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Vol. 25 No. 5
Nuts & Volts
DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS
May 2004
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May 2004
Vol. 25 No. 5
PROJECTS
COLUMNS
44 BUILD AN ARCHOS REMOTE
Make your musical downloads R/C
compatible. 8 LET’S GET TECHNICAL
by Steve Russell Fiber optic ring isolator.
12 MICRO MEMORIES
52 VIDEO SIGNAL GENERATOR
Add video message capabilities to your The Bell Picturephone.
digital screen.
by Daryl Rictor 1 8 TECHKNOWLEDGEY 2004
Wind-blown rover; Scanning the ocean floor;
Unbelievable data storage; and more.
28 ELECTRONICS Q&A
Zero-crossing; O’scope software; 555 timer
61 IPv6 calculator; Timers galore; and more.
Options for local network communication.
by Jan Axelson 76 STAMP APPLICATIONS
I/O expanders.
66 A TRULY SOLDERLESS BREADBOARD
Part 2: Take the hassle out of circuit board 81 IN THE TRENCHES
design. For design engineers facing real world
by Al Williams problems. This month: Statistics.
D E PA R T M E N T S
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MAY 2004
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Reader Feedback
Dear Nuts & Volts: we all know that, as we were all so confused). Our professor
I just received my April 2004 issue of Nuts & Volts and is extremely intelligent and has a great understanding of the
looked over the “Feedback” from Bob Nelson concerning material. The problem is, he doesn't realize that we don't
Michael Kornacker's article, "Learn About Cyclic share the same intuition. Most of us — including myself —
Redundancy Checks." Nelson mentions having trouble with walked out of the lecture completely confused. Our
the math in the examples. Michael does have a response, professor completely neglected to fill us in on the
but he seems to have only addressed part of the problem. applications of the material in the real world.
The Message (M) in "Example 1" seems incorrect. It is I came home and started reading Nuts & Volts and was
"1000110100000" and should be "101000110100000," as completely shocked when I got to Mr. Kornacher's article.
correctly illustrated in the article's text. I found this article He discussed just about everything we did in class and
very interesting and read it from beginning to end. Your explained it all so well. The biggest help was being able to
magazine is really great stuff. Keep up the excellent work! trace through his circuits. I went from understanding
Now, back to my April issue. All the best. nothing to understanding everything! I will be passing
Allen Moore around the article for my friends to read. I would just like to
Palm Bay, FL extend my deepest gratitude to the author.
If you could somehow forward this message to him, I
Dear Nuts & Volts: would appreciate it. Thank you and compliments on Nuts &
In the article "The Colossus Of Radio," by Michael Volts — it is a great magazine that I draw so much
Banks, the sidebar "Those Mysterious Call Letters" infers inspiration from. I have personally found that computer
that the KDKA call letters were from Philadelphia, PA. You engineering is a very challenging venture; it’s supplemental
have the right state, but they are actually from Pittsburgh, information from your magazine that makes my life truly
PA. KDKA was originally a Westinghouse station on the easier. Thanks again!
western side of the Alleghenies. It still exists today. Michael Passaretti
Otherwise, it was an excellent article. Keep up the good work. via Internet
Joe Patay
via Internet Dear Nuts & Volts:
Response: The circuit schematic for the March 2004 “Simple HDD
My apologies for moving KDKA from Pittsburgh to Exerciser” article by Evert Fruitman has a fundamental
Philadelphia without notifying anyone. Of course, I might problem which will cause the timing to be erratic. The cause
claim that the lapse was intentional, in honor of Hugo is the 12 V power supply voltage. Q1 and Q2 in the free
Gernsback; according to several old-timers who worked for running astable multivibrator circuit will both suffer base-
Gernsback magazines — such as Science and Invention emitter voltage breakdown. The reverse Vbe voltage rating
and Astounding Stories — it was common practice among for a 2N3904 is 6 V, maximum. Actual breakdown for silicon
editors to introduce an error or two in every issue. Their bipolar transistors is typically around 7 V.
readers were a bright lot and enjoyed pointing out mistakes Here is what will happen. Assume the circuit is starting
— so the editors gave them something to find. It kept letters to “flop.” C1 is charged with nearly 12 V across it. When Q1
coming and readers eagerly awaiting the next issue. turns on and reaches saturation, C1 will try to force the base
Author Michael Banks voltage of Q2 to minus 11.5 V or so. The Q2 base-emitter
junction will go into zener breakdown, clamping the base at
Dear Nuts & Volts: about 7 V and rapidly discharging C1 to this voltage. This is
I'm a 22-year-old computer engineering senior at the not reliable/stable operation. A simple fix is to add a diode
New Jersey Institute of Technology. I'm writing to thank the (1N914 or similar) in series with the base of transistors Q1
author of "Learn About Cyclic Redundancy Checks" in the and Q2 — diode cathode to transistor base. Try it and see.
