CM11A hangup: Any better products?

It is ABSOLUTELY so! All of the X-10 made PLC transmitters for which I've seen schematics (and looked at their innards) with the exception of the most recent RR501 (last 7-8 years?) use an LC controlled transistor oscillator. You can see the circuit in the schematics for the TW523, CM11A, CM15A, TM751, mini & maxi controllers. etc. If you need URLs, I can supply them.

PLC transmitters made by SmartHome and other manufacturers may use resonators and generate the PLC carrier with a PIC - I haven't seen many schematics for them.

The most recent RR501 does generate the 120kHz with the PIC _BUT_ the PIC itself uses an LC circuit instead of a crystal or resonator on its OSC pins so it's unlikely to be any more tightly controlled than the others.

The same is true for all of the wireless devices.

Europe now has tighter wireless requirements and most of the X-10 modules used there are fairly recent designs. They do use SAW resonators for the

Hello Dave,

Be careful. Somebody might turn on a vacuum cleaner and the spike could fry the chip if the diodes are out.

I certainly had more than that but not over 1Vpp. The diodes won't clip much at that level.

Regards, Joerg

Hello Dave,

Yes, do you have the URL for your version of the CM11A?

IIRC mine has a fixed resonator. A tunable LC would be more expensive in production.

I know. Those are a pain, hardly adjustable. I found some of the key chain ones all over the map so we quit using them.

Regards, Joerg

John Galvin reverse engineered a partial CM11A schematic. It's at...

I think if you look at your RR501 you'll find it uses one winding of the same model transformer as is used for the input as the L with a couple of

Hello Dave,

This looks way different than mine. I have to look for the schematic tomorrow. If there were no crystal or resonator how would it ever be able to keep time? Mine holds to within a few minutes a year and temps range from 65F to 95F.

Regards, Joerg

Yes, that's it.

| This looks way different than mine. I have to look for the schematic | tomorrow. If there were no crystal or resonator how would it ever be | able to keep time? Mine holds to within a few minutes a year and temps | range from 65F to 95F.

The CM11a does employ a resonator for the PIC's clock, but it uses a separate free-running LC oscillator to generate the 120kHz carrier. (That's the oscillator in the schematic.) The TM751 and the current RR501 generate the 120kHz carrier from a PIC output, but the PIC's clock itself is an LC oscillator. The TW523 and the original RR501 use free-running carrier oscillators much like that in the CM11a.

Dan Lanciani ddl@danlan.*com

It doesn't matter whether they clip a little or a lot - the positive and negative peaks are still clipped. The point is that "peaking" the signal in the manner you describe is impossible.

Hello Dave,

It is possible. When the diodes conduct a wee bit you will still have a very noticeable increase and decrease when turning the core. Just try it out. Only when they do a "hard clip" will that become hard to see.

Regards, Joerg

Hello Dave,

It can't do it always. Mine also keeps the time when the power is out and it runs on the four backup batteries. One of them that I programmed for a friend even kept time while sitting in the trunk of his car for weeks. That is nearly impossible with LC.

Regards, Joerg

Hello Dan,

Interesting. I wonder why they did that. They could have saved the cost for the extra LC if they used a timer on the PIC to generate the 120kHz. Unless they ran out of timers but then there is still the chance to use a SW timer.

Regards, Joerg

Balderbash!

At best, you might see dips below the diode voltage dr>Hello Dave,

Hello Dave,

I thought it was balderdash ;-)

A diode presents an amplitude-variable resistor to the circuit. Below

Look at the 4148 graph as an example:

Again, adjusting to the correct frequency won't significantly improve high signal amplitude reception. It's at the fringes of range where it makes a difference. Actually even a bit above that level since you want the resonant curve concentrating on 120kHz and not on the noise from the margarita blender.

Regards, Joerg

In article , snipped-for-privacy@removethispacbell.net (Joerg) writes: | Hello Dan, | | > The CM11a does employ a resonator for the PIC's clock, but it uses a | > separate free-running LC oscillator to generate the 120kHz carrier. ... | | Interesting. I wonder why they did that.

