ICS3U-E : A Tiny Clock( for 2024)

ICS3U-E ACES are going to try something ambitious for 2024. Rather than use projects to support the introduction of concepts, we'll invert this approach and place concepts in support of the project. So, the project becomes the centerpiece of the term and we fill in around it.

What do you use 5 or even ten times a day that you could make yourself ?

A clock. As well as being an interesting conversation piece a compact, custom engineered version may very well get you to class on time at university in two years time.

For starters, here are two clocks (PCBs and cases) Mr. D. developed over the 23/24 Christmas holidays in preparation for our second term. These can serve as models to guide your own design decisions as the term unfolds. There are hundreds of design decisions to be made in pursuit of your custom creations which provide both the joy and frustration of being an engineer. So, bear these in mind as we aim to have your own custom clock on your desk by the March Break!

SMT ATtiny85 Clock THT ATtiny84 Clock

3D Case View

(Approximate) Concept Sequence (22 Classes in the Term)

# CONCEPT Hardware Software Design Soldering COMPONENT DER
1 A Quartz Crystal Oscillating Time Base        
2 Capturing Crystal Oscillations and Frequency Division
(External and TimerOne Interrupts)
       
3 The I2C Communication Bus
(The Wire Library)
     
4 Breadboarding an I2C Bus with
a TC74 Temperature Sensor and DS1307 RTC
   
5 DER: Scanning an I2C Bus      
# CONCEPT Hardware Software Design Soldering COMPONENT DER
6 SetDateTime and ReadDateTime Sketches        
7 Square Wave Frequency Settings        
8 The ACES' DS1307 Breakout Board      
9 ACES ISP Breakout Boards         
10 MCU, Power & Size Considerations
(mega328P, tiny84 or tiny85)
     
11 The Display Device
(CA COM-09481? CC YSD-439AB4B?)
     
12 Arrays as Segment Maps for PoV      
# CONCEPT Hardware Software Design Soldering COMPONENT DER
13 Assembling and Testing your Prototype
with RTC Data
   
14 Designing a PCB    
15 Preparing a PCB for Manufacturing and Ordering    
16 Designing the PCB Encasement      
17 PCB Assembly and Testing  
18 Clock Case Assembly and Testing            
19              

 

SMT ATtiny85 Clock THT ATtiny84 Clock