meinEnigma

I know it takes forever but writing good doc, keeping things like website and stuff up2date plus have a family doesn't give much time left for this. However I now have 4 complete kits except for documentation and the doc is maybe 90% done so I plan on having it ready within a month.
Once the first 4 kits are gone I will order more PCBs and then about 20 kits will be ready soon after.

Have had a few requests./questions about buying the kit and that makes me wonder how many that didn't bother sending email to ask.
Current status of the kit is that all components for a few early bird kits exist, missing is documentation. While you could possible assemble it without doc (component values are on the boards) I don't like to release a half baked kit just to get it out fast so some doc is needed first.

I had hoped for more discussions around it in this forum but besides how the buttons where maid it been nothing here and that is a bit disappointing to me, lets hope it pick up a little once some kits are sold.

Did present it on makerfair ottawa and had great response there.

Now we just need to get the documentation finished and then the kit is ready.

Got all boards and assembled them as the first complete unit. Did find some issues but nothing catastrophic, more of annoying issues.

It's now time to put all kit parts in bags, label them and so on. Once done I should have enough to make 5 complete kits.

I have now ordered a second batch of PCB, this time all boards needed. I have also ordered parts enough to put together a few kits so in about 2 weeks I hope to begin assembly of the first meinEnigma.

I have uploaded some pictures to http://meinEnigma.com/gallery that shows the rendering of the boards.

Finished testing of the Lamp and Keyboard PCB, did find some issues but nothing to big.

Plugboard testing will have to wait a little because the plugboard is for narrow version of the mcp23017 and I have E/SO which is the wide version so it doesn't fit on the PBC. I have ordered new mcp23017 E/SS (=narrow) and once they come I can put them on the board and test them. However - since the wide version of the chip is way more common I changed the footprint on the plugboard so it will take the wide (E/SO) version as of next batch.

While waiting for the chip to arrive I'm going to finalize the main board and start working on a box to put it all in.

Two boards arrived and I have now started to populate them. No huge issues found so far but I will have to do another batch with some minor things corrected.

I have now ordered two of the three circuit boards (PCB), the Lamp&Keyboard and the Plugboard. Still working on the main board but didn't want to hold back for that. If some serious issues is found I can fix and order new ones when I order the main board.

I have now finalized the hardware part, all parts I was planning on are included and nothing missing.

Software wise it's some small bugs to fix

PCB - will order two boards in the next few days, the top main board will take a little longer since I need to place all components on it and I don't want to hold up the first two boards with that.

By design two of the boards are very generic. The lamp and keyboard can also be seen as 26 signal lights and 26 buttons controlled over i2c and the plugboard is 26 io ports on i2c control.
The main board is a bit trickier but if I change the design I only need to change the top board, the other two boards are the same.

Did seriously consider switching from Arduino to ESP8266 with program space as no 1 reason. After thinking about it for a while I decided to stick with arduino despite the limit of 32k program space. Reasons are mostly the time it will take to do the redesign and if I start a redesign every time I find a new shiny thing it will never be finished.

The current version will be limited in some ways but I rather add a arduino mega than switch to esp since that redesign would be just a physically bigger board than the current nano plus a ton of more program space. Going with ESP8266 means redesign a lot more, things like need more io pins, 3.3v to 5v level shifter and software changes both to make it work and also to implement the stuff I then would have space for - that will all take a lot of time to do.

For V1.0 it will be basically what I already have, a mainboard based on arduino nano, a separate lamp and keyboard plus a plug board.

If it is interest for more I may make a v2 mainboard based on ESP8266 with way more simulators included, things like UKWD, UHR box, all enigma models, custom models and more.