dfinitski / n7ddc-atu-100-mini-and-extended-boards Goto Github PK

Hi all,

I'm really sorry but looking on search engines I wasn't able to find any information about the difference on the two processors implementation. I'm certain that somewhere there will surely be a lot of discussions on this matter but I didn't find them. Please, offering in advance my apologies, is anybody here that can tell me something about ?

Thanks all in advance

Pino, IK2HEW

Is wire gauge critical? 10:1 ok, but what wire diameter?

I have ATU100 extended SMD and works fine. What I miss is setup for QRP needs. Sensitivity for working from 1W to max. 20W. Setup min. power in firmware bellow 05 cause unexpected results as is already described in manual. Is there solution adding extra windings on PWR/SWR core or something else?
Additionally I have issue using OLED 091 because it is not turn on always when I turn power up. In my case every tenth time shows up. I have no experiences using other suggested displays.
Thanks in advance.

73, Marko, S54AM

Hi
I biuld Atu 100 7x7 external board few days ago. Its so fast and small atu. I discover some problem. When i tune on any frequecy, and i try make some qso and start talking atu after few secunds swtch to Bypass mode and antena not in tune, SWR rise, after another few secunds back to normal and working like this in loop. I no idea where is some problem.

Thanks

Hi,
Here can I find the v3.2 PIC source code? Also, how to burn a now firmware to the pic?

Hi,

I've recently built one of the kits and it's all been going well until today. I am driving it from a KX3 with 10w output and found that the tuning could hang if the power went below 5, possibly due to the KX3 reducing power out to protect itself. To resolve this I've change the EEPROM address 5 from 5 to 1 and it seemed to be much happier.

I was using it to tune an antenna on 24Mhz and was half way through a CW QSO when the fuse on my power supplt blew and the shack filled with 'an interetsing smell'! On investigation then only damage seems to be C27 or C26 that has blown. The ATU still works, I can enter test mode and cycle through the L and C values.

Any advice or replacing the cap would be appreciated, do I need a better rated cap?

Many thanks for any advice you can give.

Martin
G0PJO

I completed the kit I just bought the problem is when the voltage is released, the contact stays off and one does not release back so I cannot adjust the swr setting everything was done correctly please help

I'm curious why you have not used flyback protection diodes across the relays and have instead used a 1uF capacitor

Was this to fix some specific problem, e.g chattering or perhaps noise spikes ?

David,
I received my new ATU-100 and it indicated it was programmed with version 3.2. I put it online and it booted in Auto Mode. Did a couple of tunes on 40 and 20 meters at low power. Worked OK. Once I ran a tune I increased the power to 100 watts in CW. The unit at this level tried to do a tune again as I could see the VSWR jump on the Ameritron Swr meter and could hear the relays being manipulated. Every time I keyed the transmitter it would try and retune at this high power level. It would fine a tune and stop tuning. Then I noticed that the period was gone on the display and the unit had taken itself out of auto tune. I have not experienced this in version 3.0. Since there is only one button on this unit I could see some one getting a tad irritated. I'm going to open up the unit and get a look at the construction and also get a copy of the firmware installed. Just thought you might want to know. Not a big deal here as I plan on using one of the earlier versions. I believe the unit came from China.

Steve W8TTY

I have just received my ATU-100 extended kit but it did not have instructions with it.

I have read the manual and looked at the schematic but nowhere can I find whether the winding direction of inductors L2/L3 and L4/L5 is important - I assume that it is. Additionally the transformer T1/T2 (for 100 watts) is 1:10 but no mention is made of what the primary winding T1 should be or instead what the secondary T2 should be. The picture of the board on GITHUB seems to indicate the primary is several turns but the secondary does not seem to be 10 times that. Could you please clarify if possible

Hello David, hello list,

thanks for the nice ATU-100 concept.
Let me ask for an extension: (feature request)

For low-power operation, e.g. for WSPR with less than 1 W, I suggest to introduce a low-power factor -- perhaps in cell 37.

This way also powers below 1 W can be set for the variable "min_for_start". This allows tuning at the low available power of a QRP-WSPR-TX.

There is already a setting for high power in cell 30. Maybe the setting for low power can also be made there with a changed parameter "-1". - Of course the program and the calculation of the power must be adapted...

