Author Topic: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference  (Read 367647 times)

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steverino

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #250 on: November 12, 2016, 03:21:18 am »
Just got a newer version of the GPSDO from BG7TBL and it does receive the data fine with Visual GPS View. It seems like a neat program now that it is working. Too bad the other makes of Chinese GPSDOs won't work with Visual GPS View.

If the RS232 connectors can output NMEA sentences on one of the pins. Using U-Center from U-Blox works very well. Lot's of features.

[url]https://www.u-blox.com/en/product/u-center-windows]https://www.u-blox.com/en/product/u-center-windows] [url]https://www.u-blox.com/en/product/u-center-windows[/url]
how about https://www.u-blox.com/en/product/u-center-windows
 

Offline Bryan

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #251 on: November 12, 2016, 09:59:45 am »
Quote
how about https://www.u-blox.com/en/product/u-center-windows

Sorry about the messed up URL, Win 10 and Edge Browser doesn't seem to play nice with the EEVBLOG forum.
-=Bryan=-
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #252 on: November 12, 2016, 11:22:45 pm »

without the proprietary oscilloquartz configuration manager software you wouldn't be able to talk to the ocxo anyway. the protocol does not appear to be documented. nor does the software appear to be available anymore.


I recently got in one of the Oscilloquartz Star-4 GPSDOs off of Ebay:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/10Mhz-GPSDO-OSCILLOQUARTZ-OSA-OEM-GPS-GPSDO-10MHz-1PPS-STAR-GPS-Clock-/262675973538?hash=item3d28b545a2:g:sbYAAOSwh2xYAjrp

The serial port output on the unit is a NMEA output stream from the Ublox receiver.  I don't think it has a serial input to the GPS.

The GPSDO board is mated to a well built board with a DC-DC converter and RS-232 interface.  The 26-pin connector to the GPSDO is broken out to through-hole pads. On the connector is "management interface" serial link.  The TX and RX management interface pins (3.3V, 9600 baud serial) are further broken out to some more pads.  On the 26-pin connector pin 5A is serial data to the GPSDO,  5B is data from the GPSDO.

I got hold of some documentation for the Star-4 (still checking to see if I can share it).
I connected a RS-232 level converter to those pins and now have Lady Heather talking to it.

The control language lets you adjust the GPSDO time constant,  satellite elevation mask,  cable delay,  enter/exit holdover, warm/cold start.   You can monitor device status, alarms, satellite constellation,  time/date/position, temperature.  There are no messages that indicate things like the PPS time error / oscillator frequency / GPSDO performance.

The device saves the settings/configuration in EEPROM,  but always does a 4-hour self-survey on power-up.   It takes 10-15 minutes for the device to warm up and the GPSDO PLL to lock.

The next version of Lady Heather (with New and Improved Documentation (tm)) should be out in a couple of week...
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #253 on: November 13, 2016, 02:06:04 am »
I got hold of some documentation for the Star-4 (still checking to see if I can share it).

I compared my Star-4 documentation to the Star-4 doc posted earlier in this thread and they are pretty much the same.  My documentation mentions an INPUT_TYPE(1) command that the other does not talk about (and the device does not respond to anyway),  so no need to post it.

Anyway,  Lady Heather now talks to and can control the Star-4 serial management port.
The time code that the INFO_GPS_POS; message reports has some occasional skips/duplicates, but Lady Heather tweaks them so the clock displays run smoothly.
 

Offline K1FPV

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #254 on: November 13, 2016, 11:05:05 pm »
Interesting! Have you tried Lady Heather with other GPSDOs made in China? I've got 3 others that I can't get to talk with PUTTY, Termite,  or Visual GPS. I haven't tried SatStat or GPSCon. I love the way the BG7TBL GPSDO communicates with Visual GPS.
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #255 on: November 16, 2016, 01:29:05 am »
Interesting! Have you tried Lady Heather with other GPSDOs made in China? I've got 3 others that I can't get to talk with PUTTY, Termite,  or Visual GPS. I haven't tried SatStat or GPSCon. I love the way the BG7TBL GPSDO communicates with Visual GPS.

Yes,  Lady Heather now talks to pretty much all GPSDO,  GPS timing receivers, NMEA receivers, GPSD, etc including those small Trimble/Symmetricom "UCCM" GPSDOs.

Attached is a screen dump of Lady Heather controlling the BG7TBL GPSDO via the Star-4 "management" port.  It shows the unit doing its 4-hour self-survey after a power-up.  Once it surveys in, it switches to position hold mode.

I wired a RS-232 level converter to the management port pins on the 26 pin Star-4 connector.  The management port lets you monitor and control the device a lot better than through the NMEA TOD output on the RS-232 connector.  One funky thing that happens if you use the management port is the TOD output switches from NMEA to Ublox binary messages.

