ESR meter upgrades

[Per Hansson]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

That's exactly what I did.
Mine is a GM328R

[xelectech]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

Longtime lurker here checking in - I finally got cable internet a little while ago, never be able to go back now...

Anyway, got tired of not having a working esr meter so tried another one, this time from aliexpress, a supposedly pre-assembled- and working one - but it doesn't work; the problem is it won't measure the capacitor during self-test, just keeps flashing the '>100nF' and 0pF
till it times out and says 'end test' (or whatever). Over a period of 3 days I must have tried to
complete the self-test 2 or 3 dozen times, and then this morning it finally completed the test once, by correctly reading the 100nF cap hooked up to it, but after the test it still couldn't read any component correctly, and was once again found unable to complete the self-test ( wouldn't read the .1 cap ).

Also, the pins on the 'chip socket' don't ohm out with respect to the numbered pads (1,2,3)
like they did on previous ones, can someone please tell me what the chip socket pin-out should be?

[vinceroger69]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

Longtime lurker here checking in - I finally got cable internet a little while ago, never be able to go back now...

Anyway, got tired of not having a working esr meter so tried another one, this time from aliexpress, a supposedly pre-assembled- and working one - but it doesn't work; the problem is it won't measure the capacitor during self-test, just keeps flashing the '>100nF' and 0pF
till it times out and says 'end test' (or whatever). Over a period of 3 days I must have tried to
complete the self-test 2 or 3 dozen times, and then this morning it finally completed the test once, by correctly reading the 100nF cap hooked up to it, but after the test it still couldn't read any component correctly, and was once again found unable to complete the self-test ( wouldn't read the .1 cap ).

Also, the pins on the 'chip socket' don't ohm out with respect to the numbered pads (1,2,3)
like they did on previous ones, can someone please tell me what the chip socket pin-out should be?

im not sure if the latest firmware is in this thread so maybe look in this eevblog thread as it has this identical meter in it with the latest firmware etc
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/$20-lcr-esr-transistor-checker-project/4000/

[xelectech]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

Thank you sir!

[stj]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

that's an "AY-AT" loads of info on that.
btw, to calibrate it you need a 220nF cap for best results.
a 100nF cap can be read as 99nF and then not complete the test - it must see 100n or higher.

[jondoe]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

Make sure the cap isn't in the device until it starts flashing/asking for it, then use a 220nF as mention above, I've found if you put it in early the calibration can fail.

[xelectech]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

that's an "AY-AT" loads of info on that.
btw, to calibrate it you need a 220nF cap for best results.
a 100nF cap can be read as 99nF and then not complete the test - it must see 100n or higher.

I'd only used 100nF before on the 2 previous testers I had and never had a problem with calibrating, thanks for the info - I'll just twist a couple together and try it with 200nF.

What's "AY-AT"? Gotta go read eevblog now for about 4372 posts...

[stj]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

well there are shitloads of these devices with small differences.
it gets to be a serious problem when you need to upgrade with the correct firmware.

so i started calling that model the "AY-AT" because it's screen printed on the pcb, and it just caught on.
so i set the trend.

the other common one is the GM328 series from E-Z studio's
which surprisingly has exactly that screen printed on it.

the real problems come from the scraping the bottom of the barrel types like the T4 that actually never says anything on it!
that's the crude yellow pcb model you see for peanuts.

[RukyCon]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

I recently got a new part test unit thingy... Here it is.

Not sure what the model is but i think it's the one stj has been calling 'AY-AT'.
The black box [the one you can't see in the photo :P] behind it is a 8 AA battery holder in place of the 9v battery, the reason for it is because the 9v battery holder for some reason just stopped working. [By that i mean the unit would not work at all even with a brand new cell.] One problem i had out-of-the-box was a broken copper track, But i fixed it.
This unit seems to be decent for the price and i'm happy with it.

[stj]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

you dont need 9v, the regulator can probaby handle 6v.

i'm intending to run mine from a pair of lithium 18650's once i get some protection boards from china.

[RukyCon]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

you dont need 9v, the regulator can probaby handle 6v.

i'm intending to run mine from a pair of lithium 18650's once i get some protection boards from china.

My original plain was to make my unit run off of two 18650 cells. I have all of the parts i need to do so.

