Help wiring 2.1mm recharge ports...

[Novastar]

Has anyone ever gotten a bunch of weird pops & clicks when using these in combination with CF and/or a sound + driver board?

When I plug in to recharge... all sorts of bizarre things happen, and I'm quite positive the wiring is just fine. Some of the wiring was actually done by an electronics expert (not me, btw). It's this way on two sabers.

Sometimes also, when I put the kill pin in... the circuit reboots anyway and it sits there in idle mode as if the pin isn't even in!!! what the..??!??

Finally, my recharge port pin (female end, technically) doesn't seem to fit all the way in. I'm using the 2.1mm canon port in the saber, and its corresponding "type m" female port... But... it produces some weird problems, such as the board still being on when I recharge! As if somehow the circuit ISN'T cut. Yikes.

Help! :) I guess I rarely ask for it on here, but I need some. If I get a chance, I'll get some photos up.

[eastern57]

oye:(

I've had a "dud" with recharge ports before. Try testing the port seperate from the board. It might just be busted.

Also, I got a bunch of 2.1mm plugs from an online retailer, and they don't cut power - how? why? I don't know. But the only thing that acutally works (for that specific port) is a smaller diameter plug.

[atomsk]

Had this problem with the recharge port on my first CF 2.5 i never tested it outside the setup just got a new one and rewired it. Worked fine after, so i assumed it was a faulty one. Thats odd that you would have two of the same though... maybe i wired it differently the second time?

[Novastar]

Mmm... thanks guys, looks like I'm not alone on this.

Me, I'm happy to buy the ports from Tim, but--before I ended up doing these 2.1mm ports, I found I actually had a few, so I just wired them up. I think they were leftover from either BOP I or II for whatever reason... because I had started with "stereo / mono" jacks and ports, which were working fine for a while.

Eastern... I really need ones that will cut the power--that's the whole point of the recharging process, hehehe... so... if you know which ones I need to get--do tell!

This is some CRAZY stuff to me... I thought I was all fine and dandy with the stereo/mono ports (5 pins, I used 4--2 to cut + and 2 to cut -), and they worked GREAT.

BUT... Erv and Don told me that they COULD/WOULD introduce a momentary short which could be dangerous for CF or any other board. So, I switched. But man... these things are doing all KINDS of bizarre things that I just don't understand.

All I care about is that:

A) they work correctly :)
B) I'm not introducing a bunch of weird short-outs
C) the ports match the plugs

To confirm with you guys about the wiring... well... *ERV* wired up one of the two sabers in question... and I copied that wiring directly (so as to have a perfect match for the 2nd saber). So... I can't imagine Erv doing this wrong, lol.

Finally, how could I really go wrong when wiring the recharge end since I KNOW that it actually works polarity-wise... and SOMEtimes I can get it to charge whilst cutting the circuit... but... it's just REEEEAAALLY dodgey. This is very different from my experiences with the past stereo port where I was cutting both + and - lines.

Anyhow. Geez... what a mess. lol I can't figure out what's wrong! hahahah

[Eandori]

I have had a 3 pole recharge port "go bad" on me before. There is a small metal tab that gets pushed away from another contact plate when the plug has something inserted into it (a kill plug, or battery charge plug). That's how it disconnects. I have had to manually bend that metal tab back into shape once so it would connect/disconnect when a plug was inserted again.

Also, make sure your male/female ends of that setup are actually matched. I have lots of plugs that will fit into the TCSS 3 pole recharge port socket... but only certain ones work right. Some are too wide in the middle hole or they are not long enough overall. If the middle hole is too wide then you won't get a solid connection when charging. If the plug is too short then it won't properly disconnect the saber circuitry and be like you described... as if it's not there.

So... check the very small metal tabs on the socket, bend them into place if needed. And make sure your male end of the plug is the right one for the job.

Cheers buddy.

[eastern57]

Eastern... I really need ones that will cut the power--that's the whole point of the recharging process, hehehe... so... if you know which ones I need to get--do tell!


no, the plugs. I get ports from Tim, but I got a bunch of plugs from allelectronic and they just didn't work - and it took me some time to figure out that that was this issue... fate telling me "stick with Tim"