Moved

This blog moved to http://balloonblog.procknation.com

HAPB-3 Successful Launch and Recovery

Congratulations to Earl Foster and his wife on a successful launch and recovery (splash down!) of HAPB-3. Go to his HAPB-3 page to see the pictures and video of his recent flight.



When I first starting looking into this new hobby of mine described as high altitude ballooning I came across Earl Foster's HAPB site www.hapb.net. It wasn't till after I saw his pictures and videos of his first flight that I was real excited about ballooning. That day I downloaded ExpressSCH from ExpressPCB and started designing my first flight controller. I designed a piece o-crap the first time around. But since then I have learned a lot and I am on my fifth or sixth revision and am getting ready to build the first prototype. I keep checking out Earl's page to remind me how exciting it will be to launch my first balloon.

Thanks again and congratulations to Earl Foster.

Updated Schematic

Here is a new revision to the schematic. Had to add in a 1-Wire analog to digital converter. When I made the initial design I thought the BS2px had an ADC built in. The ADC converts the analog voltage output of the barometric sensor to an 8-bit digital value. I chose the DS2450 mainly for the I2C interface. The DS18B20 temperature sensors also use the 1-Wire interface which means the DS2450 and the DS18B20's can use the same bus. I also chose the DS2450 because it has four inputs to allow future addons for experiments or extra sensors.

I also rearranged the design a bit. I didn't fully read the docs on the BS2px and certain pins will only work for certain things such as synch and asynch serial, 1-wire, and I2C protocols.

Also, http://www.procknation.com/ is starting to come online. I finally found my old copy of Dreamweaver MX. As I get time I will be adding page content. But don't expect to much. I follow the Google model of web page building, less is better. I don't have a bunch of graphics or flash crap. Just the content.

Videos of Other High Altitude Balloons

Here are some videos from other people that have launched high altitude balloons.

Making Progress. Update 4-20-2008

Here is the proto version of the Basic Stamp 2px (blue chip), DS18B20 temperature sensors (little black things to the left of the blue chip), and connection to the GPS receiver (red and white wire on left to the top). The green chip on the right is a MAX1668 temperature monitor with 1 local and 4 remote sensors. Unfortunately I have not been able to get it to talk to the BS2px over the SMBUS, yet. After a little research I think I have figured out how to "bit-bash" the SMBUS protocol out of a synchronous connection from the BS2px but have not had the time to try to develop the code and test it.

There are some other components on there like the LED bars and resistors such that I am not using right now.

As for the main program code, things are going good. I got the DS18B20 sensors to talk using an I2C link. I also have the GPS data acquisition part working over a serial link. It took a while to figure out how to correctly parse the incoming data from the GPS receiver.

On Thursday I ordered the serial LCD panel, I2C EEPROM memory chips, and the atmospheric pressure sensor. I'll update again after I get those components working and post some pictures and maybe some video.

Prock-1 prelim working schematic

Here is the mostly working schematic for my balloon flight system. I am still working out how I want to preform the radio telemetry. Not all components have been labeled properly yet. I also still need to add the flashing exterior lights and a buzzer. But this is enough to get me going. As I said in one of my earlier posts, this project is going to take a while to get off the ground (pun intended) so I'm in no big hurry.


If you have any comments on how to improve the design below please let me know. I am not a professional circuit designer and only have half of a college degree in electrical engineering. Here is the source of the schematic. I used ExpressPCB's schematic software that you can get here.

Update 4-2008

The Ham radio book arrived last week and I have been reading it here and there. Seems pretty easy to follow. I'm still in the first few chapters and just now getting to what a frequency is. I can't wait to get through it all.I also ordered the Basic Stamp 2px microcontroller last week. It arrived on Tuesday. I have been to busy with work and the family to get to start playing with it. But luckily it is now the weekend. I will post later in the week on how it is going on the programming. More to follow.