March 2004 issue of Nuts & Volts. Here are some guidelines for designing this type of
On the evening I received that issue, I had my digital transistor multivibrator:
test night class. The topic of the lecture was CRC (little did 1. For power supply voltage up to 6 V, use silicon
bipolar transistors, as shown.
2. For any voltage larger than 6 V, add the
diodes.
3. An interesting option for voltage up to 9 V is
germanium transistors without diodes (if PNP,
reverse power supply polarity).
4. Forget MOSFETS in this type of circuit;
bipolar transistors work much better.
I am an electronics engineer, but I have always
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I
have chosen to finish my three- inverter will go low. After a third gate inverted. So, if the fiber is initially
part fiber series with an applica- delay, the output of the third inverter dark, the transmitter will output light.
tion that uses a fiber optic cable (where we started) goes high. The When the light has traveled through
as part of a high-frequency oscillator. output was low for three gates delays. the fiber loop and is received, the
Called a Fiber Optic Ring Oscillator, Now, the high level on the output transmitter will stop emitting light.
it makes use of a length of fiber to makes its way through the three The fiber will become dark as the
generate a square-wave signal; the inverters — requiring another three light empties out of it and the
frequency of its oscillation depends gate delays — and the output of the process will repeat.
on the length of the fiber and the third inverter goes back low again. In the ring oscillator from Figure
speed of light inside the fiber. We have just completed one 1, three inverters are used because
Consider the simple three-inverter cycle of the square-wave signal the length of the wires connecting the
circuit shown in Figure 1. Notice generated at the output of the third input and output of each inverter are
that the three inverters are connected inverter. The period of the cycle so short that they do not significantly
in a ring. Now, if we make the equals six gate delays (three while affect the frequency of operation. What
assumption that the gate delay for the third inverter output was low and am I talking about? Light travels
each inverter is identical, we can three while it was high). The frequency about one foot in one nanosecond. An
figure out a few things. Suppose the can be easily found if you know the electrical signal (electrons moving
output sits at a logic zero level when period. For example, if the inverters down a wire) travels slower inside
we first turn the circuit on. After one each have a gate delay of five copper wire. Thus, a signal that travels
gate delay, the output of the first nanoseconds, the period of the output a foot in a copper wire requires slightly
inverter will go high. After a second signal will be 30 nanoseconds, which more than one nanosecond.
gate delay, the output of the second corresponds to a frequency of 33.33 If we breadboard the ring oscillator
MHz. Like a dog chasing its tail, the 0s using a 74LS04 hex inverter and half
Figure 2. The Fiber Optic Ring and 1s are always “circling” around inch wires to connect the inverters,
Oscillator uses a length of fiber to the loop as fast as they can. the total length of the wires is one
control the frequency of oscillation.
If we extend this concept to fiber, and a half inches, which would
we have photons of light chasing correspond to less than a quarter of
each other, but there are other things a nanosecond of time for the trip
to consider. Figure 2 shows the Fiber through the wires. This is much less
Optic Ring Oscillator circuit. In this than the 30 nanosecond period, so
circuit, a single inverter is used with the frequency is not significantly
a length of fiber optic cable. The affected by the wire length.
inverter is a fiber transceiver that is Light travels slower in fiber than
wired to loop the received signal it does in air or a vacuum. Just like
back to the transmitter, with the level the speed of the electrical signal in
copper wire, the physical properties
Figure 1. Three-inverter ring oscillator. Its frequency depends on of the fiber affect the speed at which
NUTS & VOLTS
the gate delay of each inverter. light propagates down the fiber. The
fiber will have a specific velocity of
propagation (VOP) depending on its
Everything For Electronics
Figure 4. This digital frequency divider circuit conditions the output signal from the fiber oscillator, converts it to
TTL logic levels, divides the signal frequency by 8,192, and produces an audible tone on the speaker.
for the base of transistor Q1. Q1 is yank the base of Q1 low once for many pulses to get a single pulse
base-biased by the 47K resistor so each cycle. output to the speaker circuit. The
that it is always on unless something When the base is taken low, the audio transformer is used to provide
pulls the base lower than 0.7 volts. transistor shuts off, allowing the a high impedance in the collector of
When Q1 is on, the collector collector resistor to pull the output Q2, so that the 8 Ω speaker does not
output sits at a logic zero level (essen- signal up to a logic one level. When yank on the +5 V supply too much.
tially, all of the +5 V supply voltage the Fosc signal changes and Q1 turns So — over the course of this fiber
drops across the 1K collector resistor). on again, the output at the collector series — we have seen that a beam of
Although open for DC, the 0.01 µF will go to a logic zero again, providing light can be used in interesting and
capacitor acts almost like a short the falling edge required by the useful ways. We should be aware of
when operating at the high frequency 74LS393 CLK input. The 393’s are this because, right now, light is the
rate of the ring oscillator. So, the cascaded to form a 13-bit counter. fastest thing that we’ve got. Even with
capacitor allows the Fosc signal to Since 213 equals 8,192, we need that the Dense Wave Division Multiplexing
techniques now used to place
multiple 2.4 Gbps optical carriers on
one fiber, we have barely tapped the
Electronics and Electrical V8.2 New V8.2 release!
