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Author Archives: R-B

PIC12F683 based battery charger

Posted on August 18, 2014 by R-B 2 comments

Here’s an Instructable about a DIY charger for car’s battery with an analog DC ammeter in the front panel. A PIC12F683-based control circuit is enclosed inside which adds some intelligence to this charger. The PIC MCU checks the terminal voltage of the battery being charged in every ten minutes using one of its analog inputs, and if it is found above a set threshold, the charging process is stopped. A relay switch is included into the circuit to connect/disconnect the charger output and the battery terminals.

PIC-based battery charger

Frequency measuring techniques

Posted on August 16, 2014 by R-B Leave a comment

Measuring input signal frequency is a common requirement in many applications like tachometer, frequency meter, tone detection, etc. The two classic approaches of frequency measurement are measure the number of cycles in a fixed period of time and measure the time of one cycle. This application note from Cypress discusses the advantages and limitations of these methods and also presents a hybrid approach along with a sample project enabling measurement of frequencies with a typical error of 0.0016% (16 ppm).

Frequency measurement demo

Ultrasonic distance measurements for parking-assistance systems in automotive

Posted on August 15, 2014 by R-B Leave a comment

Parking assistance systems are becoming a common feature in modern day cars to enhance safety and driver convenience. These systems use ultrasonic transducers and a microprocessor unit to compute the distance between the surrounding objects and car’s body. This application note from Cypress describes how to build an ultrasonic distance-measurement systems and provides a reference hardware design of a four-channel ultrasonic distance measurement system for parking-assistance applications.

Parking-assistance system design

OpenHardwareExG: An open source platform for ECG, EEG, EMG, ENG, and EOG signal processing

Posted on August 14, 2014 by R-B Leave a comment

The OpenHardwareExG project is aimed to develop an open source hardware and software platform for electrophysiologic signal processing applications, including ECG, EEG, EMG, ENG, and EOG. The current version of the design is based on an ADS1299 analog front end for capturing electrophysiologic signals and integrates an Arduino Due compatible microcontroller along with 5kV of reinforced isolation for safety.

OpenHardwareExG: An open source platform for electrophysiologic signal processing

Q&A concerning Microchip’s MCP79XXX RTC chips

Posted on August 13, 2014 by R-B Leave a comment

If your design contains Microchip’s MCP79XXX series RTC chips and you are running into troubles using them, this technical brief is intended to resolve several of the commonly-asked questions regarding developing stand-alone serial interface real-time clock/ calendar devices with MCP79XXX. Similarly, there’s also another application note from Microchip which provides detail assistance and guidance in using these RTC devices.

RECOMMENDED CONNECTIONS FOR MCP794XX SERIES
DEVICES

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