Finally got my DNA200 chip plugged in and working! RX200 -> DNA200

[The DigitalAlchemist]

So, it may have took 2 days, a small fire, and now a set of batteries I no longer trust... But my Reuleaux RX200 is now a DNA200, and I'm hella proud of it. So I'm gana share my story:

~~~~~~~~~Commence TL;DR warning~~~~~~~~~~

Lots of learning, plenty of frustration. I started with a 20 year old 25W soldering iron... That didnt work too well. My first day was a complete failure... 

After about 7 hours I finally got everything plugged in and soldered well enough that wires wouldnt just snap or fall off... But the device was only turning on when I hit the fire button? Lol no clue how that's even possible I didnt touch those connections...

Then, I re-wired it and nearly caught it on fire... Completely melted fortunately just a single wire.

Well, after taking a break and going to bed, I woke up, got a new soldering iron (a 140 watt one, was done having solder just sit there for 5 minutes potentially frying the chip while I waited for it to heat up...) and tore all the wires off, cleaned the solder off as best I could (desoldering wicks are pretty uncommon apparently, went to 2 hardware stores...), and salvaged an old external DVD drive for new wires.

So, after that I took it from the beginning, as if I was making a new device not just adapting an old one and upgrading with new tech. I re wired the entire battery tray, giving it longer wires (the original ones were so tightly wired I couldnt even take it apart with out desoldering it) so I knew exactly where the power was going. Then I attached another wire to the positives of every battery, and manually soldered it into the terminal. Net result is now the DNA200 can read the voltage off of each battery and balance them like it should be able to. My 3 18650's are being treated as a 3s LiPo, and it works perfectly... Well almost...

Anyways, the second total rebuild with the new iron took only about an hour of measuring, stripping, and soldering all new wires onto every part. One of the golden disks (that the positive end sits on) melted so bad I had to throw it away and make up something new for it to sit in... Ended up being a mess of electrical tape but it works and doesnt fall out. 

After that, everything was finally assembled. I gave everything longer wires so I had more room to work with, and can pull the battery tray out w/o desoldering anything. It's not perfect, I think theres too much wire since the battery cover doesnt sit perfectly flush, theres a half mm gap in it now but whatever... I'm here to vape, and it does. Carefully I tested it, slowly inserting each battery, waiting for any of the wires to short and none did. I gave it a few test vapes and celebrated, putting it down and taking a break for a good hour. When I came back I went to tighten everything up and found that when I did apparently the atty shorts? No clue how. I went back in, and painted everything over in clear nail polish giving it a good 30 mins to dry, then plastered strips of thin rubber over the connections to be 100% sure it's insulated. Low and behold, it works fine now. I couldnt determine how or why it was shorting, but that fixed it.

After that, I had a few more challenges to overcome, that took several hours. First off, the DNA200 screen is about twice the size of the RX200, so I had to dremel out the viewport. I cant use the glass insert so I'll have to make my own at some point. Then, none of the buttons fit. The fire button made no contact, and the up/down buttons were hard up against the board... Simple fix, I put a bit of foam in the fire button to give it a bit more depth (also had the side effect of making it not clicky) and drilled a 0.5mm hole into the up/down buttons. Simple enough, problem solved! 


~~~~~~~~~~TL;DR break~~~~~~~~~

Anyways, now here I'm sitting and I havnt even drained a full battery... I've been playing with the escribe software getting a feel for it. I dont understand everything in it yet, but I'd say a fair 70% of it. The thing I bought the DNA200 for was to customize the temperature curves so I can finally get a reliable SS build going, though I've yet to venture that far. I'm still getting a grasp on everything this chip can do, it's incredible. Unless a new revelation in vaping hardware comes out, I dont think I'll need another setup. Even then, I have all the bits I need to migrate if that does happen. I can either take the chip over into a new/better mod (It'll be hard to beat the Reuleaux's form factor, it's awesome) or if theres somehow a better chip in the near future, I can just wire that into the Reuleaux now that I've obtained the knowledge on how to do so proficiently. 

Other than that, there doesnt seem to be anything this chip cant do. 200W is all I need (and it's true 200w, not 200 pulse like so many others), and it can be programmed to handle any potentially new wire types that come out. And having custom screens is awesome too of course. 

Anyways, that's just me introducing myself and my adventure on getting here. Was frustrating, but totally worth it!

[dl12345]

I did the same as you, although I also replaced the 510 connector because mine was shot. I had the same issue with the battery sled being difficult to fit because of the wires. 

Ultimately I abandoned the project because I had to make substantial cutouts in the battery sled (for both the 510 and for the DNA 200 wiring) that, in my opinion, made the mod somewhat unsafe.

You can remove the top plastic covering on the battery connectors to prevent them melting when you solder them....

I made a write-up with some photos

[jurdanas]

dl12345 said:

I did the same as you, although I also replaced the 510 connector because mine was shot.........

I made a write-up with some photos

Good job.