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Micro Memories
A Phone too Far: Bell’s Picturephone
U
sing the telephone is such a brand names that are no more, such ideas. The basic technology had
hassle these days; women as Bell Telephone and Pan Am.) been there since the mid-‘60s to
have to make sure their However, as marketing experts make it a reality, but it has never
makeup and hair is just so and all Al Ries and Jack Trout wrote in their caught on.
but the most Cro-Magnon of men 1993 book, The 22 Immutable
want to appear clean-shaven and Laws of Marketing: Would Have
well-groomed when calling their Strained Bell
wives or parents. “Capturing the imagination of
Oh, you mean you don’t think the public is not the same as
Network
about such things when you pick up revolutionizing a market. Take the This may have been a good thing.
the telephone? That’s probably Picturephone, now called the Had Picturephones actually caught on,
because, like 99.99% of the population, videophone. Ever since its introduction they would have placed a tremendous
you don’t own a videophone — but at the 1964 New York World’s Fair, strain on the Bell network. Each unit
you would, had Bell Laboratories had the Picturephone has been in the would have been connected to a Bell
their way in the early 1960s. news, usually on the front page. The central office via three standard wire
The Picturephone is one of those latest example is a front page story pairs, as opposed to the traditional
classic “what if” bits of history. It in the Wall Street Journal, ‘The single pair of wires that a voice-only
made a huge splash at the 1964 Videophone Era May Finally Be telephone uses. One pair of wires carried
World’s Fair in Queens, NY (the Near, Bringing Big Changes.’” the phone’s 1 MHz video signal in one
same one where the flying saucers direction and the other carried the
were parked so they’d be ready for This is the third try for AT&T. In video in the opposite direction. The
the first Men in Black movie). Two the ‘70s, it failed with the third pair carried the traditional voice
years later, Stanley Kubrick thought Picturephone, priced at $100.00 a information, as well as the TouchTone
they would be commonplace month. In the ‘80s, it failed with signals that directed each phone call.
enough in the future that, when he another Picturephone, offering According to the Bell System
was shooting 2001: A Space service at $2,300.00 an hour. In the Memorial website (www.bell
Odyssey, he wrote and directed a ‘90s, AT&T was hustling $1,500.00 systemmemorial.com), each
famous scene in which Dr. Heywood videophones. It’s easy to see why the central office that dealt with
Floyd — one of his lead characters — videophone hasn’t made much Picturephones had to accommodate
called his daughter from space via a progress. Who wants to get dressed those making Picturephone calls by
Bell Picturephone. (2001 is full of up to make a phone call? adding a second switch, operating in
technologies we’re still waiting for. As a result, the idea became one parallel to the regular switch.
On the other hand, it’s also full of of those perennial “maybe someday” David Massey, who runs the site,
writes, “The fun comes when a call
1962 shot of L.H. Meacham of Bell Labs 1962 shot of Joseph A. Mazzeo of Bell Labs has to be connected to someone
on his PicturePhone. removing circuits from PicturePhone.
served via another central office.”
Normally, a voice channel is allotted
only 3,000 Hz (as opposed to 20,000
Hz for hi-fi audio) for each direction. A
NUTS & VOLTS
12 MAY 2004
MicroMemories.qxd 4/7/2004 9:15 AM Page 13
Micro Memories
2001 predicts widespread use of the Picturephone. 2001 shows some of the fears the Picturephone raised.
how they will appear on the screen of how difficult it is to predict the way totalitarian government, also caused
the called party. These reactions are people will respond to something new subliminal fears?) As a result, the
only natural, but they also indicate and different.” project was basically DOA by the
early 1970s and Bell itself died a
No kidding! The Bell System decade later, when the Federal
estimated that 3,000,000 Government broke it into eight
Picturephone units would be operating regional networks to diffuse its
in homes and offices by the mid- monopoly on December 31, 1983.
1980s, bringing in a combined
revenue of $5,000,000,000 a year, A New Lease on Life
but the cost, both to the consumer
and to the Bell network in upgrades, In the late ‘90s, the concept of
coupled with the simple, but extremely the Picturephone received a new
understandable fear by consumers of lease on life via the Internet, allowing
being seen at inopportune moments, webcams to proliferate at home and
soon dampened much of the enabling video meetings and telecon-
enthusiasm for the project. (George ferencing to become commonplace
Orwell’s 1984 was a perennial best- in the office. Most people, though,
seller since the late 1940s. I wonder if still get dressed up at least a little
June 1968 Western Electric Ad. its two-way telescreens, used as a bit or put on a suit and, no doubt,
controlling mechanism by his futuristic, plan their appearance ahead of time
if they know that there’s a
videoconference scheduled that day.
