The Amp Hour

By The Amp Hour (Chris Gammell and David L Jones)Science Technology Education How To Physics

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18th
on Physics
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Followers
Typical duration
66 min
per episode

Based on Podcast App listening data

The Amp Hour episodes

May 23, 2024Long Distance with CNLohr-a
Welcome back, CNLohr!
CNLohr was on the last episode talking about the CH32V003 part and the CH32V003fun library
Charlieplexed errings
Fast iteration
Lohr-a...LoRa...get it?
LoRa
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIdHBDSQHyw
Started in January 2024 with discussions with mustardtiger / Frank
Charles had done Wifi long range before
Also FM from ATTINY85
Ethernet + AM
Radio signals without radios
USB
Harmonics
LolRa
Upchirps / downchirps
903.825 - 903.975 mhz
Michael Ossmann talk
LoRa doesn't do code matching
JP Norair talking about LoRaWAN / DASH7
Tool / emulator for the airwaves
3 lines of the repo
Tool to create tables
There are two 2 lookup tables (up and downchirps)
Table is different for differnet spreading factors and base frequencies
Andreas Spiess LoRa/LoRaWAN distance attempts
Spreading Factor -- can't past SF10 on this setup for unknown reason
AirSpy
Matt Knight
LoRaWAN -- protocol vs network
The Things Network / Helium
Activation by personalization
Nesting dolls of encryption
New parts CH32V002 (also, -005, -006. -007)
Charles is excited about the op amp on the CH32V006 that has 64 MHz GBW
CH32V203 - 144 MHz - $0.24, has usb xcvr
CH32X035 is self clocking - best low cost option for USB
All are supported in library now
Community - CNLohr discord
Porting examples for the parts using the technical reference manual
MNIST database - handwriting recognition system
Announcement post on CNX about the new parts
It's possible to hook up parts directly through the 1 pin SWIO, so you can hot-load firmware
Writing code onto a "scratch pad"
Want to see more CNLohr experiements online?
Youtube.com/cnlohr
discord: cnlohr reach out for invite
Github
1 hr 32 min
May 08, 2024Good Energy Citizen
Sickness
Starliner scrub
Boeing and the Dark Age of American Manufacturing
Toolkit for flying
Search industry
A380
EUV in semiconductors
EV vs PHEV vs ICE
Tesla sending emails to suppliers after laying off the Supercharger team
powerledger / POWR
Virtual power plant
DEYE inverter
Buying repacked batteries
AC Battery vs DC battery
Hybrid inverter
Colin Furze
TSMC running into problems with work culter after moving to US (Arizona)
Marketplace piece about jobs at semi plans in AZ
996
Photos of the new Samsung Fab going up on Google Maps
Chris asked on Mastodon about the best time to charge an EV
Duck Curve, which Chris first learned about on episode for 630
The costs of different aspects of a chip fab
1 hr 7 min
April 25, 2024Really long needle nose pliers
Analog Cochlear Detectors
Voyager I is back online
Sustaining engineering
Bobiverse books
Chandra telescope
Embedded World
Embedded World US in October
Trade shows in US
Travel budgets
Z80 obsolete notice
Rabbit instruction set
Dave trying out the Jumperless breadboard (lights up)
Uri
Robert Nelson
Bluetooth
Sigrok
Zephyr LLEXT
ZMK
1 hr 10 min
April 04, 2024Simulating doors falling off
Chris will be at Embedded World 24 next week
Bluetooth standard messages like HT, HR
Early bluetooth devices (were terrible)
WiBree (?)
Sequans deal with Renesas fell apart
There was a Sequans modem on the PyCom FiPy
The low power ISM network Chris couldn't remember was SigFox
Synopsis acquired Ansys (back in January)
Here comes the flood of Plugin Hybrids
Dave's sick car - 2010 Nissan dualis - Second channel
New Espressif ESP32-P4 is getting ready to release
Bitluni makes custom silicon (spoilers!)
Past guest Pete Bevelaqua has a new Kickstarter where he's passing power through a window (up to 30 mm thick)
Top 10 Hobby Components (PartsBox) - submitted by former guest Jan Rychter
Top 5 transistor video
New BealgleBoard.org board isn't in the BeagleBone form factor
1 hr 4 min
March 26, 2024Motors on PCBs with Carl Bugeja
Welcome Carl Bugeja!
Carl lives and works in Malta
He got started with robotics at his university
Carl recently announced he would be launching a new company
The company is called Microbots and they will sell components and kits for building similar projects to what Carl shows on his channel
BigHero6 reference
https://microbots.io/products/flatflap
Max PCB temp is 130C
Driven by series resistance of coil
Tg value of PCBs
A circuit that can solder itself
How hot can a Flex PCB get?
Batch vs raster
Do you math?