[dwcraig1]

dl12345 said:

I did the same as you, although I also replaced the 510 connector because mine was shot. I had the same issue with the battery sled being difficult to fit because of the wires. 

Ultimately I abandoned the project because I had to make substantial cutouts in the battery sled (for both the 510 and for the DNA 200 wiring) that, in my opinion, made the mod somewhat unsafe.

You can remove the top plastic covering on the battery connectors to prevent them melting when you solder them....

I made a write-up with some photos

Can the original Wismec 510 socket be disassembled for example so the insulator or spring can be replaced?

[The DigitalAlchemist]

dwcraig1 said:

Can the original Wismec 510 socket be disassembled for example so the insulator or spring can be replaced?

I actually really need to know this, because mine is shot. I somehow ended up melting the insulator on mine (a long time ago) and it's having difficulty connecting with some of my mods now.

[dl12345]

dwcraig1 said:

Can the original Wismec 510 socket be disassembled for example so the insulator or spring can be replaced?

No, it cannot. It is an integral unit that cannot be disassembled.

[dwcraig1]

Thanks for your reply.

[dl12345]

I have not tried this on a Wismec DNA200 (only on a RX200), but you should be able to replace the 510 connector with a Fat Daddy Vapes V4 low profile 22mm connector.

This will require at minimum making a cut-out in the middle part of the top of the battery sled to prevent the 510 impinging against the back of the sled. 

Have a look at the post I linked earlier in this thread. This would be your only option since the Wismec 510 is proprietary and they won't send you one either (I tried).

According to one report I've seen, the 510 can be replaced on the RX200 without needing to dremel out the internal mount. However, when I did this with a DNA200 board in place I needed to dremel out the internal mount and use 22m washers to mount the 510 connector proud of the mount in order for the 510 pin not to contact against the board.

[justinizme]

Hi there... First post.. Does anyone have a picture or a diagram of the stock battery sled? What I mean is how the stock wiring is ran.. I seen in the thread he posted just one side was posted. I need the opposite side. I need a picture/diagram of the side with the "negative" up front(The spring loaded pin).

[The DigitalAlchemist]

justinizme said:

Hi there... First post.. Does anyone have a picture or a diagram of the stock battery sled? What I mean is how the stock wiring is ran.. I seen in the thread he posted just one side was posted. I need the opposite side. I need a picture/diagram of the side with the "negative" up front(The spring loaded pin).

Welcome aboard!

TBH, you'd do just as well to re-wire the whole sled, that's what I had to do... It's simple if you just follow where the power should be flowing from each point


That said, I still have it memorized how I did it, leme draw something up.


 

It's impressive I know, do try not to be intimidated by my 1337 drawing skills... Really though I'm no engineer but this is how it should look. 

Big dots show the ends of the batteries, red lines are positive out wires, the blue ones connect to the voltage terminal. The start of the loop is the negative gold... Thingie on the top right, and it all comes out the bottom left on the positive bottom right wire (that's what you connect to the positive on the board, dont worry about the negative). The faded maroon ones just show the power flow, so I know I'm right. It's a series battery pack.

Some one please help my low confidence and tell me I got it correct in the draw up lol... 

For the terminals you need to connect them in order (I'm pretty sure it's subtraction, that's how it knows what's in the battery (just minus the voltage from the previous battery in the series)). 

dl12345 said:

I have not tried this on a Wismec DNA200 (only on a RX200), but you should be able to replace the 510 connector with a Fat Daddy Vapes V4 low profile 22mm connector.

This will require at minimum making a cut-out in the middle part of the top of the battery sled to prevent the 510 impinging against the back of the sled. 

Have a look at the post I linked earlier in this thread. This would be your only option since the Wismec 510 is proprietary and they won't send you one either (I tried).

According to one report I've seen, the 510 can be replaced on the RX200 without needing to dremel out the internal mount. However, when I did this with a DNA200 board in place I needed to dremel out the internal mount and use 22m washers to mount the 510 connector proud of the mount in order for the 510 pin not to contact against the board.

Hmm... Well it's not like it doesnt work, the spring is just busted... Meaning some of my mods have difficulty making connections, but none that I care terribly about. Unless mine presents significantly greater problems, I wont dare the replacement. For me, I'm not very great at soldering so each modification and repair is a risk. I'm even dealing with the fact I routed the top posts through the wrong side of the board making my battery tray not fit flush for now... Perhaps in the future but not for now. 

Too bad to hear Wimsec wont sell us another connector... I actually could use a few replacement parts myself, like the plastic mounts for the pins and a new battery tray (I messed mine up bad trying to get it out the first time, cracked it on the top)

[VapingBad]

You have an extra balance wire, the one by the positive Wismec just bridge the outer two balance pads on the circuit board to the adjective power pads so only use two wires for the balance connections.  You could use 4 balance wires if ther is room, but not much point using 3 rather than 2 IMO.  Of the remaining 2 balance wires on your drawing the top on should go to balance 2 and the bottom one to balance 1, with balance 3 and balance GND bridging from adjacent power connection pads.