TechTV estimates that 6,000,000
webcams were sold in 2002, but how
many are used regularly? Most
people sit at their home computers
during planned times when they surf
the ‘net and chat with friends, not
when there’s an emergency or when
they need to call their spouse to pick
up some milk on the way home from
work. Otherwise, they’re used
specifically for the purpose that made
Picturephones unpopular — for the “R
U Nekkid” crowd and for viewing live
action “pr0n.”
NUTS & VOLTS
© 2004 eBay Inc. All rights reserved. eBay and the eBay logo are registered trademarks of eBay Inc. Designated trademarks and brands are the property of their respective owners. All items subject to availability.
Greg Culkowski—eBay user ID: gjc4 (329)
Chief Technical Officer, Transmitter Location Systems, LLC
(www.tls2000.com), a provider of geo-location
technology for satellite operators.
www.ebaybusiness.com
Circle #35 on the Reader Service Card.
ElectronetMay04.qxd 4/7/2004 9:50 PM Page 16
www.gatewayelectronics.com
(Electronically Speaking, Gateway’s Got It!)
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NUTS & VOLTS
TechKnowledgey
2004 Events, Advances, and News
From the Electronics World
Advanced tometers, in a range of hostile environ- have developed an improved method
Technologies ments. Possible utilization sites include for locating objects buried in the
remote areas of the Earth, as well as ocean floor without the use of
Simple, Cheap Rover
Mars, Venus, and Titan — perhaps complex, unreliable modeling or the
Travels with the Wind even Saturn's moon Io (via supersonic usual arrays of sonar transmitters
volcanic wind) and Neptune's moon and receivers. The method records
Triton (which shows signs of the return echo of a sonar transceiver's
significant surface wind erosion). "ping," then time-reverses and
One version of the rover was transmits that signal. The resulting
recently deployed in Greenland, echo clearly shows buried objects
where it completed a more than 130 and suppresses the response from
km autonomous traverse across an the seafloor itself, making the
ice sheet. Communicating via the underwater terrain "transparent."
Iridium satellite network, the rover According to Pierson, using time
relayed live GPS, temperature, and reversal to find buried mines requires
pressure data to a ground station at only one transceiver — although more
JPL every 30 minutes for nearly 10 can be used — and the method isn't
Exploded view of the Tumbleweed Rover, days. At the time of this report, two limited by the composition of the
showing layout and electronics package. more rovers were making a traverse ocean floor. "Previous methods had to
Courtesy of NASA Jet Propulsion from the South Pole to the coast of incorporate a lot of complex modeling of
Laboratory.
Antarctica, some 2,000 km away. the sea floor and the ocean environment
The Antarctic test is designed to and required sophisticated software
MAY 2004
18
Tech2004.qxd 4/7/2004 9:54 AM Page 19
Computers and wide between January and early May dynamic bearing motors for
of 2003 are potentially defective and quieter operation. (The motor uses vis-
Networking should be replaced. Although there cous oil in its rotational component
Big Power in a Small Box are no safety concerns, a voltage- instead of ball bearings, increasing head
regulating inductor can overheat, positioning accuracy and reducing
generate some smoke, and cause the rotational fluctuations.)
machine to shut down. The machine
is a rack-mount server intended for Industry and the
use in data centers. The company did Profession
not disclose how many servers have HP and Dell Battle
the problem, but will be contacting
TechKnowledgey 2004
Engineers (IEEE, www.ieee.org) and many other industrialized nations electronic equipment. The LM4780 is a
have launched the first conference to move forward towards a hydrogen stereo audio amplifier capable of deliv-
address the technologies and impact economy." If you are interested in ering 60 W per channel of continuous
of a hydrogen-based economy. Titled upcoming events, visit www. average output power. The LM4781 is a
"The Hydrogen Economy: Its Impact energetics.com/hydrogen three-channel audio amplifier capable
on the Future of Electric Energy," the of delivering 35 W per channel of
conference was held in Washington, Circuits and Devices continuous average output power into
DC, late in April. Organized by the New Audio Amplifiers for an 8 Ω load and the LM4782 is a three-
Power Engineering Society, Power Home Stereo Systems channel audio amplifier capable of
Electronics Society, Industry delivering 25 W per channel of continu-
Applications Society, and the Society ous average output power into an 8 Ω
for Social Implications of Technology, load. All three devices are specified at
the conference focused on information less than 0.5% total harmonic distortion
about what a hydrogen-based economy plus noise (THD+N) from 20 Hz to 20
would look like, what the technologies kHz.
are, and what impact it would have on The chips are protected by
our society. A slate of technical National's self-peak instantaneous
experts offered focus on hydrogen temperature (°Ke) (SPiKe) protection
production, its delivery infrastructure, circuitry, which provides a dynamically
power generation technologies, National's LM478x audio amplifiers feature optimized safe operating area. SPiKe
system interface issues, and case fade-in/fade-out mute mode circuitry. Courtesy protection safeguards the device outputs
studies from North America, Europe, of National Semiconductor Corp. against overvoltage, undervoltage,
and Japan; the potential impact of overloads, shorts to the supply or
hydrogen fuel on the future delivery of
electric energy was also discussed.
