Recent content by Circuit

Whoa! Not at all! It is all a question of horses for courses. I have just been on the MicroMite forum recommending a member to look at PICAXE for an application which requires very low power and relatively simple operation of micro stepper motors. I keep a full range of PICAXE chips...

I recently upgraded for similar reasons. First message is that you should not be afraid of moving to USB-C /Thunderbolt 3 ports. I opted for an ASUS ZenBook; i7; 500GB SSD; 4K screen; 16GB RAM and so forth ...and no USB2/3 ports - just 3 USB-C ports. I connect to a lot of uncommon devices...

The Brother range of P-Touch label printers are excellent for labelling control panels. The simplest models of the printers are hand-held with built-in keyboards; the top of the range machines connect via USB to your computer and print on tapes up to 36mm wide and of effectively unlimited...

This was a most helpful pointer; when I tried the TBD62083A back in 2017 I was so impressed by the improved performance that I swapped over to using them exclusively (and I am left with piles of unused ULN2803s - I think I have around fifty sitting in drawer!). I mainly use them for firing...

The interface to the RC522 is straightforward; the code necessary to operate it is not. I have several RC522 now operational but not with PICAXE - which was my original intention - but with another system that is based on 32-bit PICs. It is quite a programming challenge to write PICAXE code...

Oh dear, I need to rethink... Well that is an embarrassing schoolboy error indeed. Okay, rather than delete my enquiry with sheer embarrassment, how about if I keep the same idea but connect the 10 K pull-ups to 12 volts+ve? And, of course, pull-ups on the receiving PICAXE pins. (Crikey, I am...

I need to send 8 lines of digital logic over some long wires; 20 to 100 metres perhaps, as part of a security system. PICAXEs will be at either end. The lines are in a domestic environment but may be passing a variety of other cables, mainly mains cables, washing machines and so forth, and...

Hence the parameter "Mean TIme Between Failures"...

A recent posting that covers some of these aspects with an input from Hippy on wiring and software; https://picaxeforum.co.uk/threads/08m2-eeprom-life-span.28641/ Edit; whoops! I see that you were asking a question there also.

Probably not directly useful to the questioner, but worth noting for others perhaps who may look to this issue; if there is a battery-backed DS1307 clock chip in the circuit then the RAM on that can be very useful for storing values between power-downs without fear of wearing the storage out as...

Hippy, that is a most welcome document - I have already reformatted it into an eight page .PDF and printed it as an A5 booklet, stapled and sitting on my desk ready for careful reading and further thought. Thank you for this excellent narrative. It would be excellent to see an update of the...

As a true RS232 signal swings +/-15 volts I would clamp the input voltage to the PICAXE Vcc with a couple of diodes and limit the current with a resistor as follows; If you look in PICAXE manual 3 page 44 it shows the "PICAXE recommended" handling of RS232.

I used Elements + and stacking with my Canon 5DIII before I bought the Panasonic ZD200 earlier this year. The focus stacking in the modified Photoshop works extremely well and this should serve you nicely; to work well, though, you need a pretty capable processor and lots of RAM otherwise the...

The TMC2103 drive can do what you want - it detects stall currents and will report back to the PICAXE chip; the downside is the 103 page datasheet! This is a challenging little chip to choose if you want to use the advanced features. Stalling stepper motors against end-stops without stall...

I am proposing to switch 12V AC at around 500mA using this a PICAXE in this configuration; This involves using the body diode of the MOSFET to conduct and I find it difficult to get full specs on the body diode from many MOSFET datasheets. Clearly, the maximum current capability of the body...