Electronic
The PCB has been designed to easily connect the various elements that allow the word clock displays the time in words.
To make it more "flexible", it is possible to add other elements that you will find it in Upgrade section
The only essential components for the "basic" function are:
- 1x Arduino Nano
- 1x Capacitor 1mF - 25V
- 1x Resettable fuse
- 1x RTC DS3231
- 1x Rotary encoder
- 1x resistor 500 ohms - 2W
- 144 LEDS (leds strip)
- Connectors (optional)
As mentioned above, this PCB is flexible. Several options are available to improve the behavior of your Wordclock.
You can add a photo resistor on place "sensor". After activating the feature in the software, your clock will set the LED's brightness automatically.
The components are:
- 1x Photo resistor
- 1x Resistor 10k ohms - 1/4W Connect the components as following:
If you want to connect your word clock on WiFi, you can add a ESP8266 to manage the communication between your network and the Arduino.
You can for example get internet time, display temperature, weather, all datas from the world wide network.
Note: If you want to get internet time, you can of course remove the RTC module.
The essential components for Wifi:
- 1x ESP8266-01
- 1x voltage regulator 3.3 Volts (smd) <- 3.3V is mandatory for ESP. It really doesn't like 5 Volts!
- 1x MOS FET BS170
- 2x Resistor 10k ohms - 1/2W
- 1x Resistor 4k7 ohms - 1/4W
- Pin header 3x2
- 2x Jumpers
- 1x Capacitor 10uF
- 1x Capacitor 47uF The two capacitors provide a stable wireless connection.
Emplacement photo ESP
In normal operation, the RX/TX pins must be bridged as below. To program the ESP, remove the two jumpers and put a jumper on SET. Your Arduino as to be set on programmer mode.
Otherwise, mount the ESP on female pins and make a solder bridge on RX and TX.
Emplacement photo RX/TX
An I2C bus is available on the PCB, this allows you to add all the sensors or I2C devices you wish.
The components to add are:
- 2x resistors 4k7 ohms - 1/4W
Emplacement photo I2C