldering station.  This is something I've been wanting to do, and after our conversation I decided to go out in the wood shop and just build it.

The stand for the soldering station looks great.  Much of my stuff is spread all over the place, falling on the floor and usually missing to the point I need to look for an hour to find it.  Then I ask my wife, and she says, "That thing laying there?" while pointing at whatever I can't find.  I guess there are none so blind as those who cannot see.  I really should create something like you did.

Paul VE1DX


   
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Robo Pi
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Posted by: @ve1dx

The stand for the soldering station looks great.   I really should create something like you did.

It was well worth it.  Something I should have done the day it arrived!   It didn't take that long to build and it's much easier to use this way as well as being more easily portable.   It was well worth the hour or so it took to build it.

Posted by: @ve1dx

He did respond, but I don't know if it's of any help.

I actually already read the article you linked to.    In fact, that is one of the more succinct articles on how to do it.   Unfortunately it isn't working for me.   Although this could be a problem elsewhere in my code.  I have code that calculates both the weights and the decision boundary.    I confess that I've been quite confused on it as it seemed to work in some cases but not in others.   It could be other parts of my program that are causing the problems.   I actually haven't worked on that specific program in a while because I was getting to frustrated with the failures.   Maybe if I go back and look at it now things will click better.

DroneBot Workshop Robotics Engineer
James


   
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VE1DX
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Posted by: @zeferby

Remember to include the STM into the Arduino IDE Preferences/Additional Boards Manager URLs :

Posted by: @robo-pi

Just be aware that some pins and signals may be on different pins.  Have a pinout chart handy

Thanks, fellows! You both saved me a ton of headaches. I have an STM32F103C8T6 working well. I'm using USB interface to program it right now, but the FTDI module does look better and simple to get going. I want to benchmark the new system with a few sketches first. You guys know your stuff.  ? 


   
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Robo Pi
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@ve1dx

Just another tip on how to preserve soldering tips,....

When you are all done soldering and you're going to put the soldering station away for a while.  Load the soldering tip up with some molten solder before turning it off.   That layer of solder on the tip will actually protect the tip from corroding in the air.   If you actually clean the tip  off of all solder before turning it off, that will leave the tip exposed to air while the soldering station is just sitting around.  The surface of the tip will oxidize in the air. Then the next time you get the soldering iron out it may not perform as well as it did when new.   So load it up with molten solder before shutting down the iron.  This way when you get it out the next time only the surface of that old solder will be oxidized, but the tip underneath will remain as pristine as new.

This will make your tips last a lot longer.

DroneBot Workshop Robotics Engineer
James


   
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VE1DX
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@zeferby and @robo-pi

This with the "blue pill" and an old computer speaker.

Paul VE1DX


   
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Robo Pi
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@ve1dx

Now you're a blue pill expert. ? ? ? 

I'll soon be picking your brain for tips and tricks on how to program an STM32.

DroneBot Workshop Robotics Engineer
James


   
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VE1DX
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