Documentation/Video/Scripts/CEB Press/Controllerbox

The Compressed Earth Brick Press Controller runs the Brick Press. The main components of the controller are an electrical enclosure with an Arduino microcontroller board, an Arduino breakout board, and a solenoid driver board.

This video describes this controller as of September 2011.

To begin, clear the mounting platform by gently bending away all of the wiring.

Next, place the microcontroller on the blue mounting box, and the breakout board atop the microcontroller, matching the breakout board's male pins to the microcontroller's female pins. The "tops" of the boards should be aligned to the left of the control box. Center the boards to leave as much room as possible around the breakout board. Remove the breakout board while holding the microcontroller in place, and mark screw locations on opposite corners. Remove the microcontroller, and carefully drill the top hole at the mark. Attach the microcontroller with one screw and mark the second hole again for accuracy. Remove the board and drill the second hole. Then attach the microcontroller with small screws. Be careful not to screw the board in too tightly, or the board may bend or crack.

Next, mount the breakout board onto the microcontroller. To accommodate the microcontroller's USB port and power jack, some pins on the breakout board must be removed. Snip the third, fourth and fifth pins from the left and the third and fourth pins from the right on the underside of the bottom of the breakout board. Then gently install the breakout board atop the microcontroller.

Next, connect the power wire from the control box to the breakout board. Use a precision screwdriver to unscrew the terminal labelled "V in" located second from the right on the top terminal block of the breakout board. Attach the red positive voltage wire from the control box to this terminal. Insert the wire and screw the terminal back down while continuing to hold the wire until it is secured.

Connect the black ground wire to the leftmost ground terminal (GND) at the bottom of the breakout board. Connect the two orange ground wires to the two "GND" terminals that are 5th and 6th from the left of the top terminal block. Connect the two blue sensor positive voltage wires to the two "5V" terminals that are the 5th and 6th terminals from the right of the top terminal block.

Connect the two sensor signal wires, which are white with blue stripes, to the "A0" and "A1" terminals which are the 7th and 8th terminals from the top of the right terminal block. Make a note of which wire goes to A0 and which wire goes to A1, as they are different sensors. The sensor that wires into A0 is for the primary hydraulic cylinder and the sensor that wires into A1 is for the secondary hydraulic cylinder.

Now connect the two soldered LED/resistor pairs to the breakout board one at a time. The procedure to soldering these is explained in a separate video. Bend the wires on each end to facilitate the connection. Connect the LED end into terminal blocks 12 and 13, which are the second and third lowermost terminals of the right terminal block. Connect the resistor end to any of the ground terminals on the bottom terminal block.

Mount the solenoid driver board onto the breakout board. This driver board will be oriented such that the five terminal blocks that go to the solenoids are on the right side facing right, and the power terminal points down.

Connect the ground to the solenoid driver board. Take a piece of stranded 18-gauge wire long enough to reach from the bottom-left ground terminals of the breakout board to the solenoid driver negative power terminal. Strip a quarter inch off both ends of the wire, tin the ends of the wire with a soldering iron, and connect.

Note that the power terminal block has both ground and +12V connections, and if you reverse this polarity, you will burn out the driver board.

Now connect the power to the solenoid driver board.Take a piece of red 18-gauge wire long enough to reach from the V in terminal on the breakout board to the solenoid driver positive power terminal. Strip a quarter inch off both ends of the wire, tin the ends, and connect.

There are 5 connections going to the hydraulic valve of the CEB press. These are labeled 1-5. Strip 1/4" from the ends of each wire, tin the ends, and install them into the negative solenoid terminals. Start with 5 at the top and go down sequentially. It may be necessary to trim off a few strands of the ends of the wires to get them to fit in the terminals, but do not cut any more than necessary.

Finally, ensure that the terminal block screws are firmly fastened to the connected wires and that the microcontroller, breakout, and solenoid driver boards are firmly mounted together.

This completes the installation of the controller board, breakout board, and solenoid driver board into the Controller Box. In other videos, you can see how the controller box was prepared, and how the controller box integrates with the mechanical part of the CEB press. For more information on the CEB Press, please visit the Open Source Ecology Wiki.