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DIY Assembly For: Reflex LiveLoop Kit

Flash-8 Expansion Kit

I. Introduction II. Front Panel Board II. Main Board III. Digital Board IV. Flash-8 Expansion Board V. Boot Loading and uploading Reflex Firmware

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I. Introduction This is a step by step guide to assembling the Reflex LiveLoop Boards and the Flash-8 Expansion board (If you chose to include with kit) . Each step is numerically organized. The parts list for each section will be listed, along with schematic and/or photos of an actual assembly procedure in progress. The methods used herein are for the most part suggestions that will ensure proper construction but if you are more comfortable with an alternative method that will achieve the same result, then go ahead with that. Programming boards: The core (PIC18F46K22) will already have it's software loaded. This has been done because most DIYer's that aren't familiar with PIC programming likely won't have the required specialized programmer, such as a PICkit 3, and would have to pay for one. The Flash-8 Expansion has this same PIC chip, and is also programmed with it's own firmware. This firmware may be updated in the future using a firmware update to the main control chip, an Atmega 2560, which will in turn update the core and Flash-8 if needed. The main control chip, the Atmega 2560, must be boot loaded via USB upon completion. This requires another Atmega chip/board to act as the boot flasher via SPI. See Section V. upon completion of the project for more. Static Electricity: When working with this, or any digital circuitry, be certain to have a ground nearby to release any static electricity you may have built up by moving around. For me the static discharge writ-band is very impeding, so I have always habitually touched a known ground before touching any board or component with my hand or a tool. Most of the circuitry at the headers is static surge compensated, but just keep it in mind.

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II. Front Panel Board The front panel board has the LED circle in the center and no parts mounted at all so is easily identified from the others included in the kit. All of the parts are clearly visible on the PCB silkscreen. Parts List: Resistors 8 x 470 ohm resistors SMD 1206 R5, R6, R7, R8, R9, R10, R11, R12 7 x 470K resistors SMD 1206 R14, R15, R16, R18, R19, R20, R21 4 x 4.7K resistors SMD 1206 R2, R3, R22, R23 3 x 1K resistors SMD 1206 R4, R13, R17 1 x 1.5K resistor R24 1 x 15K resistor R1 Capacitors 1 x 10uF Capacitor C2 IC's 1 x Max7219 LED Driver U1 Potentiometers 5 x Alpha 9mm pot: 10K Rate1, Start1, End1, Blend1, Fbk1 2 x Alpha 9mm pot pl.shaft: 100K EQatt1, RateAtt1 Switches 6 x 6*6mm pushbuttons SW5, SW6, SW7, SW8, SW9, SW10 4 x 12*12mm pushbuttons SW1, SW2,SW3,SW4 Jacks / headers 15 x 3.5mm jacks J1 - J15 2 x 1*16 pin male header J17, J19 1 x 1*10 pin male header J18 1 x 1*8 pin male header J16 LED's 22 x Red LEDs 3mm (CR) D2,D3,D4,D5,D6,D7,D8, D9 D10,D11,D12,D13, D15,D17 D18,D23,D24,D25,D26, D30,D31,D32 3 x Green LEDs 3mm D19,D27,D28 2 x Yellow LEDs 3mm D29,D30 2 x Blue LEDs 3mm D16,D20 1 x Amber LED 3mm D14 1 x Bicolour R/G LED 3mm D21 1 x RGB LED 5mm diff D1 Panel Board Schematic: Recommend to print it, or zoom and rotate pdf

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*1* Mounting SMD Resistors / Capacitor

Choose a line (same value) of resistors, starting with 470 ohm, and tin one side of each. The 470 ohm resistors are mostly in the upper left quadrant of the board.

Using tweezers or your favorite SMD tool, tack each of the first set of resistors in place. If they go on lifted (as is usually the case), lightly press on them with your finger and re-solder so they fall close to the board. This is much prettier!

After each set of resistors, solder the other pads. I recommend counting aloud so as not to miss any. This will be useful with LED soldering. There are 8 470 ohm resistors.

