Never one to take the easy road, I thought I'd share my progress so far
with building up my uBitx. I call it my "Franken-uBitx" because it is
made up from a lot of different parts I had laying around. :-) :-)
So far, my Franken-uBitx consists of the following:
1) An unchanged uBitx main board (no Raduino used)
2) An Adafruit 2050 3.5 inch (320 x 480) TFT touchscreen
3) An Adafruit 2045 Si5351 Clock Generator Breakout board
4) Meduino Mega2560 Pro Mini board
as the major assemblies.
The software started out as the TFT_uBitx sketch by VU2SPF and VE1BWV.
I then made various changes to the code:
1) To more easily support the Meduino board (2 row pin headers
instead of single pins; but the board is about the size of an
Uno)
2) Support the TFT display
3) Support the encoder
Some of the other changes I have made (or am planing to make) are:
1) Added a socket for the TDA2822 chip
2) Separate fuses for the uBitx board and PA
3) Separate On/Off switch (and power on LED) and traditional
(shaft) sized volume control
4) Separate 5V regulator (with plus and minus power buss) to
power the Meduino, display, and Si5351 boards
All of this in a Hammond box I had around.
Right now, the sketch works with a nice touch screen interface as well
as all the clock frequencies generated. The next major step is to wire
up the 5V regulator and power buss. Then it is really nothing more than
connecting everything up. Then some final testing before getting on the
air.
In addition, I'll be documenting all of this (with pictures) for anyone
else to borrow from :-)
Oh yes, I also have another uBitx I plan to leave pretty much stock except
for changing the 2 line display to a 4 line display. That way I'll have
an easy way to do A / B comparisons.
Hopefully my project will add to the pool of things for others to try :-P
73
- Mark N1VQW
