Bpod Valve Module r2 with Sparkfun SAMD21??

nobias

Hi! I inherited a Bpod valve module that was bought about 5 years ago. The silkscreen label on the valve module says that it is a "Bpod Valve Driver Module r2" (see photo). However, it seems that the microcontroller plug-in board is a (red) Sparkfun SAMD21, and not the (green) Teensy v4. This is confusing, because according to the valve module wiki page, v1 comes with a SAMD21, and v2 with a Teensy v4. So it seems that I got some kind of in-between version? I noted the wiki page refers to v1 vs v2, whereas the silkscreen print on my board says r2 (not v2). Note that the silkscreen label shown on the webshop page for the current v2 module says "Bpod Valve Driver Module", without a version string, but otherwise looks identical to mine. Does this make sense to anyone?

I tried downloading the valve module firmware with the HARDWARE_VERSION parameter set to 1, so that's for "rev 1.0" of the valve driver module and the SAMD21 microcontroller. It downloads fine, but valve switching doesn't work. Perhaps because of a pinout mismatch? I do think that this module was used successfully with Bpod in the past, but I don't know which exact firmware was used.

Here's a hi-res photo of my module:

If anyone had any hints on this I'd be grateful. Which firmware and firmware config is most appropriate for my hardware? Alternatively, would you suggest replacing the SAMD21 with a Teensy v4 board, to make my hardware match more closely with the current v2 module? Thank you!

nobias

nobias Oh, looking at the EAGLE board file, it seems that my board is simply the "v1" board, isn't it? In the v1 board file, the silkscreen label includes the string "r2". So the "r2" probably indicates that it is a minor revision of v1, and not that it is the the newer, Teensy-based v2 of the valve module. Still not sure why my valves aren't working, but at least it looks like the firmware I downloaded is correct (v1, for SAMD21).

Josh

Hello Nobias,

This is indeed confusing!
You have v1 of the module, as far as firmware is concerned.
You're correct that r2 was a board revision, which we usually indicate with a decimal (it should have been rev 1.2)

Regarding the valves not working, I see from the photo that the board LED is lit, which means the logic line going to valve 8 is high, which means the issue is downstream from the controller. My first guess is the wall adapter. Its voltage has to match the valves (12V according to the photo), it should be DC output, and its polarity should be positive-center. I'd double check the voltage coming into the board with a multimeter just to be sure.

If you're sending commands from the state machine, it's also possible (though unlikely) that the RS-485 chip has failed. In this case you wouldn't see it appear as a valve driver module on its tab on the Bpod Console.

Another possibility is that the valve driver IC has failed, though I don't believe we've had one fail yet.

Please let me know what you find!

Thanks,
Josh