My theory is that the implementors of the CM11a were familiar with the free-running oscillator design used in the TW523 and decided to adapt it. It was a proven circuit used in other X10 products as well.

| They could have saved the cost | for the extra LC if they used a timer on the PIC to generate the 120kHz.

Does the 16C58 have the capability to route a timer to an output pin? When I wrote the enhanced version of my replacement firmware for the RR501 I used a timer, but I had to swap some pins around to I could send it out via the PWM block of the 16F628 (not doing actual PWM, of course).

| Unless they ran out of timers but then there is still the chance to use | a SW timer.

I used a software loop for my basic version of the replacement RR501 firmware and it requires a pretty short loop. (I assume the real RR501 & TM751 code works the same way.) I don't think you have a lot of flexibility for the CPU clock rate if you use this approach (or even if you use a timer). The RR501 (and, I assume, the TM751) uses a ~3.84MHz clock to make the carrier come out right. The CM11a uses a 4MHz clock. Perhaps there was a conflict between the clock needed to make the bit-banging serial easy and the clock needed to make the carrier generation come out right. Or maybe they didn't want to tie up the CPU during burst generation. But I still like my convenience-of-familiarity theory best...

Dan Lanciani ddl@danlan.*com

Hello Dan,

That could very well be but it would be pretty sad. Engineers are supposed to embrace new concepts when something can be realized at less cost.

Frankly, I don't know the PIC series much. But it would surprise me if it wasn't possible. Pin swaps may be needed. Timer-based outputs are pretty easy on most uC like the MSP430 series even though they often do not have a dedicated PWM block.

It can be a challenge to perform proper RS232 timing and 120kHz. However, since the amount of data exchange between uC and ActiveHome is quite minimal they could have chosen a very slow speed. Then it would be easier to fall into the tolerance range of even do it purely in SW.

Regards, Joerg

In article , snipped-for-privacy@removethispacbell.net (Joerg) writes: | Hello Dan, | | > | > The CM11a does employ a resonator for the PIC's clock, but it uses a | > | > separate free-running LC oscillator to generate the 120kHz carrier. ... | > | | > | Interesting. I wonder why they did that. | > | > My theory is that the implementors of the CM11a were familiar with the | > free-running oscillator design used in the TW523 and decided to adapt | > it. It was a proven circuit used in other X10 products as well. | | That could very well be but it would be pretty sad. Engineers are | supposed to embrace new concepts when something can be realized at less | cost.

Of course, they might have done the analysis and decided that this solution _was_ the most cost effective. Typically X10 does a pretty good job of "value engineering" in spite of what its competitors sometimes claim.

| > | They could have saved the cost | > | for the extra LC if they used a timer on the PIC to generate the 120kHz. | > | > Does the 16C58 have the capability to route a timer to an output pin? When | > I wrote the enhanced version of my replacement firmware for the RR501 I used | > a timer, but I had to swap some pins around to I could send it out via the | > PWM block of the 16F628 (not doing actual PWM, of course). | | Frankly, I don't know the PIC series much. But it would surprise me if | it wasn't possible. Pin swaps may be needed. Timer-based outputs are | pretty easy on most uC like the MSP430 series even though they often do | not have a dedicated PWM block.

As far as I can tell, there is no obvious way to route the 16C58's TMR0 (the only one it has) to an output pin. I don't think this function is typically available on 16x PICs. I was able to do it only by using that PWM block in basically a pass-through mode, and a PIC with a PWM block may not have been available (or cost effective) when the CM11a was designed.

Dan Lanciani ddl@danlan.*com

Hello Dan,

It could be. However, every aligment procedure in production is usually a significant cost contributor. Even in China.

IIUC it outputs to TMR0 reg which indeed isn't so cool. But look at Figure 6-6. Maybe there is a way to pipe it through the WDT path. Unless PSA turns off the WDT Time-Out mux or that signal cannot go anywhere. This doesn't seem to be a very versatile uC. Or as they say in the UK, it doesn't float my boat.

If it can't do all that maybe there is a better uC for X-10 than this one, at similar cost. Quite frankly it is the first uC I come across that seems to be unable to do PWM. Even ye olde C51 could do that.

Regards, Joerg