Slide Switch Wires
I started off by making wires for connecting the slide switch to the lipo backpack. Most of the wires in the project are going to be pretty short, but it's OK if they're a little longer than necessary – You can always shorten them later. I suggest using 30AWG silicone cover wires because they're flexible and less prone to stress / breakage.
Tin Switch Wires
Once I cut the two wires, I then used wire strippers to remove a little bit of insulation from the tips of each wire. With the bare wire exposed, I mounted them to a pair of helping third hands and tinned the tips by adding a little bit of solder – This helps prevent the strands of wire from fraying.
Connect Wires to Slide Switch
Then I soldered the two wires to the leads on the slide switch. We only need two of the three leads on the slide switch, so remove one (either the far left or right, but not the middle.) I recommend tinning the two leads on the slide switch before soldering in the wires – This helps the two connections stick together and adhere.
Cut Trace for Power Switch
Next, I needed to cut a trace on the Lipo Backpack to enable the power switch – By default the lipo backpack will always stay powered on. Cutting the trace allows a switch to power the circuit on and off. I used an X-Acto knife to scrape off the little trace that connects the two switch pins together. Make sure the trace is fully cut and the two pins do not have an electronical connection.
Connect Switch to Lipo Backpack
Now I can solder in the two wires from the slide switch to the Lipo backpack. The polarity of the wires and switch doesn't matter, so don't worry about wiring it in backwards.
Lipo Backpack Wires
We'll need three more pieces of wire for connecting the lipo backpack to the Trinket. These can be in different colors to help tell the connections apart.
Tin Lipo Backpack Wires
Again, I stripped and tinned the tips of each wire. I found it much faster if you mount all wires of the to one of the arms on the helping third hand. That way you can apply solder to the wires faster.
Connect Wires to Lipo Backpack
Now we can solder in the three wires to the pins on the lipo backpack – 5V, G, and BAT.
Connect Lipo Backpack to Trinket
With the wires now connected to the lipo backpack, we can then connect those to the Trinket. Connect 5V from the lipo backpack to USB on the Trinket. G (ground) from the lipo backpack goes to GND(ground) on the Trinket. Lastly, BAT from lipo backpack goes to BAT on the Trinket.
Trim Camera Wires Short
The wires from the camera module are a little long so I cut them short. Don't cut them too short, just enough to fit into the enclosure without too much excess. The three wires from the camera module have a little connector, it's OK to remove it – We won't be using it in the project.
Tin Camera Wires
Then I stripped and tinned the tips on each wire. Notice these wires are a bit more stiff than the silicone coated ones? Most wires are. Also, the coating is prone to warp when too much heat is applied to them, so be careful not to melt it too much.
Connect Camera to Trinket
OK, now we can connect the wires from the camera to the Trinket. Red wire from camera goes to 5V on the Trinket. Black wire from camera connects to GND (ground) on Trinket. Then, white wire goes to pin # 0 on the Trinket. The black wire (ground) might be tricky to solder in because we already have a connection here (from the lipo backpack). I recommend using a pair of tweezers to hold the wire steady while soldering it through the ground pin. I also found it helpful to simply remove the lipo backpack ground wire from the Trinket. Then you can solder the two ground wires together and connect them to the ground pin all at once.
Test Circuit
Now that we have all of our wired connections made, we can plug in the 100mAh lipo battery into the lipo backpack. Depending on where the slide switch is set, the circuit will power on. The LEDs from the Trinket and camera will light up. Yay! Now we can start fitting the components into the case.
Page last edited January 29, 2017
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