 

Offline Dwaine

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #256 on: November 16, 2016, 02:57:15 am »
Interesting! Have you tried Lady Heather with other GPSDOs made in China? I've got 3 others that I can't get to talk with PUTTY, Termite,  or Visual GPS. I haven't tried SatStat or GPSCon. I love the way the BG7TBL GPSDO communicates with Visual GPS.

Yes,  Lady Heather now talks to pretty much all GPSDO,  GPS timing receivers, NMEA receivers, GPSD, etc including those small Trimble/Symmetricom "UCCM" GPSDOs.

Attached is a screen dump of Lady Heather controlling the BG7TBL GPSDO via the Star-4 "management" port.  It shows the unit doing its 4-hour self-survey after a power-up.  Once it surveys in, it switches to position hold mode.

I wired a RS-232 level converter to the management port pins on the 26 pin Star-4 connector.  The management port lets you monitor and control the device a lot better than through the NMEA TOD output on the RS-232 connector.  One funky thing that happens if you use the management port is the TOD output switches from NMEA to Ublox binary messages.

It would be cool if someone stuck their GPSDO into a case with a front panel LCD, with that as the output being displayed.
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #257 on: November 16, 2016, 03:17:27 am »
It would be cool if someone stuck their GPSDO into a case with a front panel LCD, with that as the output being displayed.

Lady Heather runs well on a Raspberry Pi (also Windows, Linux, macOS).   The standard PI LCD display (800x480) can work but is really a a bit too small to be effective.   A 1024x768 screen would be a lot better.  Linux and macOS use X11 as the display system.

It can work with NMEA, Trimble TSIP, Motorola, Ublox, Sirf, NVS, Z38xx (SCPI), Star-4, GPSD, etc devices or as a fancy clock display off the system clock and provides full control and monitoring/logging.
 

Offline Dwaine

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #258 on: November 16, 2016, 11:58:51 pm »
You could use a raspberry PI 3 and Yocto to have Lady Heather run on boot.
 

Offline Dwaine

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #259 on: November 17, 2016, 12:26:55 am »
It would be cool if someone stuck their GPSDO into a case with a front panel LCD, with that as the output being displayed.

Lady Heather runs well on a Raspberry Pi (also Windows, Linux, macOS).   The standard PI LCD display (800x480) can work but is really a a bit too small to be effective.   A 1024x768 screen would be a lot better.  Linux and macOS use X11 as the display system.

It can work with NMEA, Trimble TSIP, Motorola, Ublox, Sirf, NVS, Z38xx (SCPI), Star-4, GPSD, etc devices or as a fancy clock display off the system clock and provides full control and monitoring/logging.

I bought the same unit as yours.  I'll get the raspberry PI 3 running Yocto embedded and Lady Heather.
 

Offline The Doktor

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #260 on: November 17, 2016, 02:16:31 am »
How do you get Lady Heather to talk to Ublox, and what version do you use?
 

Offline The Doktor

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #261 on: November 17, 2016, 02:18:53 am »
Sorry, actually MTK3339.
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #262 on: November 17, 2016, 03:31:51 am »
Sorry, actually MTK3339.

The MTK3339 outputs standard NMEA sentences which Heather understands.

For NMEA devices, Heather does not generally attempt to identify the receiver type and issue any proprietary device-specific commands.  There are a couple of NMEA receivers (like the Venus timing receivers) that it does recognize and treat specially. 

Heather does have a keyboard menu command for sending user-specified NMEA commands to the device...  and automatically adds the leading '$' and proper checksum.
 

Offline Dwaine

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #263 on: November 17, 2016, 08:57:21 pm »
Too bad Lady Heather is not ported to QT.   I have my raspberry pi 3 booting yocto.  Going to try and see if I can get the native Lady Heather Linux version to compile.
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #264 on: November 17, 2016, 10:05:35 pm »
Too bad Lady Heather is not ported to QT.   I have my raspberry pi 3 booting yocto.  Going to try and see if I can get the native Lady Heather Linux version to compile.

If you can unzip a file to a directory and type "make" you can compile it... you will need the x11-dev lib installed.    I have the documentation section finished up and hope to get the new code out this weekend...

Other than X11 (or WIN VFX under Windoze) Heather has no external package dependencies to speak of... it's a fundamental part of her charm and sleek and svelte persona...  someday even WIN VFX will be dropped (it was used when there was a DOS compatible version of Heather)

 

Offline Dwaine

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #265 on: November 17, 2016, 11:35:43 pm »
I have not looked at the source code of it.   I'm wondering how much effort would it be to port it over to QT?
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #266 on: November 18, 2016, 12:29:50 am »
I have not looked at the source code of it.   I'm wondering how much effort would it be to port it over to QT?

