search

coloradocube / balloonsat

COTS balloonsat mission to test the RPi 4 with a battery UPS, a quad camarray, a GPS module, a RockBLOCK module, and a small number of Qwiic sensors
0 stars 5 forks source link

RPi headless power up and start up for launch #19

Open ivogeorg opened 2 years ago

ivogeorg commented 2 years ago

Description

The sequence before launch is:

  1. 06:00 - All balloonsats at launch site.
  2. 07:00 - Balloonsats ready to be put onto flight string. Teams can continue to make last minute flight preparations after stringing, but minimal work.
  3. 07:30 - Launch of first string. (Depending on cloud cover, the flight my be split onto two balloons.)

We need to be able to power up a headless RPi, start and verify the program loop in the field, and launch.

Open questions

  1. How to access pins 6 - GND, 8 - TXD0, 10 - RXD0 when the HAT headers are fully topped? (Note: 3.3V serial converter needed!)
  2. How will the EP-0136 UPS Plus be turned on?
  3. How will the RPi start up? The UPS can start it automatically.
  4. How will

Knowledge

  1. EOSS-317.
  2. Headless RPi setup.
ivogeorg commented 2 years ago
  1. Thin wires can be soldered to the pins in the gaps left between the headers, as shown in the picture in the first post.
  2. If the RPi can be powered in the field, we can ssh over UART and start and/or verify the program loop.

This has to be tested on Fri: power, program loop, graceful shutdown.

ivogeorg commented 2 years ago

PSU button works to start the RPi. The RPi needs to do its own shutdown, after which the PSU button has to be held to power down the PSU.

ivogeorg commented 2 years ago

The current solution (shown below) of connecting to the UART pins on the hat header doesn't work because one of the holes doesn't make good connection with the pin. image

Will try to connect via male-to-female jumper wires to the Qwiic hat breakout.

ivogeorg commented 2 years ago

If portable monitor can be plugged into power, this issue is redundant. We need to access the UPS power-on button and can have start the flight executive at the same time by briefly connecting HDMI monitor and keyboard+mouse. We'll have to activate the hand warmers anyway.