9 replies to this topic

[iced98lx]

While working on my lighting project tonight, I pulled a good one, fried $60 worth of hardware, figured I'd share so everyone can have a laugh.

 

Back story: Hooking up netduino plus 2 to control a series of LDD-H drivers from meanwell via PWM. 

 

Have netduino working great, playing with PWM on the onboard LED, feeling good. Get my driver boards from China, source my drivers, have my LED's and a 48v power supply. Solder everything up, going to use an adafruit PWM expansion board as I need 15 channels. Figure I'll play with the onboard available channels as I only need 5 to prototype for now. I Start hooking up, get to the part where I tie the drivers to the board. PWM to PWM, no problem. Doesn't work.

 

What am I missing??

 

A common Ground!!

 

 

I'm an electronics newbie, I admit it. I google around and it appears that I need to tie the (-) on the drivers to the grnd on the board. Easy peasy, already have ground from the board on the breadboard, just need to tie it in.

 

Here is a tip: don't choose the VOUT pin of a driver to tie it in, that's the WRONG ONE.

 

Choose the (-) from the power supply that is going to the vin(-) of the drivers. 

 

Results of hitting the wrong pin: Fried Driver, Fried Netduino plus 2. Now I get to wait for 2 days for my new N+2 to arrive

 

[Chris Walker]

iced98lx, Ouch. That's no fun at all. A moment of silence please, to mourn our fallen friend. The upside is that you and others learned something new. BTW, this sounds interesting. What is your final project going to look like? Be safe, Chris

[iced98lx]

iced98lx, Ouch. That's no fun at all. A moment of silence please, to mourn our fallen friend. The upside is that you and others learned something new. BTW, this sounds interesting. What is your final project going to look like? Be safe, Chris

 

It's an aquarium controller, take temp, ph etc and log to my webserver, control a few outlets based on conditions and control 15 channels of LED's based on time of day and some other factors. I'm using LDD-H Series drivers from meanwell (great drivers until you fry them) and 100w  LED multi-chips with 5 independent channels on each chip.  What I like is that the drivers are obviously powered on their own, so no need to worry about pulling power, just a PWM signal from the N+2. Obviously you still need a common ground plane, which is where I caught myself up by attaching things quickly in an attempt to test instead of thinking logically.  V(-) in, not AFTER the driver. *sigh* 

 

Thank goodness I can get the N+2 on amazon prime! Free 2day shipping FTW.

 

Seriously silly and obvious error on my part, so always good to share with others and move on.

[iced98lx]

Woops, and look, another error on my part, meant this to go in the N+2 forum. 

 

I think I'll stop tinkering tonight before I break something more expensive.

[Stefan]

 My sincere condolences for your loss. I know the feeling of frying hardware, no fun

[Gutworks]

I shed a tear this morning reading your post. I have yet to lose a loved one in such a way, but I'm sure that day will come. To commemorate this sad occasion I thought I'd pen something for its tombstone. 
 

 

 

Sad Regards,

Steve

[Stanislav Husár]

I shed a tear this morning reading your post. I have yet to lose a loved one in such a way, but I'm sure that day will come. To commemorate this sad occasion I thought I'd pen something for its tombstone. 
 

 

 

Sad Regards,

Steve

Nice. How you made it?

[Gutworks]

Nice. How you made it?

With a big piece of rock, hammer, and a chisel. 

 

...and perhaps a touch of Photoshop magic. 

[Verdris]

I've fried some tiny MSOP parts this way. I never knew such a small chip could smoke so much.

[iced98lx]

Replacement N+2 arrived today so all is well. Need to get the latest firmware on and start coding tonight!