Why?

BTW,  there's 63000+ lines of code.  Around 10000 are just for the user input interface...
 

Online KE5FX

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #267 on: November 18, 2016, 03:12:04 am »
I have not looked at the source code of it.   I'm wondering how much effort would it be to port it over to QT?

I'm hurt, deeply hurt.   :-DD
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #268 on: November 18, 2016, 03:42:08 am »
I have not looked at the source code of it.   I'm wondering how much effort would it be to port it over to QT?

I'm hurt, deeply hurt.   :-DD

Lady Heather will kiss it and make it all better...  then smack the crap out of you...  don't ask how I know.
 

Offline K1FPV

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #269 on: November 20, 2016, 07:00:05 pm »
I've got a question! I have a BG7TBL GPSDO, version 2015-09-17 here. It produces about 2.5 volts of a modified saw-tooth waveform into a 50? load and a lousy looking sine-wave into a high impedance.  Does the newer version of 2016-05-31 improve on the waveform or are there any major changes in it's output? I believe the newer version's 10 MHz output is supposedly more accurate.

Thanks,
Bill
K1FPV 
 

Offline DaJMasta

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #270 on: November 21, 2016, 03:37:18 am »
Can't speak to the sine wave output variant, but my square wave output version gave a pretty decent square wave with 50 ohm impedance and a very jagged, overshot one at 1M impedance  :) (I think there's a pic of it on the scope a page or two back)

Comparing the boards with the current version sinewave output, it seems like the difference is all passive filtering, so it's a square wave until about a half an inch from the BNC terminal where it's filtered to a sine.  You can actually use the alternate oscillator through hole pads to tap into the sinewave directly from the oscillator (which is squared up and sent into the cpld, then which comes out of it and to the output), and a little gain on a decent opamp would yield you a nice signal - the raw signal is something like 1Vpp.
 

Offline K1FPV

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #271 on: November 21, 2016, 09:39:45 pm »
Interesting point....I tried to hook up the output of my 2015-09-17 BG7TBL GPSDO to my counter which was terminated with a 50? load and the high impedance of my scope and I got the waveform mentioned in the last post I made. I have since tried to run it through the BG7TBL 10 port splitter/amplifier designed to supply the 10 MHz to up to 10 pieces of equipment needing the 10 MHz reference. Now at the input of the splitter/amplifier I get a beautiful sine-wave of about 2.8 volts peak to peak as I do at the output ports on the splitter. I guess it likes the input impedance of the splitter/amplifier.

Bill
K1FPV
 

Offline Dwaine

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #272 on: November 22, 2016, 03:05:26 am »
I have not looked at the source code of it.   I'm wondering how much effort would it be to port it over to QT?

I'm hurt, deeply hurt.   :-DD

Don't be...   I was just thinking out loud.  Would like to stick the gpsdo and a raspberry pi 3 into a nice case with a 10inch display.   Have the unit boot directly into Lady Heather.   I got my yocto image built.  It boots in about 8 seconds.

I'm just having some fun...
 

Offline texaspyro

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #273 on: November 22, 2016, 04:22:57 am »

Would like to stick the gpsdo and a raspberry pi 3 into a nice case with a 10inch display.   Have the unit boot directly into Lady Heather.   I got my yocto image built.  It boots in about 8 seconds.


That should be easy to do without having to mess with the code. 

I don't know what the PI likes to see in the way of a start-up script,  but something like "change to heather directory" followed by "./heather"    Heather loads a "heather.cfg" file where you can set all your heather startup config options.

I haven't looked into what it would take to support a touch screen...  Heather processes keystrokes from the window manager loop into a small fifo which it then processes when it has nothing else to do.   You would need to display an on-screen keyboard and cram keystrokes into that.  Once you have heather configured for your tastes,  if you are just using it as a monitoring program,   you really don't need a keyboard... in fact there is a command line option for disabling the keyboard and/or mouse.

The official PI LCD is not well suited to heather since it is a bit small.  Heather likes 1024x768 screens,  800x600 is OKish.  X11 does eat a few lines for the window decoration/top menu bar.  I suspect that there are ways for bypassing that and recovering that space...


 

Offline K1FPV

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Re: bg7tbl gpsdo master reference
« Reply #274 on: November 28, 2016, 06:48:35 pm »
WOW! I just received the newest version of the BG7TBL GPSDO with the version date of 2016-05-31 and the output wave is the same sawtooth type waveform but the difference mainly is it the amplitude of the output sawtooth. I'm getting 6.8 volts p/p into a 50? load. NOT BAD !!!

Bill
K1FPV
 


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