In its mission statement, the
N ational Semiconductor Corp.
(www.national.com)
introduced three new stereo audio
has
ground, thermal runaway, and
instantaneous temperature peaks.
The LM4780/81/82 audio amplifiers
group noted, "The IEEE is a leading amplifiers in its Overture® line of can easily be configured for bridge or
authority in a wide range of technical products for home stereo systems. The parallel operation for higher power and
areas — including electric power — devices feature quiet fade-in/fade-out bi-amp solutions. In addition, the
and is organizing this conference to mute mode circuitry that gradually LM4782 has a power-conserving stand-by
provide a venue for furthering the brings the sound up or down, which is mode. The 4780/81/82 devices — in
participants' knowledge base on intended to enhance the listening expe- TO-220 packaging — are respectively
hydrogen systems. We hope this will rience in compact stereos, high-defini- priced at only $3.25, $3.25, and $2.75
help to develop relationships with the tion televisions (HDTVs), 5.1 surround in lots of 1,000, so your next stereo
hydrogen energy industry as the US sound systems, and other consumer system may be highly affordable. NV
+ =
from
5
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Now you can analyze electronic circuits in the analog and digital domains at the same time.
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Everything For Electronics
MAY 2004
20
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1-800-446-2295 Mini-Kits...
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dard AM broadcast band, and is easily set to any clear channel in your area. It will drive any load up to 100 mA.
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AC125 110VAC Power Supply for AM1 $9.95 TS1 Touch Switch Kit $9.95
NutNVolt200402.qxd 4/8/2004 11:42 AM Page 23
P
eople communicate their with relative ease. Every so often, and poor printing/scanning processes
ideas via written text, yet it is however, we all come across a can lead to confusion as to whether
true that a picture is worth a mystery. Unraveling that mystery or not intersecting wires are really
thousand words. Electrical circuits may be done by its context or meant to connect. Some schematic
are commonly documented in through descriptive text that may diagrams clarify this by placing a
graphical form to describe their accompany the schematic diagram. “bump” at the intersection of two
specific components and connections. This article provides a quick non-connecting wires.
These pictorial representations are overview of how schematic diagrams
termed “schematic diagrams” are commonly drawn. Power and Ground
because they explain functionality
rather than serving as a photograph Wires Electrical circuits require power to
of a circuit board. Reading and operate and each schematic diagram
interpreting schematic diagrams is Wires are a basic element of shows how its components are
an important skill for anyone who schematic diagrams — they attach to powered. There are many styles for
wants to work with electronic circuits. and connect every electrical representing power nodes, some of
There is no single set of rules component. A wire is usually drawn which are shown in Figure 2. Arrows
governing how schematic diagrams as a straight line with neat 45° or 90° are most common and they point up
are created. There are almost as bends. Some diagrams may have or down, depending on whether the
many styles as there are engineers. curved wires, but many curved wires voltage level is positive or negative.
A common stylistic difference is can start to look like spaghetti very Tee and inverted-tee symbols are
how each type of component (e.g., quickly. Figure 1 shows a variety of sometimes used in place of arrows.
resistor or transistor) is drawn. wire representations connecting Some people may draw circles.
Fortunately, schematic diagrams generic components that are Regardless of the symbol used, power
tend to share many common represented as rectangles. nodes are often labeled with their
attributes. A small, filled circle or dot voltage (e.g., +5 V, -12 V, etc.) or with
Once you’ve learned the basics indicates a connection between two a variable (e.g., +V, -VPOWER, etc.).
and have seen a few different styles, intersecting wires. Intersecting wires Explicit ground nodes are found
you can usually decipher a new style without a dot do not have an electrical in most electrical circuits, although
connection. Small some circuits may refer to ground as
Figure 1. Wire Representations. intersection dots a variable, such as GND. Ground
nodes are drawn in
Figure 2. Power Nodes. varying styles, but
almost always point
downward with multiple
small lines, as shown in
Figure 3. Some circuits
contain multiple ground
NUTS & VOLTS
by using a different
symbol. There is no uni-
versal standard (though
there are standards in
MAY 2004
24
JustForStarters.qxd 4/7/2004 10:01 AM Page 25
MAY 2004 25
JustForStarters.qxd 4/7/2004 10:03 AM Page 26
General Zener
LED NPN PNP
SW10 Diode Diode
SW4 D10 D5 D1 Q1 Q2
N.O. N.C.