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*2* Mounting the Chip

The MAX7219 is an LED driver for all of the LED's (except the RGB) If the board is oriented upward, the chip's pin # 1 is in the top left corner as shown below. A small inset circle indicates this corner. When soldering this SOIC chip, pin # 4 is on a ground plane so will draw more heat when soldering.

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*3* Mounting the Pots When mounting the metal shafted pots (10K), only solder one leg to start so the pot and board can be held for easy alignment. The plastic pots can be pressed into place so don't solder them for now.

It is important these pots are not crooked so they should seat "on all fours" to the board. Pressing them in with finger as shown below and re-soldering the single pin will allow them to snap into place when the solder melts.

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Solder the opposite pins and visually check. The pot to the right in the photo isn't yet fully down.

A good test is to momentarily slide the panel on and check that the all fit. Next, move the two plastic pots to ensure they are not binding or tight. If they need to be moved you may need to use a tool as they are very stiff when pressed in. (These ones have no marker paint, but yours should!)

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Once alignment has been satisfied, solder all of the remaining pot's pins

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*4* Installing the 12x12 buttons The large button switches must be offset be 1.6mm to give good height above the panel. Included with the kit are break-apart strips. These can be broken with fingers or using pliers.

These shims will be mounted oriented as shown the photo (right)

As with the pots, these switches must be held in place while soldering as it's important they are aligned to the panel holes. Before mounting a switch, make sure the pins aren't crooked.

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*5* Installing the 6x6 buttons

To mount the smaller 6x6 switches, the leads must be bent to hold them in place before soldering. They are intentionally loose in the holes to allow for alignment. Bend with cutters as show below.

Check that they are free and not binding, then solder with face panel still attached.

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*5* Installing the 15 Jacks

Flatten the ground (collar) pin in some with your fingers. This is so the jacks don't try to pop out while you're mounting them. Balancing 15 jacks isn't easy!

Note that there are two jacks (J6 and J13) that will need the ground pin bend to fit, so it's best to start with these.

Ready for panel. Move back and forth so all jacks pop through the holes.

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Thread on the 5 pot's nuts and the 4 corner jack's nuts. All 15 can be threaded on if you like, but it's not necessary.

Squeeze together the corners while soldering 1 pin of each of the 4 corner jacks. This will ensure any warps in the board are flattened to be parallel with the panel and snug up all jacks.

* Make sure the outer jacks are straight, not angled, so they won't protrude past the board edge. Solder all of the remaining jacks while panel is still in place, that's a total of 45 solder joints. Don't forget the ground pin just below the MAX7219 chip!

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*6* Installing the LED's Remove the panel and prepare the LED's for insertion. If you have a board clamp / holder it's a good time to use it. I just hold it in my left hand and insert with the right. The RGB LED is first. The longest pin is the ground pin so must align to the 3rd hole as shown.

Next is the Bi-color LED above and to the left of the Record button. Note that the flat edge of the LED should face right. It's not easy to see so I'll have marked it with black pen.

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Next, install all of the 2-lead LED's. As you insert them, note that the long lead goes into the round padded hole, "long-round"

Follow the colors (reds, greens, blues, yellows) as shown below. Let the LED's fall through. * NOTE: The center LED of the LED circle is the AMBER LED, not a yellow as appears here!

* If you plan to customize the colors of LEDs, the blues should remain blue due to their lower current, which was to dim them as they are far too bright if powered normally. All of the rest are fine.

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Once all of the LED's are on, attach the panel as before (5 nuts + outer 4 jack nuts) and quickly flip the whole thing. Most of the LED's should fall into place. The rest will need some pushing / aligning.

Before soldering, you may want to set the RGB depth by pushing it up so only 1mm sticks out, then bend one of it's pins to hold in place. I also like to pull up the blue LED in the EQ section as it sticks out further than the other two. Once you are satisfied all LED's are happily in place, solder only 1 lead of each of the 32 LED's. I usually solder the round pad. Soldering only 1 pad allows easy adjustment should it be required.

