Universal PICAXE Programming Board

 

I designed this board by myself and I plan to sell it. It can fit the PICAXE 08M - 14M -18x- 20x2 - 28x2.

 

It has switch to turn the power on and keep the reset to 5V. It also has ZIF socket so removing and placing PICAXEs are easy. Really fast if you want to program in a flash.

 

Requires 3AA batteries.

V.1

OUTDATED!

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V2.0

PICAXE.jpg

The 4k resistor is connected to power because it's basically the pull up resistor for the reset. I didn't know where to put it because the reset pin on the PICAXE-28 is the same as power for the rest of the chips. So I just connected it to power.

Tell me if there's something wrong with the wiring. It was really hard to incorporate all the chips onto one board! :P

 


 

New Board With Mounting Holes and jumper wire layout.

V2.1

PICAXE_2.jpg

 

 


 

Sorry Chirs. I couldn't make a switch to separate power and the reset. So that's why I put the 4k in the power supply.  I reconfigure the board and most of the stuff should work now.

V3.0

PICAXE_3_0.jpg

 


 

V3.1

smoothed out some 90 degree turns and eliminated one jumper wire.

After soo many tries. I think I got it!

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I had to redo this one more time because I missed 2 connections.

Where it says PICAXE 18. That is a switch that switches the serial in of all the other chips to serial out for the PICAXE-18. It was inconvenient because the PICAXE 18's serial out was the serial in of all the other chips.

I added the resonator for the PICAXE-28.

New power LED

 


V3.2

Thanks for tips from Geir Andersen, I shrunk the board a bit and repositioned some things. It saves space and money!

 


 

V4.0

With about a month of thinking. The Universal PICAXE Programming board is back. This time I have shrunk the board a little. I predict it’s about the size of a credit card. What’s left is to see if it can work with the 28x2 and the 18 series. I also added in one more SPDT switch that you must flick for the 28x2 in order to set pin1 to the pull up 4.7k resistor.

Hope you guys like this one!

 


 

V4.1

The board has been shrunken. But not that much.

 


 

On the road to becoming a real PCB!

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Ok. So while I was i bed, I was reminded by the thoughts of many people saying that it's a hassle to pull the PICAXE in and out. So I jumped out of my bed and added a special feature to the board.

So were I marked jumper wire out. There will be ports there. Kinda like these but longer. I will supply these nifty jumper wires. So if you need to program your PICAXE and you don't want to pull it out. Pull out the jumper wires, connect it to the board and the other side to you PICAXE.Great for debugging too.

Please note that when I finish my test board, it might not have this feature because I had this idea after I made the board. :P 

Now it's truly universal in interface.

 


 

Ok, right here I have drilled my holes:

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And after many months of planning and designing, the Universal PICAXE Programming Board is finally Complete!!!!

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There's a wire across one battery port because I couldn't find a 3AA battery holder. It still works with 6V the same way it works with 4.5. I have tested all the PICAXE's and they do work except for one right now. The 18M is giving me some problems. I have checked everything from settings on the programming to the connections on the board. The only conclusion I can see is that it's defective.


So while testing with the 18M, I found out it wasn't broken, the chip doesn't work when serial signals go into the outputs, So i found out that Output 0 and Output 1 were the culprits. The outputs ruin the serial signal. So I had to add these jumps were you connect and disconnect the path to the outputs. They are were the white boxes are.

So sad, the board got alittle fatter due to the run out of space.

 

Hmm… interesting idea… I

Hmm… interesting idea… I was thinking about some sort of universal “programmer” as I use 08m, 18x and 28x1 and 28x2 chips… If you could put in more detailes and pictures for people to see…

They are so easy to program

They are so easy to program in circuit, I’ve never seen the need for a seperate programming board.

Yes, usually it is the case,

Yes, usually it is the case, but sometimes you encounter such a projects that saving space of an audio jack and resistor can become a cornerstone. )) Or if you do not plan to reprogram Picaxe again a all…

Sure, I’ll try. Still trying

Sure, I’ll try. Still trying to change the board up a bit to fit them.

what makes this better than

what makes this better than the picaxe breadboard adapter and a breadboard?

You just plug it in and

You just plug it in and program. It’s easier than building it on the breadboard everytime you need to program.

Reset pull up resistor for

Reset pull up resistor for 18/28 devices? Resonator for 28X or 28/28A?

For the rest 10 bucks or more for two resistors and a 3 pin header resp. jack socket, dude?

I’m still working on it man.

I’m still working on it man. It’s just a start up board. 

It has a resonator and a

It has a resonator and a pull up reset resistor. It can also fit the PICAXE 20x2 and the 14M

So help me God… If you don’t add mounting holes…

Mounting holes. 4 of them… in the corners. --A little bigger than 1/8".

That was always my biggest beef with the 28 board and well, a lot of other boards. My Kingdom for some Mounting Holes!

Sure, I’ll add that. Thanks

Sure, I’ll add that. Thanks for the recommendation!

I think you have some extra traces there…

Are you only showing the top side --or only the bottom? I gotta be missing something, I think.

You seem to have a lot of extra traces, static vias and a bunch of stuff that should not be connected to any other stuff. And there are a few things sorta missing too.

If you don’t want to use

If you don’t want to use bootlodader, why don’t you use clean pics? Building suchadapter have sense then.

Have a look at RBBB

If you are adding mounting holes you might as well add a header row on each side of the Picaxe so there is a way to connect to the pins and use this as permanent project board, and not just as an programming socket.  
If you have room, a voltage regulator would be nice.

I would rethink this and maybe build it more like the RBBB http://www.moderndevice.com/products/rbbb-kit and design your board so the users can cut off programming jack (leaving the serial-in resistor in place).  Also have space for a voltage regulator that can be used or cut off.

I don’t understand what you

I don’t understand what you mean.

He means…

Blank pic chips. Assembly language. Not containing a bootloader.

Back to my question… What are all those extra traces and static vias? Some of the traces don’t even go to anything and some go to the wrong things. I don’t get it. What are all the extra traces and stuff?

Those are where jumper wires

Those are where jumper wires will go. I’m just about to upload a picture showing the holes and the jumper cables.

I would not sell this.

I would not sell this, you will end up with a lot of boards that don’t work. A few issues:

Pin1 and Pin4 are tied to Vcc. You will be driving an ADC high for no reason when you are using any of the bigger chips.

The resonator is not connected to the correct pins.

There is no current limiting resistor on the power LED.

Pin1 reset is tied directly to Vcc with no resistor

There is a 4k resistor on the main power coming in and this should not be.

Pin7 Serial out is connected to pin27 and should not be.

 

Also, when PCB’s are fabricated, you usally pay for sq. inches. It would be wise to shrink the overall footprint. If you simpy use a double sided board you can eleminate all those jumper wires. Acually, if you narrow the width of your traces, you could route the whole board single sided as the narrower traces will allow you to pass between pads. I think that’s all I saw.

 

Well this is the kind of

Well this is the kind of stuff you need to tell me so I can fix it and make it better so then I can sell it.