I didn’t pay a whole lot of attention to the number of pins when I bought one of these devices. I assumed it used the same pin layout as Adafruit’s Feather devices, so I bought one of their stackable header kits, but now I see the Meadow has an additional 2 pins per row. Without thinking about it enough, I bought a kit of stackable headers for Arduino devices, thinking I could use a 1x8 header next to a 1x10 header, but that doesn’t work because the spacing between two ends. I do have an option to file/sandpaper down the plastic. However:
Does anyone know where I can get stackable headers for the Meadow’s 1x18 and 1x14 layout?
I want to use Feather devices both below (screen) and above (sensors, such as IR camera), so the non-stackable header and the pins that came with the Meadow are not suitable for me. Who is the manufacturer of the non-stackable header that came with the device? Do they make a stackable version as well?
I have no experience of these parts so please check the data sheet carefully.
Also, bear in mind that if you are making a sandwich (sensor board on the bottom, Meadow in the middle and display on the top) then the two extra pins at the end may come into contact with parts on the sensor board to take care before applying power.
Thank you! I had tried searching DigiKey myself, but my search skills are obviously not as good as yours. I’ll check the datasheets more carefully before ordering, but from an initial look, they appear to be what I want.
And thanks for the advice about the extra pins. It’s something I already checked briefly, but it was good to double check. Testing a Feather device inserted at a 2 pin offset, the pins not in the socket get to less than 1 mm clearance of the board. I don’t think it’s making physical contact, but it’s so close. Fortunately there don’t appear to be PCB traces (tracks?) there, so I hope it’s ok even if if that part of the board is actually the ground plane.
I think it’s a bit of a shame that the Meadow didn’t use the exact same pin layout/count as Feather devices, to minimise issues such as what I’m experiencing. But hopefully the advantages outweigh my issues. In any case it is what it is, and dealing with it is at least a learning opportunity for me, even if it slows me down at first.
Thanks again, I really appreciate you finding and giving me the links to the products I failed to find myself.
Andy
The extra two pins are there to give additional GPIO to people who really want / need it.
If you look at the Meadow pin out and the Feather pin out moving from the USB connector down the board, you will find that the pin out matches the Feather pin out. This was done so that you can used Feather boards.
