I found a decade old backup of this blog a few weeks ago and figured I would put it back online. Unfortunately the backup was just the database of posts, all the images have been lost to time.

A new project has caught my interest, and I’ve been having fun drawing PCB designs for it as well as working on microcontroller firmware.

I’ve been working for the past year or so on a CAN bus connected series of modules that will control loads and collect data in an automotive or recreational vehicle environment. Inspiration came from lighting control panels like those from AuxBeam and a few others, which are proprietary and don’t offer any expandability or modularity.

The CAN bus lends both to the project. Modules can be added, moved or removed as needs changed. Controls can be expanded and personalized. Using a network also allows integration with “smart” control platforms such as Home Assistant.

This project is teaching me lots of new things. I’ve taught myself how to use KiCad – it’s at version 9 now! Previously I was using EagleCad for at least twenty years. KiCad is so flexible. All my old projects were restrained by the limitations of the free version Cadsoft provided, I never upgraded to the newer versions offered by Autodesk.

I’ve also been learning a new embedded platform, the STM32 series of microcontrollers. A long time ago I was heavy into Microchip PIC – that was the controller for hobbyists. AVR was out there too, and Arduino came along and made AVR really popular. What a great ecosystem Arduino developed into. It’s sad to see that Qualcomm is killing Arduino, and Microchip is killing AVR.

It’s okay; things change, sometimes for the worse, sometimes for the better.