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Raspberry Pi RF frequency counter

Raspberry Pi RF frequency counter

A Raspberry PI RF frequency counter project from Scott Harden, that is available on GitHub:

Raspberry PI RF Frequency Counter with Python Interface. The RF signal clocks a 32-bit counter (SN74LV8154) connected to a 16-bit IO expander (MCP23017) accessable to the Raspberry Pi (via I²C) to provide real-time frequency measurements from a python script.

The entire circuit is only two microchips! I have a few passives to clean up the RF signal (the RF input is loaded with a 1k resistor to ground, decoupled through a series 100 nF capacitor, and balanced at VCC/2 through a voltage divider of two 47k resistors), but if the measured signal is already a strong square wave they could be omitted. The circuit requires a gate pulse which typically will be 1 pulse per second (1PPS) and can be generated by dividing-down a 32.768kHz oscillator, a spare pin on a microcontroller, a fancy 1PPS time reference, or like in my case a GPS module (Neo-6M) with 1PPS output to provide an extremely accurate gate.



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Here’s a quick summary describing how the code works: First I send bytes to address 0 and 1 to set all pins of GPIO A as inputs, and GPIO B as outputs. Note that only 4 of 8 pins are used for the output, so technically 4 extra pins could be used for things like blinking LEDs or controlling other devices. I then set the register select pins by sending a value to 0x13 (GPIO B), and read the entire GPIO A bus (INTCAPB, 0x18). For address details, consult the datasheet. I do this 4 times (1 for each byte of the 32-bit counter), do a little math to turn it into a frequency value, and compare the current value with the last value and take the difference to display as the measured frequency.

More details at Scott Harden’s blog.

 


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