Garrett Mace’s Centipede Shield has some pretty cool features:
The Centipede Shield is an add-on PCB for standard layout (Duemilanova, Diecimila) Arduino microcontroller boards. It uses the Wire I2C interface on analog pins 4 and 5 to provide 64 general purpose I/O pins.
This means that each pin can be assigned as an input or output, just like the standard digital pins on the Arduino. A library is provided that makes it easy to access the pins from Arduino code. The library commands are extremely similar to the existing pinMode, digitalWrite and digitalRead commands.
Each group of 16 pins is controlled by a separate chip on the I2C bus. The pins are wired to 2×10 headers, intended for use with IDC ribbon cable connectors. Two of the extra wires are used for ground, and two more are used for a “common” connection that can be wired to some other signal or voltage by the user if desired.
Even better, two Centipedes can be stacked, giving you 128 I/O pins. Madness.
10 thoughts on “Centipede shield offers 64 I/O pins”
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Wow, cool to see this on here…I’ll throw in a word of caution about stacking. It’s electrically feasible but the I/O connectors are too tall to allow stacking with normal headers. If you get some headers with extra long tails, 20mm or so, then you could stack.
These are out of stock right now, glad I got several last order!
http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=17_21&products_id=85
I am using them on almost every board now.
Those are the same kind we have…we’ve got hundreds of them, they’re an option with every shield. I meant that 10.5mm tails are not long enough to provide room for the ribbon cable connectors if you stack a shield on top of the Centipede Shield.
“Those are the same kind we have…we’ve got hundreds of them, they’re an option with every shield.”
Sounds cool.. Howz about a link? :) I luv shopping for arduino stuff.
http://mpepcw.blu.livefilestore.com/y1pnK-sgrgjLsbDAIIPcuaNpYL143_mjfS4CCENNN7TmSpc0ApF38pUuIGVMBfSYk4YXIQa1kJlWq6A1BAx5Oz6iB6OSXQuJ9qe/100_6033.JPG?psid=1
http://mpepcw.blu.livefilestore.com/y1pbSU4z8xFEl29cpqCJ8gA40Z_Zmt_al22BwAfjk0sIZuI7yqAVWT7ZiuqUY-lZGY1gEWqeZ5DBNG7k8dZgVqR50OxrzTfto6I/100_6031.JPG?psid=1
I did overlook the 20mm tail detail, but this is what I am doing to get the SD/DataLogger shield on top of my XBee breakout board. Stack the 10.5mm in the middle.
Hm…Dont you love it when you scroll up and realize…
Garret is the maker of the board, and the link is above..
D’OH!!!
Well, anyhoo…. off to have a closer look.