What are the values of the two smaller capacitors connected to the 0.1u capacitors in the attached image?

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

73s 2M0LWS

Hi

Reading your code. I noticed this line in the tune() function

SWR - get_swr();

https://github.com/Dfinitski/N7DDC-ATU-100-mini-and-extended-boards/blob/master/ATU_100_EXT_board/FirmWare_PIC16F1938/1938_EXT_board_sources_V_3.0/main_main.h#L471

Although this probably compiles, it does not seem to do anything apart from running the get_swr() function, as the result of the calculation does not seem to be assigned to a variable.

Also. The get_swr() function seems to return the global value SWR, which is pointless as SWR is global

https://github.com/Dfinitski/N7DDC-ATU-100-mini-and-extended-boards/blob/master/ATU_100_EXT_board/FirmWare_PIC16F1938/1938_EXT_board_sources_V_3.0/main_main.h#L120-L133

Hi David,
Help :).
I just updated the firmware of my ATU to v3.2 using the appropriate Github Hexfile to find out the OLED 128x64 display is now inverted. My question: would it be possible, using a hex-editor, to revert the display back to normal?
I checked out the source-code of "oled_control.c" and found line 186: Soft_I2C_Write (0xA6); // 0xA6 - normal, 0xA7 - inverse). Would this do the trick? And if so, would hex-editor suffice to change this single item?
What string would I than need to search for? I looked for A6 but got stranded..
Thanks for your help and for this inspiring project!
73's Christiaan Roselaar PA3FUN

Anyone know where one can get a case to mount the Tuner in ?

It has to be for the square display not the rectangular one.

Hello david,

I notished that c5 c6 and c7 are under rated.
On the lower bands like 80m band
They get verry hot in a view seconds when you use 100 watt. And the swr is moving when that happens.
I replaced them with high Q low ESR 500v types from johanson.
The capacitor kit P/N from Johansons is S111DUE.
This capacitors solve the problem.
The capacitors witch are included in the kit are most likely 50v capacitors i ques if I look to the size of the capacitors.
If everybody get this capacitors then you get a lot of complains I think.

Grts

PA3HEA

Hello
I connected a 50 ohm load (Bird 3 Ghz, but is the same with any load) to the out port, Bypass function activated.
The swr indication with 10W( any power) is:
7 MHz swr 1.2
14 MHz swr 1.5
24 MHz swr 2.1
30 MHz swr 3.0
above higher
But really on the at-100 input there is 50 ohm tested with nanovna and swr meter
May you reply a hint?
Atu-100 is 7 cells version with firmware 3 and oled display
Regards

I don't have any experience with development for PIC processors, so please excuse my ignorance regarding development environments. I have successfully used the MPLAB X IPE to program the hex file into the chip, but now I'd like to play around with the source code. I tried to load the project into MPLAB X IDE, but it does not recognize the project folder as a valid project. That prompted me to poke around in the project configuration files, and it looks like you are using MicroC, which is a bit on the expensive side for just playing with one project. Do you have any suggestions for getting this to compile using a free system?

Thanks,
Karl Heinz - K5KHK

Hi Great atu ,and info from you David,

I got a ready made board off ebay for the same price as a kit,
i re-programmed it and set the tandem match to 5 turns as i want to use it with my uk mil radio Clansman PRC320
That puts out up to 30w output but the foldback is to fast,
Now i have set it to work from 1w all is good,
But after 14mhz The swr reading was going up the higher you go up in frequency if i set 25 ohm it should read near swr of 2:1 but it was reading over 3-5:1 the higher you go,
So i replaced the sensing diodes with BAT41 and all is now correct ,
so i do not know what was fitted but they were not bat41,
so if anyone is having the same problem, i would change the sensing diodes before doing anything else
Thanks Dave 2E0DMB

Need some help with the i2c reprogramming. I have a 1602 LCD with a i2c backpack. I used i2c scanner to find out the address, which is 3F. I changed the address using a PIC 3 and wrote the change to my ATU-100. Connected the LCD, background light comes on along with 16 square blocks on second row. I readjust the brightness but no readable display. I am using ver 3.0 of your frimware

Is there a formula to use to design a custom T1/T2 turns ratio for optimum use at a given power level?

