Robot Illiterate has questions

[Anonymous]

This is all new to me, so these are probably boneheaded questions, but I’m failing to do something important here.

I’m putting together the control box for the Makelangelo 3 – specifically the innards – and the LCD screen doesn’t light up when I plug it in.

Before I begin flipping ribbon cables around, since right now they are hooked up like the picture in the instructions,

first question:

Is the LCD screen suppose to light up just by plugging the RUMBA board in, or does the RUMBA board and/or LCD screen have on/off buttons?

Second question

If it is indeed supposed to just light up when I plug it in, and I have the ribbon cables “backwards,” does that mean “backwards” in the sense that I just need to flip around the ends that I plugged into the RUMBA board, or does it mean flip the cables around so the ends that are currently plugged into the LCD go into the RUMBA?

Finally, the power and ground – just to rule that out as a problem:

I stripped the ends, twisted those hairy little copper strands into points, inserted them into the terminals (white stripe positive) and then screwed them down. Does that sound right..? I’ve never done that before either.

Muchas gracias

[Anonymous]

1. Light up
2. Swap only one end around. If you get it wrong it doesn’t damage the lcd.
3. Sounds right. Set the jumper for “stand alone” and the rumba should light up before the Lcd is connected.

[Anonymous]

My Rumba board’s supposed to light up too?? Well, crap – that’s not happening. The jumper was in the stand alone position when I got it. Maybe I did a crappy job with the power line.

[Anonymous]

Put the jumper to “USB power” and connect the USB to your computer. The board should turn on, tho it won’t have enough power to move the steppers.

[Author]

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