Here is yet another new product announcement! In the same line as the new pi3hat, here is a new minor revision of the power_dist, the r4.5b:
The changes are largely the same as for the new pi3hat:
Check it out at mjbots.com today!
I’m excited to announce a minor upgrade to the mjbots pi3hat product line, the pi3hat r4.5!
This has a few upgrades over the old r4.4b:
Check it out at mjbots.com today!
Here’s yet another update to the moteus line, moteus r4.11!
r4.11 is electrically, mechanically, and software compatible with r4.3, r4.5, and r4.8.
This revision supports two alternate footprints for the CAN-FD transceiver to better support component availability and refines the power stage for the DRV8353 gate driver. moteus r4.8 was the first version to use the DRV8353 because of, once again, component availability issues. However, it was developed on a very abbreviated schedule. With r4.11 the EMI is much improved over r4.8 and r4.5, and the efficiency is much better than r4.8 at all input voltages and PWM frequencies.
| PWM Frequency | 24V r4.11 | 24V r4.8 | 36V r4.11 | 36V r4.8 |
| 15kHz | 95% / 0.28W | 94% / 0.20W | 95% / 0.30W | 92% / 0.25W |
| 40kHz | 93% / 0.35W | 88% / 0.25W | 90% / 0.38W | 85% / 0.30W |
| 50kHz | 91% / 0.36W | 84% / 0.30W | 89% / 0.40W | 84% / 0.35W |
The matching development kit will be available shortly, once the r4.8 developer kits sell out.
While testing some variants and new versions of the power_dist board, I wanted to be able to simulate the types of loads that it experiences with a fully loaded robot. Some things are easy, like this capacitor attached to an XT30 connector:
I also have giant power resistors in a similar form factor:
However, a dumb load resistor isn’t a particularly representative load. Most likely, the loads that a power_dist will drive are active loads with switching regulators. When the output voltage is lower, the current will be correspondingly higher. That is especially important when validating pre-charge behavior, because it means that the current is much higher during the initial pre-charge window than it would be for a pure resistive load.
Thus, I made a tiny switching regulator to which I can stick a load resistor to the output.
Unfortunately since MacroFab discontinued their prototype tier, it no longer is as convenient to get one offs populated in the US. So this one I did by hand with a stencil, solder paste, a 3D printed frame, and some new tools, a vacuum pick, and a hot plate. I discovered you can get room temperature stable solder paste now — how convenient!
There were a few bugs… I managed to not have 0603 resistors for the voltage sense divider on hand, but had 0402 of the right values so just stuck a blob of solder to connect them. On the same resistors, I also managed to get the PCB labels swapped. Fixing that resulted in a board that does what it is supposed to!
Meet the newest revision of the moteus controller!
Yes, it does look mostly the same as the r4.3 that has been getting a lot of use lately. This revision exists mostly to improve manufacturability, but I snuck in a minor design improvement while at it. Now, the maximum voltage input is rated up to 44V from the 34V of the r4.3! (Note though, that the pi3hat and power_dist still are limited to 34V). Otherwise the new controller is fully electrically, mechanically, and software compatible with the r4.3.
It is now the default in the mjbots store, only $5 more than the old version at $84.
It seems that I’m learning much about PCB design the very hard way. Back last year I wrote up my discovery of MLCC bias derating. Now I’ll share some of my experiences with MLCC cracking on the first production moteus controllers.
When I was first putting the production moteus controllers through their test and programming sequence, I observed a failure mode that I had yet to have observe in my career (which admittedly doesn’t include much board manufacturing). When applying voltage, I got a spark and puff of magic smoke from near one of the DC link capacitors on the left hand side. In the first batch of 40 I programmed, a full 20% failed in this way, some at 24V, and a few more at a 38V test. I initially thought the problem might have been an etching issue resulting in voltage breakdown between a via and an internal ground plane, but after examining the results under the microscope and conferring with MacroFab determined the most likely cause was cracking of the MLCCs during PCB depanelization.
Here’s a video describing the problem and potential solutions in way more detail than I’ll go into:
Needless to say, I hadn’t managed to see this failure in the 100 or so previous moteus controllers I’ve built, or I would have figured this out and resolved it!
For this first round of production controllers, I went and replaced every single capacitor near the edge of the board with a TDK variant that has internal soft termination, then tested them all at max voltage and a little beyond. Future revisions will use that variant of capacitor everywhere, as well as relocating the capacitors to reduce the mechanical stress they experience during manufacturing, handling, and installation.
Like with the fdcanusb, I built a programming and test fixture for the moteus controllers. The basic setup is similar to the fdcanusb. I have a raspberry pi with a touchscreen connected via USB to a number of peripherals. In this case, there is a STM32 programmer, a fdcanusb, and a label printer. Here though, unlike with the fdcanusb fixture, I wanted to be able to test the drive stage of the controllers and the encoders too.
My solution was to create a mechanical fixture that each board slots onto, with pogo pins that connect to test points for the phase outputs.
While it doesn’t make as good a connection as the solder through holes normally used to connect a motor, it is good enough to verify that the controller works. As a side-bonus, it also makes it trivial to test that the absolute magnetic encoder works properly.
This video shows how the programming and testing process works, and walks through testing a few boards.
While I was able to make the r2 power distribution board work, it did require quite a bit more than my usual number of blue wires and careful trace cutting.
Thus I spun a new revision r3, basically just to fix all the blue wires so that I could have some spares without having to worry about the robustness of my hot glue. While I was at it, I updated the logo:
As seems to be the way of things, a few days after I sent this board off to be manufactured, I realized that the CAN port needed to actually be isolated, since when the switches are off, the ground is disconnected from the rest of the system. Sigh. Guess that will wait for r4.
Here is r3 all wired up into the chassis:
With the new FD-CAN based moteus controllers I need a way for the raspberry pi to communicate with them. Thus I’ve got a new adapter board in house that I’m bringing up:
This one has 5 independent FD-CAN channels, an IMU, a port for an nrf2401l RF transceiver as well as a buck converter to power the computer from the main battery bus.
The prototypes were largely constructed by MacroFab, although I did the Amass connectors and the STM32s because supply chain issues prevented me from getting those parts to MacroFab in time.
Next I’ll start bringing up the various pieces!
Finally returning back to other pieces of my quad roadmap, I finished getting an updated power distribution board ready for the quad A0. This board is one I had made many months ago and mostly brought up, but then didn’t quite finish. The r1 was when I first discovered my unfortunate stm32g4 pinout problems that doomed 3 of my in flight boards. The pictures here are of r2, which suffered from yet more pinout problems, resulting in more than my usual number of blue wires. Fortunately, identifying those problems here let me fix them ahead of time for the fdcanusb and moteus r4 boards.
This version has a probably overkill XT90 input connector, 6x XT30 output connectors, a connector for a lighted toggle switch and an FD-CAN port. The CAN port will eventually allow me to implement a soft power off, although I haven’t done that yet.
When hooked up to a moteus dev kit, it does do the proper pre-charging thing:
A Modicum of Fun 