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Do a final check that all of the 2 legged LED's long leads are protruding through round holes, and all of the short leads are coming through square holes….

Before soldering the rest of the RGB LED's leads, snip them off. This will make lot easier as the pads are quite close, and the ground lead takes a bit of heat to solder.

Solder the square pins of the 30 LED's that have them, and don't forget the 3-pin bi-color LED!

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Almost done… Remove the aluminum front panel for the last time to instal the panel headers. Your board should appear as such:

Put together the male headers (which will be soldered to our panel board) and the female headers. Use the Main (mother) board to align the 2 16 pin headers, the 8 pin, and the 10 pin header.

Orient as shown and solder the end pins of each header. Check they are seated then solder the rest.

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Make sure the header pins are well covered in solder to ensure good connection. Replace the aluminum panel plate once the headers are on, tighten on the nuts and the panel section (the most difficult!) is complete.

When putting on the knobs, make a small spacer out of thin cardboard for the black knobs. I make a "U" shape for easy removal. The center Rate knob also needs to be stood off by a hair as it will fall onto the aluminum. The next portion of assembly is adding the though-hole parts to the main (mother) board.

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II. Main Board The Main board only has a few parts that need to be added. .

*1* Starting with the 12 and 16 MHz crystals (below) which are dropped in on the side of the board opposite the components already mounted. The values are on the top of the crystals Drop them in flush and carefully solder them into place There are other tiny components nearby so try to let the solder flow into the hole without bridging to them

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*2* Installing the Reverse Protection Rectifiers Install the reverse protection rectifiers by first bending their leads to match the holes. The leads are fairly heavy so pre-bending is necessary.

Note the orientation shown in relation to the 16 pin header. The silver bands denote the cathode side of the rectifier, so should appear as in the photo. Solder them in place.

*3* Installing the 1N60P Diode Being a diode, orientation is again important.

Drop the diode in and carefully solder as shown above. BTW: This diode is part of the Peak Slicing circuitry

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*4* Installing the USB Jack The USB jack is installed on the component side of the board. Check that the pins are not bridged after soldering as this may cause damage to your computer if plugged in.

*5* Mounting the 16 Pin Box Header This is the header for the PSU ribbon to plug into, so it's important that it is oriented (also indicated on silk screen) with the slot towards the center of the board.

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When soldering, start with 2 pins, one each end, then check that it is pressed down evenly. It won't be flush with the board as there's some tiny components under there, but try to keep it parallel to the board. This will give good alignment if the dual PSU ribbon is used for the Flash-8 expansion board.

*5* Digital Board Headers The inter-board headers to the small Digital board can be installed next. On the main board these headers are the male pin headers. The Digital Board will be used for alignment.

To get vertical alignment, push the 10-pin headers together, male and female, then insert the male side in both of the header holes as shown next page.

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Although it's not important right now, the large arrow on the digital board and the main board should be pointing the same way, up.

Once in place and flipped over, do the same as before. Solder 1 pin on each end and check for straightness, then go to town on the remaining pins.

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*6* Panel Board Headers The final addition to the Main board is the headers to the front panel board. Push the remaining two 16 pin, the 10 pin, and the 8 pin female headers onto the panel board. Use these to align for the Main board as shown.

They can be wiggled into place easily. Don't forget to check they are flush, nobody likes a crooked module! Inspect all of the 50 pins for bridges / bad connections once finished soldering.

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III. Digital Board *1* Components The little Digital board is the final part of the Reflex LiveLoop assembly. Mount the remaining two diodes as shown, along with the 24MHz crystal.

Once these are soldered in, give a good inspection to you work. As this circuitry is very sensitive, a short / bridge in the diode area could be catastrophic on power-up.

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*2* Headers The 30 pin box header is next. It should be mounted with the slot opening inward even though the Flash-8 Expansion has no key in it's header.