DPDT 1N5333B
SW3 1N914
SW1 3.3V Green 2N3904 2N3906
symbols for a small-signal diode, an respectively. Symbols often include Integrated Circuits
LED (light emitting diode), a Zener detailed part information — such as the
diode, and NPN and PNP transistors. component part number — because Schematic representation styles
As with other components, electrical there are wide ranging characteristics for ICs are quite numerous due to the
ratings (e.g., power, voltage, current) between different diodes and transis- great diversity among ICs. General
may be included in the diagram. tors. Understanding the function of a ICs are drawn as a rectangle with
Diodes and transistors use “Dx” diode, transistor, or semiconductor in multiple pins on one or more sides.
and “Qx” reference designators, general goes beyond the basic skill of Each pin has both a signal name and
reading a schematic diagram. You a pin number. Figure 8 shows a sym-
Figure 8. LM555 Symbol. need familiarity with the component bol for an LM555 timer IC. Simple
and how it behaves in various logic ICs may break out individual
8 4 configurations. gates for clarity, as shown in Figure 9.
Note that the 74LS00’s power pins
VCC RESET
Figure 9. 74LS00 Break Out. (VCC and GND) are drawn on the
7 first of four NAND gates that com-
DISCHARGE
VCC 14 prise the IC. Like other components,
LM555 1 10 each IC in a schematic diagram has
3 8
U1 2
74LS00
9
74LS00
an associated reference designator.
3 6 1/4 U2 3/4 U2
OUT THRESHOLD IC reference designators are
5 2 GND 7
CONTROL TRIGGER generally in the format “Ux.”
4 13
GND
74LS00 6 74LS00 11 It’s Just
5 12
1 2/4 U2 4/4 U2 Documentation
Keep in mind that schematics are
just another form of documentation
and, therefore, styles vary according
to the context and intent of the
designer. While certain institutions
may have standards, there are no
universal rules for how to draw a
schematic diagram. The main goal to
keep in mind when drawing a
schematic diagram is clarity.
Feel free to insert descriptive
text or sketch a picture to convey
accurate information to your intended
audience.
There is a vast collection of
electrical components in the world
NUTS & VOLTS
Electronics Q&A
In this column, I answer Zero-Crossing dimmers simply chop up the sine
questions about all aspects Detectors wave to adjust the brightness of the
lamp. They do this by detecting the
of electronics, including . I found your October 2003 zero-crossing of the waveform and
computer hardware,
Q article on zero-crossing detectors
(“Another Zero-Crossing Detector”)
waiting a specified time before
turning on the conducting switch —
software, circuits, electronic very interesting. However, I do not typically a triac or SCR. (Figure 1)
know much about these detectors. However, this method generates vast
theory, troubleshooting, Please provide me with a few practical amounts of RFI that can cause noise
and anything else of applications. and interference in electronic devices.
Joel Smith A better solution is to turn on the
interest to the hobbyist. via Internet switch only at the zero-crossing point.
While I used a light dimmer for
Feel free to participate .Here are a few applications the example of zero-crossing, they
with your questions, as A where zero-crossing detectors are
used.
have far-reaching power switching
applications, including industrial
well as comments and motors and solenoids. In addition to
suggestions. 1. Video blanking signals for blanking reducing RFI emissions, zero-crossing
the screen during the retrace of a switching provides a “soft-start” that
You can reach me at: raster. eliminates surge currents.
2. Breaker-less ignition systems.
TJBYERS@aol.com. 3. Microcontroller sensor position Guitar Preamp
/speed interface.
4. Phase and frequency measurements. . I read the microphone preamp
What's Up: 5. Speech/music discriminators in
digital recordings.
Q answer in the December 2003
issue and I was wondering if this same
Zero-crossing preamp would work for an acoustic
The most prolific use of zero- guitar that has a pickup in it?
applications, o’scope crossing is for the switching of power Walter
circuits. Let’s take the typical lamp via Internet
software, and a 555 dimmer as an example. Cheap lamp
. Nope. The amp is designed for
timer calculator. Figure 1 A a very small input voltage in the
range of 2 mV to 10 mV. The output
A bunch of timers: of a high performance guitar pickup
can be as much as 2.5 volts when you
24-volt commercial Sine Wave start rockin’. The best guitar preamp
circuit I’ve found to date was designed
grade, precision on/off, by J. Donald Tillman way back in 1993
and uses a single FET transistor. You
and a weekly timer. can download it from his website
NUTS & VOLTS
(www.till.com/articles/index.html)
Non-Zero Crossing
A guitar preamp and or find it here in Figure 2.
Unlike the design in the
Everything For Electronics
ers Q&A
This circuit changes the impedance to flow, which results in more heating.
of the guitar pickup from 1 MΩ to 51 At some point, the amount of Figure 2 +9V
KΩ, which, in turn, reduces the self-heating equalizes the heat dissi-
+
amount of noise picked up by the pated to free space (air). 0.1 10uF
connecting cable. It also reduces the Herein lies the principle of air flow 6.8k
attenuation of the higher frequencies detection. Different gases — helium 4.7uF
+
(roll-off) at low volume. and nitrogen, for example — dissipate Out
That’s not to say you can’t add a heat at different rates, which can be J201
high-frequency boost to your sounds measured via thermistors. When you
(to give it that Jimmy Hendrix effect). add air flow (chill factor), the cooling Guitar Jack 3.0M
C1
Simply insert the optional C1. The FET rate is even more pronounced. That is 2.2k
.05
is a low-noise J201 (Vishay) which is the heart of this sensor.
