From TIER

Once the parts are organized, this board takes about 1hr to solder.

• List of parts - enough parts to build 3 48V controllers. The 12V controller parts list is a subset of this list. The list is missing
  • 3-pin headers
  • 1k resistors
  • red and green LEDs
• Schematic - EAGLE schematic of the board
• Layout - EAGLE layout of the board (there is an error)
  • Image of error
  • the via near the solder point for the wire needs to be separated from the connected line
• Project File (missing)
• errata
  • Missing parts in order (see above)
  • C22-C22 are 220uF
  • L2 is 33uH
  • L1 has part number BLM21AG121SND1D in the above list
  • SL1 and SL2 are headers
  • The footprint for X1 is wrong, so you have to tweak the pins to get it to fit
  • Layout mistake (see above)
  • heatsink on Q3 doesn't fit with the screw header

RS-232 Interface

The SL2 three pin header is an RS-232 interface. The charge controller periodically outputs data on this

Testing

12 Volt output

Adjustable voltage output

The solar panel connects to where the YELLOW-BLACK wire pair is connected (near the bottom of the picture ). YELLOW wire is positive terminal of the panel, BLACK is for the negative.

The battery connects to where the RED-BLACK wire pair is connected (near the bottom of the picture ). RED wire is positive, BLACK is negative.

Ethernet with PoE goes into the RJ45 connector. Pins 4/5 of the RJ45 is positive, while 7/8 is negative. Warning. Do not connect the RJ45 cable to a laptop or computer as this may fry your wired ethernet port. You can build a cable with wires 4/5 and 7/8 disconnected or uncrimped so you can connect this RJ45 a laptop or computer. You can then see what the board is sending through the Ethernet by using a packet sniffer (e.g. Ethereal).

The group of BLACK-BLUE-YELLOW wire near the top right corner is for the serial interface. BLACK is GND, BLUE is RX and YELLOW is TX. You can also view data here, format is 19200 8N1.

The remain pair of connections of the black terminal block (where the panel and battery are also connected) is for an optional load 12V load. GND is connector near the left edge of the black terminal block.

hen powering up the board, LED1 should light up, and LED2 should also light up, then go from bright to dim to off in about one minute.

You should get something like this out of the serial port.

B747 B80F C400 506C 5065 4BB3 4B8D 5087 4DE4 804B A000

04
9FC0 A04F AC00 506E 5053 4BBC 4B82 4F60 4F0E 804B 9F00
894F 89C1 C500 5073 505B 4BBD 4B86 4FA9 4ECF 804B A180
94C0 9500 A540 5086 5046 4BAF 4B8A 4F6C 4F0A 804B 9C80

Except for the single "04" output in one line, all other streams from the serial port should look like the first line. The "04" indicates that the pic is able to talk to the ethernet chip and hopefully as is well with respect to the ethernet part.

The 32-bit words represent (in the following order)

1. load voltage,
2. battery voltage,
3. solar panel voltage,
4. load current high cycle (iLh),
5. load current low cycle (iLl),
6. battery current high cycle (iBh),
7. battery current low cycle (iBl),
8. solar current high cycle (iSh),
9. solar current low cycle (iSl),
10. debugging stuff

Conversion factor for the voltages is 12.73/"0x8F80." To get the current readings, use

iB = {[iBh/(IBh + IBl) - 0.5]/0.5}*10 A
iL = ...
iS = ...

Thus, a quick look at the stream from the serial port, with no load on the system you should get iLh approx equal to iLl, iBh approx equal to iBl, etc.

Assuming your powering the system from solar panel connector (terminals nearest the capacitor), you should be getting non-zero readings from the battery and load terminals. If testing the board through the solar connector, you should be using about 20V. If testing the board through the battery connector (middle two terminals), you should use 12-14