The Anderson "Half-board" Project

Project Description

This project modifies the Anderson protoboard. The PICAXE 08M Anderson proto- boards that Steve handed out have two sections. The top of the board contains the serial port, the power supply, the PICAXE chip itself and the I/O ports for the chip. The bottom section is the prototype area which is a matrix of individual soldering points with a +5 bar running down one side and ground down the other.

The problem is that to play with the prototype section you must continually solder and desolder components and wires.

Project Hardware Setup

The "Half-board" approach cuts the board in half (I used a Dremel with cutoff wheel) leaving just one row of the prototype area. The following picture shows how I cut the board in half. I actually cut the board before I soldered in the components. Much less to worry about. But you could still do it with them soldered in.

Then I soldered header pins facing down to the I/O ports and to the +5 and ground solder points. Here is an edge view of the Half-board showing the header pins.

These are then pushed into a solderless breadboard where you can prototype and change, solder free. This picture shows the Half-board mounted on a solderless breadboard with the PICetSat Lite components placed in the breadboard. Notice how the wires connect the pin on the left to the blue ground strip on the top of the picture and connect the pin on the right to the red V+ strip. We will discuss each component under the PICetSat Lite topic .

I picked up 25 solderless breadboards at our TailGate Fest, which should be enough for everyone with a protoboard to go the "Half-board" route if you want to. We are looking for header pins to complete the conversion. For my own conversion I took pins from an old system board that was in my recycle bin.

Project Software

There is no software for this project