[werk_ag]

THIS GUIDE ONLY APPLIES TO RX BOARDS VERSIONS PRIOR TO V4.XX

Here is a quick guide about how to connect a 1.8" color TFT display to WeatherDuino Pro2 receiver (with boards versions v3.xx)

1- Be sure it's a 5V TFT display and it uses ST7735 driver.
There are many similar 1.8" TFT screens, but some are 3.3V or use a different driver.
This one is guaranteed to work.

2- The connections for the FTF display are on the bottom side of the RX board.

After you have assembled all the parts, solder a KF2510 8 pin right angle connector (search on eBay, very easy to find) in the specified place.

3- Take one of these Dupont Female to Female Jumper Wire, with no more than 20 to 25 cm, and remove a slice with ten wires, yes, ten wires...



and put 8 of them in the RX boardconnector. The two remaining wires will be used latter for powering the TFT backlight (more on this, below).

4- Now, connect the eight wires coming from the TFT connector to the TFT display.
Following the colors on the image above (you may use wires with other colors, just make sure you connect them right).

Brown wire to GND
Red wire to VCC
Orange wire to AO (DC)
Yellow wire to Reset
Green wire to CS
Blue wire - not used
Violet wire to SDA (MOSI)
Grey wire to SCK

5- Now let's connect the backlight Leds.

You have two extra wires on your ten wires ribbon cable, right?
On the TFT display, connect one to LED+ and the other to LED- (see picture above).

Now, on the other side of your ribbon cable connect those wires to the ICSP Arduino header:
LED+ to ICSP pin 2 - 5V
LED- to ICSP pin 6 - GND



6- Open WeatherDuino Pro2 RX software on your Arduino IDE and find this line of code (it's arround line 59)

Code:

#define DisplayType     0        // Type 0= TFT, Type 1= LCD

Make sure #define DisplayType have a zero (0) value. Compile and upload to your WeatherDuino Pro2 receiver.

Now your weather station have a beautifull color screen!

It's time to play with the SW1 momentary switch (have you connected it to the RX board?). Try a brief toutch and a long toutch... if you find something, don't tell anyone, it's secret . Enjoy!!!


Now, put this all in a plastic project box, and you get this...

[werk_ag]

TFT backlight control is available since v013 software.

With the already existent press button, it's possible to switch the TFT backlight on or off. A user defined timeout for auto off is also implemented in v013 software.

With RX boards prior to v4.xx, this new feature requires some extra hardware, but just a 2N7000 transistor and a 10K resistor. Less than 1€

These modifications can be applied to all RX units already built with any board version below v3.01
For all those who have already built your RX units, I leave out some pictures that illustrate the necessary connections.

For this mod to work you need to be using v013 software.

Note: This hardware and software mods are not mandatory. Even without them, your system will work with v013 software releases, you just don't have TFT backlight control.

Image bellow shows only connections for the control of the backlight. All other connections should be made as illustrated in the previous topic.
The bicolor Led is no longer used. Just a normal Led at LD1.

[uncle_bob]

Nice. Thanks Werk_AG

[water01]

The latest addition to the TFT says use a normal LED in LD1 but the additional pin hole for the Bi-coloured LED is not used so can a Bi-coloured LED still be used or must it be a normal LED?

[werk_ag]

That "additional hole" which signal is controlled by pin D3 is now used (v013 software) for TFT backlight control.
Use only a normal Led between LD1 and central pin (cathode).