Tryng to get the perfect temperatures and dealing with flex materials
Dealing with manufacturing differnces
Scanning PCB Coils with X-Rays
Sending PCB specs
Incoming inspection and testing
Testing boards with resistance
Time flap produce
User testing
Drive circuits - How do you evaluate?
Don't build your own H Bridge
Optimizing for size
Is Carl looking for other features?
Building libraries for driver
Foldable 4 wheeled robot , an all one PCB
ESP32-C3, connected to playstation remote
Boston Dynamics uncanny valley
Gathering on social
Top down vs bottom up (start at the top)
Prior to YouTube, Carl worked at a startup
Drones - 2 prop
Bluetooth tags
Later he moved to the automotive industry
Concept vehicles
Software
What's in Malta?
Building a remote electronics business
Remote actuators on a PCB
Microbots Flexar Driver
Driving down the price per cell
Similar to how they drove down the cost of LCD displays
Pixel, voxel, moxel, maxel?
Flipdots
PCB Actuation
Find Carl on YouTube and Instagram, and check out his work on the new Microbots site!
57 min
March 20, 2024The non-Stinky Car
Chris got a Chevy Bolt (2023 1LT) The model has since been discontinued
11 kW charging using a level 2 charger
Flappy paddle to recapture battery (instead of the brake)
Ioniq 5/6
Aptera
Marques Brownlee reviews the Prius
V2G is avaialble as a software upgrade to the Nissan Leaf
2nd channel abs bypass
Microbit v2
Robot video with Huxley
Software updates on a door handle
Chris is playing around with 20V DeWalt batteries
Battery fast charger schematic
Bosch adapter
Vmount batteries, as explained by Caleb of DSLR Video Shooter
Sony batteries
Dave's tutorial on charging
Chris might try out OnShape
If you're interested in helping model some battery stuff (or know someone who can), please email [email protected]
Sony battery lab hack
1 hr 7 min
March 11, 2024Blogging Electronics with Pallav Aggarwal
Welcome Pallav Aggarwal of CAPUF Embedded!
Chris enjoyed Pallav's series on learning the ch32v003 - fun vs HAL
Ambiq Apollo
Decision trees when considering hardware vs firmware
Expensive to do software and stuff
Order some of the boards Pallav created on Evelta
India ecosystem for hw
India industry
CAPUF team size
Pallav shares teardowns on YouTube
reducing complexity
Reviewing customer designs and removing 40%
RP2040 in usb debuggers
Efficiency consulting
Over indexing on form and fit during rev 1
Troubleshoot: Joulescope / Saleae / Static analyzer
Pallav has a page where he tracks AI tools for PCB creation
There's another page where he tracks AI modules / chips
DevRel as a service
Nordic
Check out Capuf.in for more info on Pallav's consulting or reach out via email
1 hr 4 min
March 05, 2024My Toothbrush Is Broadcasting
Promise of smart home
Electronic keypad
Keyfob
Proxmark
Oral B bluetooth toothbrush
Braun toothbrush teardown
Solar road shutdown
Smart mains socket tester
ch32v003 testing success
Samy keylogger
Startups in Germany (can any German listeners verify?)
Diyode mag is shutting down
KiCad 8 was released! James Lewis did a good overview video
SPICE in CAD
Composite amplifier
Zephyr 3.6 release
Altera
1 hr 7 min
February 20, 2024Altium...Acquired!
Renesas buying Altium
Altium bought Octopart in 2017
Tasking debugger
Cloud focus after reorg
History of Protel / Altium - started in 1985 by Nick Martin
Turbo Pascal
CAD tool for windows in 90s
protel99
Altium Buys Morfik in 2010
Nick booted out
After the reorg, the stock steadily grew
You can watch the Renesas/Altium announcement on Zoom
There is also a slide deck available
Dave linked an article from the financial press in Austrailia
Zuken
Altera is apparently spinning back out
Steve Liebsen on The Amp Hour
Intel is getting a $10B chunk of the CHIPS act money
Steve Sanghi (Microchip) discussed the act when he was on the show
Synergy flavored milk
Other properties we forgot were part of Altium:
Circuit Studio
Upverter (formerly on the show!)
Gumstix
Autotrax - Taylor's version (DEX PCB just...took the name?)
1 hr 14 min
February 13, 2024Uncle Al's Eating Garbage Again
AI tools for recording
32 bit recording
Pool robot
Home assistant
Power points in the ceiling in Dave's office park
CH32V003 board
CNLohr episode
rv003usb library
Mike Harrison doing a video about a CH32V003 standalone programmer
nRF24
Low cost modules Chris bought on Amazon
Samy Kamkar on the show
Samy talk about balloons
Drone shows
Time difference of distances
Dave's video about HP atomic clocks
XKCD Radiation Dose Chart
DTCXO
In the Bond movies they're not nerds
LCD and fonts
AI pin
Vision Pro
iFixit teardown
Chris will be at Embedded World again this year, come say hi!
1 hr 8 min