ioBridge RJ45 Breakout Board
My new iobridge is great, and I already have several project ideas. The problem I faced was how to connect multiple projects, in different locations of my house, to one central iobridge. Ethernet is the cheapest multi-wire cable I could think of, with 8 separate wires it will pass enough signals for most projects. As an example my LaserPup module requires 6 lines: 2 PWM servo signals, 2 DOUT signals, and +5/GND. That still leaves 2 to spare.
I purchased a few RJ45 jacks from digikey, and once they came in I noticed that the second row of pins is offset. This means it wouldn’t fit in the holes of a .1″ prototype board, but that was nothing a little bending of the pins to align them wouldn’t fix.
With that figured out I soldered together a simple breakout board that had one RJ45 jack, an 8 pin male header, and an 8 pin female header. This would give me the versatility to send any signal down any pin of the ethernet cable. By using two headers I can connect to the board with a bare wire or one that has a header attached. It also allows me a second point to easily connect a multimeter for testing and debugging.
Breakout wired for LaserPup module (6/8 pins used)
Now for all of my remote iobridge modules, I will just add an RJ45 port and use a standard cat5 cable to connect them together.
One Response to “ioBridge RJ45 Breakout Board”
Programmethem - December 4, 2009
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