Dropbeacon

The DropBeacon is an iBeacon compatible beacon based on BlueGiga’s BLE112 module. It is not intended to be as small as possible but to be suitable for hand soldering by makers. Well the resistors, capacitors and the led is in 0603 package, but should be possible to hand solder by an experienced maker.

The DropBeacon’s firmware can be updated over the air since it implements BlueGiga’s OTA service. The security mechanism which is implemented to prohibit others to modify the UUID Major and Minor IDs is a push button which changes the beacon to writable mode. You need to press the button, the red LED turns on and you are now able to write the UUIDs and even updating the firmware OTA is enabled now.

The battery (CR2450) holds for at least 6 months (tested) but I’m currently doing some more tests on the battery right now.

As you can see on the backside of the PCB the DropBeacon is the first MiKro-Labs branded hardware.

This will not change where the devices are developed. It is still out of my hands.

You can download the PCB design as well as the firmware files from the new github repository I created for the DropBeacon which can be found here: https://github.com/michaelkroll/DropBeacon

Please let me know if you have suggestions on how to improve the firmware or the PCB. Initial enclosure designs can be ordered in my Shapeways Shop at http://www.shapeways.com/shops/mkroll?section=Enclosures&s=0

Top and Bottom enclosure parts:

The DropBeacon inside the enclosure:

The DropBeacon in the closed enclosure: