Thanks for all the help!

DiverBob

I just wanted to thank everyone for their help. This help consisted of either helping me with specific programing problems or the many people's generous code donations to the exchange.

I have nearly finished a project that has taken almost 2 years to complete by sending out the first 2 prototypes for testing. Talk about cutting back on my stress levels! Now I spend the next couple of months tweeking the software and design as the testers identify issues.

For those of you who haven't read some of my earlier threads, I am a shipwreck diver that uses a rebreather to explore these ships from the past. Since a rebreather recycles oxygen it is vital to know what you are breathing at all times. To do that most rebreathers have 3 independent O2 monitoring cells that create a linear millivolt output based on the exposed O2 level. I take the millivolt output from th eO2 cells, amplify it, process it in an micochip ADC processor and display the results using a organic LED display system that uses a prop to control the display. That was actually the easy part, the hard part was designing the housings that allow the system to stay waterproof down to ~400 feet.

The prop code uses the Brillidea display driver, basic I2C Driver, FullDuplexSerial, FloatString, and Numbers from the exchange. The code for the prop is fairly complex and I'm down to only about 400 longs left, so I've been optimizing the code to recover memory but may need to come up with some other ideas soon since I want to add a depth pressure sensor, temperature and digital compass capabilities to the system next. So I will still be around reading and watching some of the exciting projects and problems other people run into here in this forum.

I've attached some photos of the unit and the display.

Again, Thank you everyone for your invaluable help - an especially big thank you to Timothy Swieter·for his display driver, that driver pretty much pulled everything together and allowed me to concentrate on other things!

Bob Sweeney

photomankc

Wow. That is flat-out nice!

Given the difficulty I have in just finding a plastic box to fit stuff I can't imagine the added difficulty of locating something that is dead-nuts water tight down to 400ft and allows user input. Really nice looking project.

DiverBob

I didn't mention it earlier but this display is designed to mount to the divers mouthpiece (dive surface valve) and it can be positioned so that the diver can see the display through their mask all the time. Although most divers have another wrist-mounted computer there are times that both hands are busy and having the O2 levels always visible is a valuable safety feature.

There are 3 main components to the system, a switch pendant (3 stainless steel piezo NO switches, no moving parts), the battery box (uses 2 Li-ion 3.6v AA sized batteries and contains the amplifier and microchip ADC 8 pin processor chip that sends the ADC output serially to the prop when requested) and the display unit itself (uses the 0.96 diagonal micro organic LED with prop).

I have a home-made CNC mill and lathe in the basement so all the housings are re-produceable. However, each component went through quite a few revisions before I got things the way I wanted them. I used up a lot of raw materials in this project. But the end product is worth it! I have been diving with an earlier prototype the last 2-3 months with better success than I initially expected·-·although there were a few hiccups along the way! The plan is that this will become a commerial product·early next year.

Bob

Post Edited (DiverBob) : 10/4/2009 4:10:06 PM GMT

potatohead

Thanks for posting up your finished work. I'm just going to echo the sentiments others have and say, "Nice!" --(really e-ffing nice!)

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Timothy D. Swieter

Thanks DiverBob for posting your progress and the pictures. What you have created looks beautiful!

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Timothy D. Swieter, E.I.
www.brilldea.com - Prop Blade, LED Painter, RGB LEDs, 3.0" LCD Composite video display, eProto for SunSPOT
www.tdswieter.com

localroger

Very nice work DB. Thanks for letting us see it.

Cluso99

Very nice indeed Bob. Congratulations, thanks for posting, and kudos to those who helped you

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Links to other interesting threads:

· Home of the MultiBladeProps: TriBlade,·RamBlade, RetroBlade,·TwinBlade,·SixBlade, website
· Single Board Computer:·3 Propeller ICs·and a·TriBladeProp board (ZiCog Z80 Emulator)
· Prop Tools under Development or Completed (Index)
· Emulators: Micros eg Altair, and Terminals eg VT100 (Index) ZiCog (Z80) , MoCog (6809)
· Search the Propeller forums·(uses advanced Google search)
My cruising website is: ·www.bluemagic.biz·· MultiBladeProp is: www.bluemagic.biz/cluso.htm

Roger Lee

Thanks for sharing. Nice practical project.
2 years at elevated stress levels can't be good.

Sorry, I'm not a diver....No, not going to happen.

Here's wishing you nothing but success in the commercial market.

Roger

Rayman

Good job! Looks really professional.

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My Prop Info&Apps: ·http://www.rayslogic.com/propeller/propeller.htm