available from Mouser Electronics R1 and R2 in the schematic
(800-346-6873; www.mouser.com), (Figure 3) represent the two NTC Guitar Preamp
but a 2N5457 will work as well and is thermistors in this design. One ther-
more readily available. mistor (R2) is sealed inside a wind- faster and incorporate a 555 or 556
BTW, I added this preamp (which proof cage that has access to outside timer, but I am not sure how to put the
I built into the guitar cord) to my ambient air. My favorite shield is an two together. Presently, I am working
Gibson Pearl and it improved the upside-down prescription bottle with on a piece of equipment that requires
signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) by a full an open bottom and a couple of small a variable 0.1 to 10 second delay. Can
magnitude — i.e., much less hum. holes drilled at the top for ventilation. you give me a link to designs for such
This allows R2 to heat the air around timers?
Breathless in Seattle it for a reference. R1 is also subjected Larry Fostano
to the self-heating effect, but, this via Internet
. I’m looking for a diagram which time, it’s exposed to ambient air —
Q would act as an on/off switch by
detecting air movement. In other
including cooling via air currents.
The first stage uses the LM324 A . The kind of industrial timer you
request is probably best done
words, it would turn on whenever it op amp to establish a virtual ground. using a pair of 555 ICs or a single
detects air movement and turn off The next section is an amplifier that 556. You’ll also need a regulator, a 24-
when not detecting air movement. sets the sensitivity via Rf. Using a 10K volt relay, and a transistor driver. The
The switch has to be sensitive enough resistor, the gain is about 10. The output first 555 (Figure 4) is used to
to react to a desktop fan or the air of this stage goes to a comparator, debounce the start switch and trigger
movement which occurs when a door which closes the reed relay when air the delay timer via a negative-going
is opened. flow is detected by R1. The trigger pulse on pin 2. This causes pin 3 to
Anonymous potentiometer adjusts the trip point. go high, turn on the transistor, and
via Internet Making this circuit work will take engage the relay for the time specified
some effort on your part. That is, you (via the 1 M Delay Adj.). The values
. For this kind of sensitivity, I sug- have to increase or decrease the value have been selected for a range of 0.1
A gest using thermistors to detect
air movement. Thermistors have long
of Rf to get the sensitivity you desire,
which, in turn, causes readjustment of
to 10 seconds. Other values of the 10
µF timing capacitor will reduce or
been used to monitor gases of all the trigger pot.
sorts because they react quickly to +9V
Voltage
changing temperatures. Basically, a Commercial Reference Amplifier Comparator
thermistor is a temperature-sensitive Grade Delay
resistor of which there are two types:
those that increase resistance as the
Timer 470 470
10k
Rgain
4.7k
Reed
Relay
temperature rises (PTC) and those . I am trying to
that decrease in resistance as the
temperature rises (NTC). For this
Q buy some delay
timers, but the supplier
1k
+ +
R1 R2
project, we use NTC (Negative has been extremely 1k 1k 1k 1M
Temperature Coefficient) thermistors. slow. The timers I am +
5k
A characteristic of the NTC most interested in Trigger
LM324
thermistor is that, when you pass are for a 24-volt, DC Wind Shield
current through it, it dissipates power relay circuit. I can 1k 4.7k
— heat. This causes the resistance to purchase the relays
decrease, which allows more current from RadioShack
Air Flow Switch Figure 3
MAY 2004 29
Q&ALargeVersion.qxd 4/7/2004 6:36 PM Page 30
Q&A
+
10k COM
0.22 NC flip-flops plus support circuitry for
10k 47k 10k 1uF 1M COM fractional division and a regulated
8 4 10k 8 4
Delay
7 7 NO power supply.
3 Adj 3 1N4002
6 555 6 555 However, a reasonably accurate
.05 .05 24VDC timer can be made using a 558 ring
2 2 1k Relay
counter and a pair of D-type flip-flops
1 5 1 5 2N4410
Start 10uF
(Figure 5) — just two ICs and a fistful
1uF
.01 .01 of resistors and capacitors. A ring
counter is a concatenated string of
monostable multivibrators where the
0.1 - 10 Sec Delay Relay Figure 4 output of the last stage feeds back
and triggers the first stage so that the
increase that range. I could give you a Precision On/Off ripple effect never stops. The 558
formula for calculating the time delay, Timer contains four monostable stages.
but I’ll give you a 555 calculator If each stage times out at exactly
instead. My favorite is 555_CALC.zip, . I have been looking for a circuit 225 seconds, the total time delay
which you can find posted on our
website (www.nutsvolts.com). Here
Q to turn a relay on for 15 minutes
and off for 15 minutes, continuing in
from start to finish is 15 minutes.
