maybe adding 12 groups of vias, even though there are 11 charlieplexed groups will make it easier to route around the hour LEDs? this PCB is starting to look like a @welshpixie mandala
#Kicad friends: is there a way to request tented vias on only one side? I'd like the spiral to be shiny on the top and covered on the bottom
thanks to a suggestion from @marble and the power of python, there are now a gross number of small circles in the F.Mask layer to un-tent the vias on only one side of the board.
Now with a 3D printed case and 22mm nato watch strap. Need to get a 35mm sapphire and maybe a wider band.
All of the test Charliewatch boards fab'ed and assembled by Aisler work perfectly (other than things that I broke, like not noticing that this MSP430 requires load caps for the crystal). For the next rev I want to squeeze the LEDs closer together to shrink the watch face a bit, which might require violating the ERC.
@th I thought the version you showed me and Shenzhen a few years ago was beautiful, but you’ve outdone yourself.
@th this is so cool, and now I'm imagining it with white LEDs and a tinted acrylic cover 🤔
@pixls I made a white version of the single-color design, but the problem is that the forward voltage on the LEDs is too high, so once the battery drops below 3V it stops working. This means a few weeks instead of a several months of runtime with the red/yellow LEDs that can go down to 1.9V.
@th oh wow, wild. that does look great tho
@federico3 @pixls many of my watches are 24-hour, although the observation was that nine charlieplexed IO lines could drive 9*(9-2) = 72 = 60 + 12 LEDs. For the bicolor ones 12 IO lines can drive 12*(12-1) = 132 = 60 + 60 + 12 LEDs. There weren't any values that provided nice 24-hour dial combinations.
@th Very neat :)
For everyday use I would prefer it to make special moves only on special occasions (like end of the workday), but I assume thats presentation mode :)
@th omfg this is gorgeous! 🤩✨
@th Looks really cool✨ congrats on an interesting project!
@th @codinghorror is there no top layer on the print?
@th WOW 😱
I've started porting the older Charliewatch animations to the bi-color version. I should rethink some of them now that we can distinguish the different hands.