Future expansion projects involving a ribbon connector may assume the slot is oriented properly… As with the main boards 16 pin box header before, ensure this header is parallel to the board and more or less vertical. Components under the over-sized header will lift one side so this must be checked.

Finally, plug in the two 10 pin headers onto the main board. Match the arrow directions on each board as shown below.

Done! If you haven't ordered the Flash-8 as part of this kit, then the bypass jumper needs to be installed. See the next section on the Flash-8 in any case!

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IV. Flash-8 Expansion Board If you have included the Flash-8 Flash memory / MIDI expansion board, then a small bit of assembly will be required. If you do not have the Flash-8, install the bypass jumper as shown below.

*1* Mount the Stereo 3.5mm Jack

Care must be taken not to over heat this when soldering as it's only plastic. Upon trying to seat the jack you may have noticed it doesn't sit flush. If this is a bother, then use a dremel to "core out" the area inside the silk-screened box. It's less than 1mm in depth so don't over-do it! If this isn't a bother, then leave it to angle up on the board.

without inset…

.. and with inset

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*2* Installing Headers Mount the 16 pin box header with it's slot opening facing outside of the board as shown. It is important also that this header sits flat on the board. Start by soldering only 2 pins, then check. Mount the 30 pin female header. Be certain it is flush so start with two pins as above. The spacing between this header and the 16 pin box header must be enough to allow for the 30 pin box header to plug over without hitting on the PSU ribbon.

To mount the small 4 pin header, plug on the jumpers first. These will hold things together during soldering (more or less!) Orient the jumpers to position # 1 as shown on the silk screening.

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*3* 24 MHz Crystal Lastly, the 24 MHz crystal needs to be mounted in place.

Hopefully your Reflex resembles this when put together!

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V. Boot Loading and uploading Reflex Firmware

The PIC18F46K22 Core and Flash-8 (if you have) is programmed already. The Main Board's Atmega is virgin needs to be flashed with a boot before loading the Reflex LiveLoop Firmware 2.00.

To flash the boot, an Arduino board (Atmega2560, Uno, other) is required. The boot loader program is saved to that Arduino board, then it is connected via SPI from it's ICSP header to the Reflex on header J16 Sock5 (at bottom of Main Board) to the Ground, RST, SCK, MOSI, & MISO SPI pins.

See https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/installing-an-arduino-bootloader for more info on your type of Arduino board. A dedicated USB-SPI interface can also be used if you happen to have one. Note that the Reflex Main board must be powered and the Digital board (+Flash-8) removed as that header is needed.

The SPI connections are as follows: Your Arduino Reflex Main Board J16 Sock5 SPI GND Pin1: GND pin53 on 2560, (ICSP header pin 5) à Pin2: RST SCK pin52 on 2560 (ISCP pin 3) Pin3: SCK MOSI pin51 on 2560 (ICSP pin 4) Pin4: MOSI MISO pin 50 on 2560 (ICSP pin 1) Pin5: MISO -Select your board in Arduino IDE (& serial port etc) -Open the ArduinoISP firmware (in Examples) to your Arduino board. -Upload the ArduinoISP sketch to your board -Wire your Arduino board to the Reflex SPI as above (Note for the Arduino Uno: you'll need to add a 10 uF capacitor between reset and ground.) -Select in Tools > Board the Atmega2560 (This description may vary in your version of the IDE) -Select the Arduino as ISP in the Tools>Programmer menu. -Use the Burn Bootloader command. It'll take a minute or two for this to complete. -Remove the SPI connections and re-assemble & re-power the Reflex LiveLoop. -Plug in to the Reflex USB and load the Arduino IDE with the Reflex Firmware (V2.00+) (Check http://www.freshnelly.com/reflex/reflexFWUD.htm for any new firmwares) -Click right arrow to upload firmware -When LED circle starts flashing, press REC & PLAY buttons together to update/validate core The Flash-8 (if you have) should be already operational at this point. Enjoy!! Sandrine *