Using standard values of 1 MΩ and
are some additional 555 websites that this pattern until I turn it off. It has to 220 µF, the time delay is 220
sport 555 timer calculators. be accurate and needs to operate seconds, which is an overall error of
from a 9-volt DC source. Can you 20 seconds. R1 is used to adjust
w w w.meridianelectronics.ca/ help me on this? the final stage to make up for this
gadgets/555/555.html Robert Hernandez difference and normal variations
via Internet (tolerance) in the timing components.
w w w.talkingelectronics.com/ The 4013 flip-flop is used to
FreeProjects/555/555-P3.html . The fact that you need a toggle the relay between on and off,
http://freespace.virgin.net/matt.w
A precision timer
translates into an expensive digital
normally thus assuring a precise 50% duty
cycle. The spare flip-flop is used as a
aite/resource/handy/pinouts/555/ divider solution — one that requires a logic switch for the ring’s operation.
With S1 in the OFF
position, both chips
+9V
are reset and armed.
Moving S1 to ON and
5 pressing the Start
Vcc 1M button starts the timer.
10k 1M 10k 1M 10k 1M 10k 10k
558 558 558 R1 558 Different delay
3 TR 3 TR 3 TR 100k 3 TR times can be done by
1 1 1 1
OUT OUT OUT OUT changing the value of
2 TIME 2 TIME 2 TIME 2 TIME
Start the timing capacitors
GND RESET (220 µF) and/or
+
+
+
S Relay
SE558 or the very
1N4001
D Q expensive NTE926. At
4013 _
CP Q the time of this writing,
Everything For Electronics
R 1k
2N3906
Jameco (800-831-4242;
w w w.jameco.com)
had the NE558 in stock
Figure 5 at just $.69.
MAY 2004
30
Q&ALargeVersion.qxd 4/8/2004 1:43 PM Page 31
Q&A
FG
+sense
+source
-source
L
o
a
card oscilloscope.” How do you create read: +V+S, +V, -V, -V-S, FG, AC(N) -sense d
a PC sound card o’scope? AC(L), and AC(N). Can you
Warren help me? Remote Sensing Power Supply
Chas, SC Brian Gracia
via Internet output to play through the headset
. With software. There are several earpiece, but I have been unable to
A packages to choose from — most
of them free. My favorite is Winscope, A . Here are the definitions of the
terminals.
make the microphone feed audio into
the laptop. As I understand it, the
which you can download from our The remote sense terminals are impedance is identical, so I must be
website (www.nutsvolts.com) the voltage regulator inputs and have missing something.
under the filename WINSCOPE.ZIP. to be tied to their respective source Miguel Chabolla
This dual-trace oscilloscope is made terminal. Normally, this connection is via Internet
by converting the audio signals of the made inside the power supply. By
left and right inputs of the sound card separating them and making them . Most cell phone headset
into digital numbers using the card’s
onboard ADC. The upper frequency
available from the outside, you can
compensate for voltage loss in the
A
microphones use a 2.5 mm plug,
whereas the PC card uses a 3.5 mm
response is limited to just 20 kHz, but wiring between the power supply and jack. This means that, if the headset
that’s sufficient for most audio work the load. Let me illustrate by the way plug fits into the sound card, it
and experimentation. of a drawing (Figure 6). probably isn’t compatible with either
standard cell phones or PCs.
Downloadable Data Cell Phone to PC The microphone (Mic) input of a
Sheets Card Interface PC sound card requires about 1 volt
of audio, which requires an amplified
. I am searching for a website to . I have been interested in electret microphone — which, in turn,
Q look up data sheets. For example,
I would type 74LS00 and the site
Q interfacing a standard cell phone
hands-free headset to my laptop via
requires a power supply. This power is
provided through the center contact
would show the actual data sheets for the Mic and Spkr jacks. I have of the microphone plug (Figure 7).
this device. Does such a site exist? succeeded in getting the speaker The power supply is severely
Sassan
via Internet
Most orders ship the day received! World-wide shipping. Convenient payment options.
K150AU-24, made by Cosel. A net
MAY 2004 31
Q&ALargeVersion.qxd 4/7/2004 6:56 PM Page 32
Q&A
330 1000uF
cap from the circuit and switches creates a 10:1 voltage ratio (Figure
Figure 8
the coil over to the 12-volt line, 10). At low frequencies, all of the
which latches the relay on. The load current goes through the
330 Ω resistor bleeds resistive divider; at high frequencies,
+5V
off any charge the current through the capacity
Figure 9 remaining in the cap. divider swamps the resistive
When the button is component. For the above resistor
2N3906 pressed again, the coil and capacitor values, the crossover
100k 74HCT73 sees a shorted (fully occurs at about 1 kHz.
1k
J Q discharged) capacitor Instead of calibrating the resis-
NUTS & VOLTS
CP _
K Q and the relay drops tive and capacitive divider separately
On/Off 0.22 R
100k out. This applies volt- with variable frequency sources,
1N4148 To
Controlled
age to the capacitor, most scope probe calibrators use a 1
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