[xelectech]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

well there are shitloads of these devices with small differences.
it gets to be a serious problem when you need to upgrade with the correct firmware.

so i started calling that model the "AY-AT" because it's screen printed on the pcb, and it just caught on.
so i set the trend.

the other common one is the GM328 series from E-Z studio's
which surprisingly has exactly that screen printed on it.

the real problems come from the scraping the bottom of the barrel types like the T4 that actually never says anything on it!
that's the crude yellow pcb model you see for peanuts.

Oh, that the acronym came to me, 'And Yet - An other Tester;

I twisted a couple .1uF caps together to do the self test, then I set em down somewhere, only new ones in the house, grr...

[TEDDIBEAR]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

I know this is a long thread, I have a LCR-T4-H which I manage to corrupt in some way all it would allow me to do is adjust the contrast or in test mode every thing tested weather it was a capacitor resistor inductor showed 4.7 volt
on the display, reading all your posts, I decided to purchase a usbavr programmer. this arrived and drivers etc were loaded,not knowing much about programming I cut and pasted your avrdude file and finished up with this(see photos) and a LCR-T4 with a momentary blank screen on switch on.
All I would like to know have I bricked the atmega328, if so could I just replace the chip and reload your avrdude file.
John

[vinceroger69]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

I know this is a long thread, I have a LCR-T4-H which I manage to corrupt in some way all it would allow me to do is adjust the contrast or in test mode every thing tested weather it was a capacitor resistor inductor showed 4.7 volt
on the display, reading all your posts, I decided to purchase a usbavr programmer. this arrived and drivers etc were loaded,not knowing much about programming I cut and pasted your avrdude file and finished up with this(see photos) and a LCR-T4 with a momentary blank screen on switch on.
All I would like to know have I bricked the atmega328, if so could I just replace the chip and reload your avrdude file.
John

Maybe have a read of this thread too yes its long but it will have the firmware you need for this tester
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/$20-lcr-esr-transistor-checker-project/4175/

[jondoe]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

I know this is a long thread, I have a LCR-T4-H which I manage to corrupt in some way all it would allow me to do is adjust the contrast or in test mode every thing tested weather it was a capacitor resistor inductor showed 4.7 volt
on the display, reading all your posts, I decided to purchase a usbavr programmer. this arrived and drivers etc were loaded,not knowing much about programming I cut and pasted your avrdude file and finished up with this(see photos) and a LCR-T4 with a momentary blank screen on switch on.
All I would like to know have I bricked the atmega328, if so could I just replace the chip and reload your avrdude file.
John

Chances are you haven't broken it entirely, just uploaded a crappy firmware. Reflashing it might get you back into the land of the living without the need to replace the chip itself. I must have flashed 20+ broken firmwares to my tester when I first started playing with it, but it's working fine now!

Try this one? http://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgea...867/#msg659867

[stj]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

am i the ONLY one who reads the text on screen / in your foto??

you didnt program the mcu - only erased it.
it couldnt find the right filenames to flash!!

so program it again - this time make sure the files are there and the names match.

[jondoe]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

LOL �� well spotted!

[Per Hansson]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

No stj, I read it too.

error opening TransistorTester.hex: No such file or directory

^^Well there's your problem!
Well, that and the fact that I don't think anyone posted a precompiled T4 firmware in this thread. (I could be wrong but don't remember it at least).

The link by jondoe above looks correct.
Of course newer firmware exists, but this is a good start anyway!

[vinceroger69]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

am i the ONLY one who reads the text on screen / in your foto??

you didnt program the mcu - only erased it.
it couldnt find the right filenames to flash!!

so program it again - this time make sure the files are there and the names match.

Yes well spotted stj, i totally missed that in the first picture.

[TEDDIBEAR]

Re: ESR meter upgrades

Thanks to all for your help,and to Stj for finding the error, unfortunately being very new to using usbasp I am having trouble after downloading program transfering it to avrdude files, what files would I need to add to this (
avrdude -c USBasp -P usb -p m328p -U flash:w:TransistorTester.hex \-U eeprom:w:TransistorTester.eep \-U lfuse:w:0xf7:m \-U hfuse:w:0xd9:m \-U efuse:w:0xfc:m) to get the flash for mcu to except, sorry if I sound a bit thick
but I have been told this can not be done, only through arduino, by local computer engineer, but I think you guys know a lot more than he does.
John