My RGB Matrix Featherwing is blocking my RP2040 from connecting to my PC

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adafruit_support_carter
 
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Re: My RGB Matrix Featherwing is blocking my RP2040 from connecting to my PC

Post by adafruit_support_carter »

A basic short would not change with time. About the only thing that could cause that would be thermal effect. When cold, the short is broken, but after some warm up time, the short expands and makes connection - causing an actual short.

It's also possible it's mechanical and the apparent time change is coincidental. If your moving the setup with each setup, then the short may be getting jiggled and sometimes no shorting / sometimes shorting.

Once the run time reduces to near zero with repeated runs, how are you able to get back to a longer ~11min run time?

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MyAdaAlt
 
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Re: My RGB Matrix Featherwing is blocking my RP2040 from connecting to my PC

Post by MyAdaAlt »

adafruit_support_carter wrote: Tue Nov 22, 2022 6:25 pm Once the run time reduces to near zero with repeated runs, how are you able to get back to a longer ~11min run time?
I don't know how that happens... I know, that this only happens, when the Featherwing is attached. When I started working on this project, it was the same procedure. It worked for around the same amount of time, until it didn't work anymore. I tried again on the next day and I had the same results as the day before. But then it didn't want to work anymore, after that, I asked for help on this forum. And now we're here
adafruit_support_carter wrote: Tue Nov 22, 2022 6:25 pm A basic short would not change with time. About the only thing that could cause that would be thermal effect. When cold, the short is broken, but after some warm up time, the short expands and makes connection - causing an actual short.
I can't imagine, that this is a thermal cause, but maybe I'm wrong. But I don't really have constantly changing thermal activity in my room...
adafruit_support_carter wrote: Tue Nov 22, 2022 6:25 pm It's also possible it's mechanical and the apparent time change is coincidental. If your moving the setup with each setup, then the short may be getting jiggled and sometimes no shorting / sometimes shorting.
That can be the case, but no matter how much I move the setup and switch the slots of both components, as soon as it get's to the blocking state, it doesn't take any effect, if it takes any effect at all. Please note, that I only switch the slots or move the setup, only if it's in the blocking state. As long as it's not in the blocking state, I'm not switching or changing anything.
Which is also weird, because sometimes I'm so frustrated, that I need a small break and I keep everything plugged in. While I'm having my break, I can sometimes hear the plug in sound and the board shows up in the explorer. With other words, it's getting recognized by my PC again. Not for long though, it randomly disconnects again after some time, until it doesn't get recognized by my PC anymore, also known as "the blocking state".

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Re: My RGB Matrix Featherwing is blocking my RP2040 from connecting to my PC

Post by adafruit_support_carter »

Not sure what to suggest. It's most likely some kind of connection issue somewhere. It could still be related to the soldering.

It'd help if you could somehow better correlate how you can get from non-locking state (which seems to occur after a random amount of time) back to a good state where you can upload a sketch again. As is, it's unknown both how and why the issue is occurring and how it is being remedied, if even for a brief period of time.

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Re: My RGB Matrix Featherwing is blocking my RP2040 from connecting to my PC

Post by MyAdaAlt »

I'm still dealing with this problem, and at this point I think I'm sure what the problem is.
When I fixed some problematic soldering points, it was still not working perfectly, BUT it was working way "better"? The connection times were lasting way longer than before and the blocking state is... I would consider gone.
The longest connection time I recorded was 45 minutes which is definitely way more than my previous record of 11 minutes. However it still disconnects sometimes, and it also takes some time to reconnect, but I'm pretty sure, that all of this is a soldering issue. I will try my best to find and fix the problematic points and I will keep you updated.

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MyAdaAlt
 
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Re: My RGB Matrix Featherwing is blocking my RP2040 from connecting to my PC

Post by MyAdaAlt »

I went to a specialist to ask for advice and they've inspected my solder joints. It turns out, that I still had some problematic solder joints, which I didn't see at first. They fixed all the problematic solder joints and since then, it's running perfectly fine and I can finally start working with all components.
I want to thank you for your informative replies, which helped me a lot identifying the issue. Without these, I wouldn't know where I'm failing.
I learned a lot about soldering, and I didn't expect, that good soldering is THIS important.
Once again, thank you very much.

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Re: My RGB Matrix Featherwing is blocking my RP2040 from connecting to my PC

Post by adafruit_support_carter »

Glad that fixed it up. It can be frustrating when things don't work, but it's always nice to at least be able to discover why. Thanks for updating on what fixed things.

I think the biggest issue people new to soldering run into is not appreciating the importance of getting the parts hot. That's done with the iron. The solder is attracted to the heat. So once the iron "melts" the solder, the solder then flows nicely onto the heated parts. Otherwise the solder will "stick" to the iron, go elsewhere, etc. and you end up fighting that.

Flux is also important. Most common solder has flux built in though. So you don't typically worry about adding flux separately. But flux can help with repairs and touch ups.

It can still take a bit of practice. But knowing that general goal and solder behavior will hopefully help.

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