I see the manual gives a solution for 40 watts (1:5) and 150 watts (1:10) and for some reason they even mention 1500 watts (1:32)

The manual mentions that the turns ratio should be designed to prevent the sense voltage from exceeding 4.096 Volts for the PIC16F1938 processor and 5.0 Volts for the PIC18F2520 processor."

So ... I was wondering ...What is the formula I would use to optimize T1/T2 for a given maximum power level?

Ken Lotts

I am trying to program the ATU-100 with Pickit-2 but it shows "no device detected".
I set the device manually and it detects that the device has external Vdd, but does not detect the PIC.
Is there a problem using Pickit-2?
Victor - 4Z4ME

Good morning
When I check the number of turns through the T68-2 toroids, I never arrive at the inductance values, stated in the schematic. T68-2 cores have an AL of 57 uH/per 100 windings. For L4 resp. L5 for instance 8 resp. 13 turns are given. For L4 this ends up in 5,6 uH in stead of 0,45 uH from the schematic; for L5 we find 7,7 uH in stead of 1 uH. The same goes for L6 and L7. Is the schematic wrong, or are the cores not T68-2 ?

ON6NT

Hi I have N7DDC 7x7 tuner and SW2013 mini transieveкand windom antenna. Transiever has 14-15W of full power in all bands so I expect from tuner indication of same power value, but all that I get discribed in flowing table.

I tryed BAT41 diodes with windom antenna, and 1N5711 diodes with windom antenna and then 50Ohm dummy load.
As for now I can't understend why Power indication is so low, and why Power indication is so non liniar when antenna is connected?
Here is a picture of my transformer

Whaiting for advice. Thanks!

Been a long time since I messed with PIC micros. Didn't have any fancy gui tools back then. In PICkit 3 I can read and verify the PIC16F1938 fine, check communication says PIC device found, but when I try to write the firmware hex file, I get a "Programming failed at Program Memory address 0x000001." Re-reading the PIC shows that only the 1st word was written to Program Memory and 1st byte to EEPROM Data.

What am I doing wrong?

Hi

I've not noticed this myself, as my local QRM is too noisy, but someone who uses your ATU for SOTA work, reported to be that they thought the MCU was occasionally waking up and causing QRM

I've had a look in the code, but I can't see anywhere that the MCU is put it a sleep mode, but its quite possible you are doing this via a direct register setting to the PIC and I'd not notice that in the code.

David,
Hope all is well on your end. As you know I've been using your 7x7 Board to write code under MpLabs IDE. I find MpLabs MCC very useful. Anyway to the point. I got where I was configuring the PIC I2C Interface using MpLabs MCC to talk to a Raspberry Pi. MpLabs MCC assumes the PIC code will use pins RC3 and RC4 for the I2C communications instead of the pins you laid out, RB6 and RB7. MpLabs expects the programming tool to be connected at RB6 and RB7. So if you are ever contemplating a board revision might want to keep that in mind. I know I can go in and massage the MCC code to use the other pins. But it would have been nice to keep the debugger hooked up while the code was being developed. I purchased a populated board only so I'll look and see how much trouble it would be to re-rout some traces. Thanks Dave.
Steve (W8TTY)

I couldn't find this information anywhere.

Does someone knows what is the max SWR this tuner can handle?

Thanks,
73,
Pablo, VA3HDL

David - my recently constructed ATU-100 EXT seems to work as intended. As well, the Fast Test Mode energizes all the relays as expected.

However, in the Simple Test Mode, I cannot step through the entire range of inductances, as expected. Inductance is added as expected until reaching 2.20 uH on the LCD, then all the inductances are removed, and the cycle repeats until 4.50 uH, when all the inductances are again removed. It's not until I reach 6.70 uH on the LCD meter that expected amount of inductance is added, and works normally until 8.53 uH.

I checked the capacitance side, but all the relays seem to add capacitance as required, when stepping through using the Simple Test Mode.

Is this an issue that may affect the normal functioning of the ATU-100, or should I not worry about it?

спаси́бо de va3rr

Hello David,

I have some news about your latching verison of ATU 100. Could you contact me on my privat email address (available on QRZ.COM)?

73, Marko, S54AM

Hi.

I've noticed that I relay S8 seems to be energized when the ATU is in its Reset state.

As far as I can tell, S8 appears to connect the capacitive load chain to either the RF input or RF output side of the inductor chain, but in the Reset condition.

Was there a reason for doing this, as it causes the ATU to draw some unnecessary current when its in its Reset state.

My ATU 100 EXT works up to about 30mhz. Should it go up to 50? Is there anything I can do?

Sorry for asking help for a easy to solve difficulty.
Is there an image about how to connect PICKit3 and ATU100 board?
Thanks and 73
I2OIM

I am a newbie here, looks like fun ,I love kit building, doing it since early 60's,
I just ordered FULL KIT DIY Automatic Antenna Tuner 7x7 (ATU-100 by N7DDC), what files do i need to construct the kit, do i need anything extra like a display, etc, and where do i go to get the info?
Paul K2DB

I have got an ATU-100 EXT which is a china build. Trying to update it via the connector seems to fail. The MATLAB X IPE 5.40 gives false positive "programming ok" messages but seems to write nothing and the PICKit3 v3.10 standalone flasher is unable to detect the device. Reading works on none of the both solutions. I try to power the device via the programmer. Is there any hint on the settings required to make it work?

Afternoon all - I need to replace 2 of the diodes on the underside of the board, but am unsure of the values, or in essence what diodes to purchase. Installing them shouldn't be a problem. This issue was down to my mistake, i needed to modify the case and slipped with the tool hitting the components (lesson learned!)

Please excuse the rubbish photo, it was the best i could get .

Their location on the board :

Hoping someone can point me in the right direction.

Many thanks

Kev

Hi,
I bought the full installed ATU (CGJ-100), see picture.
The firmware is V3.0.
There is a problem because when the ATU isin AUTO mode, we can see SWR : TUNE but nothing happen. ATU stay still or until i BOT it. So no according antenna do.
Can you explain what is this issue ?
Many thanks in advance.
Best regards,
Jean

Hi All, I just finished building my atu-100 with version 3.0 and it is working fine. Being an electronics tech really helped. I would like to update it to ver 3.2. I can order a pikit3 clone very quickly but I am unsure how to connect it and get started with updating the firmware.
Is there a document out there that would help me? I am not a programmer but I can follow detailed instructions.
Thanks!

Hola amigos, tengo un problema el cual no se a que es debido en ver 3.0.Funcionar funciona a la perfección pero en ciertas frecuencias y todas las bandas me da una señal fuerte hasta el punto de no poder utilizar en esos Mhz.
Adjunto fotos con el puesto y quitado. A que es debido?
Un saludo

All display worked prior to reprograme via pickit.selected for 5w qrp. Programming successfull.Verified.Now no screen.
Any thoughts?
I am new to programming @65yrs so please be kind on any code,Thanks!!

I see you have a permissive license on the hardware as noted in the documentation, with that I was wondering if the PIC source code be available for this eventually?

Hi all,

I activated the fast test mode (Power+Tune+Bypass+Auto) but I don't understand the result. On internet I found nothing more that how to activate this mode, is it possible to have more details ?

Thank in advance.

Regards.

I have just finished building 7x7 ATU-100 with mini display, display initially worked but no screen now. Have not updated firmware, ATU is working, can hear relays clicking. Is this available as a spare part?

Hi, I've built the 7x7 kit and it all powers up fine, the power output is spot on but the swr stays on 1.00 and so doesnt tune. An analogue swr meter shows swr as 1.7 but the atu-100 stays at 1.00. Any ideas what ive done wrong or how to solve it would be greatly appreciated 73 de 2E0PRV

The Relay OFF feature on 3.2 version is very nice and I appreciate it a lot! My request is to have a relay OFF time feature independent from the display Off timer and adjustable on cell $36 (Similar as on display OFF time by cell $32, but on a new relay OFF cell $36)

• Thanks a lot for ATU-100 - Mine is working now for almost 2 Years on a outdoor installation - Not any single issue!! - 73

Hello,
I build the tuner and it works reasonably well.
It happens on a regular base that he mis the lowest swr.
Is there a posibility to control the capacitors and the coils manualy to fine tune the swr.
Grts
Pa3hea

Hello,

may I know how many turns are on T1/T2 please ?
Thank you

in Bypass and in RESETed TUNE Mode are the 0.1uH and 0.22 uH inductors activated (Relais ON).
The issue IS NOT IN VERSION 3.0

Best,
Kermit