[GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD/Palm Touchstone-No soldering on phone!!

[comprocket]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

Can you post a pic of your cover so I can position mine the same? GSM or CDMA?

 

[nkk2008]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

CDMA. I used the extended battery cover.

Note that to get the contacts in the correct place I had to do some routing of the copper trace tape whereas the OP drew a straight line from the palm contacts to the side of the cover. Since I used multiple pieces and could not get the adhesive to conduct, I had to make solder bridges at all the turns to get a continuous path.

My soldering is a bit messy, but it works. I did warp the back of the cover a bit with all the heat, but only in one place where I had to redo the solder at least five times (it was at the edge of the case at the back-phone contact, and I was continually adjusting my contact alignment). I have electrical tape over it to prevent shorts, but took it off for the pic so you could see everything.

-Nkk

 

[comprocket]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

Thanks a lot! That is higher than mine. I did not feel like running my traces like yours. But I will re-do it tonight. You do cover them with a bit of electric tape right? Also, you could scrape some of the plastic ridges for a better fit!

 

[nkk2008]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

Thanks a lot! That is higher than mine. I did not feel like running my traces like yours. But I will re-do it tonight. You do cover them with a bit of electric tape right? Also, you could scrape some of the plastic ridges for a better fit!

Yeah, I do have tape over it. I just took it off to give you a good picture. I did scrape some of the ridges, then I just got sick of it and stopped because I had done enough that it fit, so I was happy.

Nkk

 

[ohiomoto]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

I raised mine a bit and just "curved" the tape without cutting it. It bunched up a little but it pressed down nicely. You could also just go with wire from the coil to the tape.

 

[comprocket]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

For those of you wanting to charge at AC speeds instead of USB, Fast Charge Mod is here!

1) Install Franco Kernel (Milestone 1)
2) Run this script to activate it from the terminal (minus quotes): "echo 1 > /sys/kernel/fast_charge/force_fast_charge"

To turn off:

echo 0 > /sys/kernel/fast_charge/force_fast_charge

Source: USB Fast Charge mod - xda-developers
Franco Kernel: [KERNEL][GPL][5 MAR - #M1] franco.Kernel | 4.0.3/4 | 1,35GHZ | COLOR/SOUND CONTROL - xda-developers

 

[Thorn11166]

Force AC causes mine to not even start charging, normal works fine though

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

 

[ohiomoto]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

I installed Franco's and it's working for me. It was able to keep up with Navigation/Pandora/Bluetooth on my way to work today and looks to be charging at about 30-35% per hour at idle based on the last 15 minutes.

 

[ohiomoto]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

That explains why the magnets can be placed in two different positions (inner and outer) depending on which side is placed down and the original non-magnetic discs land somewhere in between.

EDIT: File this under the "Why didn't I think of that before?" category: I just removed the magnet from one corner, flipped it over and placed it next to the magnet in another corner. So why not use 2 magnets in each corner (without yoking them together)? Seems reasonable that this really make it stick to the Touchstone! I'll have to experiment when I get home from work today.

I added 4 more magnets to the back. Works really well and the pull is very, very, very strong. The only problem I can see is it might pull the battery cover off when you pick up the phone!

 

[ohiomoto]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

I've updated the guide with a few ideas and pictures.

 

[Knolly]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

Can anyone who did this with the GSM OEM cover post what theirs looks like? I've been struggling at finding a balance between getting it to work and being able to still close the battery door.

 

[ohiomoto]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

For those of you wanting to charge at AC speeds instead of USB, Fast Charge Mod is here!

1) Install Franco Kernel (Milestone 1)
2) Run this script to activate it from the terminal (minus quotes): "echo 1 > /sys/kernel/fast_charge/force_fast_charge"

To turn off:

echo 0 > /sys/kernel/fast_charge/force_fast_charge

Click to view quoted image


Source: USB Fast Charge mod - xda-developers
Franco Kernel: [KERNEL][GPL][5 MAR - #M1] franco.Kernel | 4.0.3/4 | 1,35GHZ | COLOR/SOUND CONTROL - xda-developers

The fast charge mod is now baked into the latest Codenamedroid 1.5 ROM and it works. I didn't find a toggle for it, so I set it in the terminal as you instructed.

 

[barchamb]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD for Palm Touchstone without solderin

The fast charge mod is now baked into the latest Codenamedroid 1.5 ROM and it works. I didn't find a toggle for it, so I set it in the terminal as you instructed.

I'm not running Codename, I'm running AOKP, so I just downloaded the kernel, installed it, and ran the script. I can confirm that my screen now says "Charging (AC)" instead of "Charging (USB)" when it's on the touchstone. Now, whether or not it's actually charging faster, I'll have to wait and see.

 

[mikemck]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD/Palm Touchstone-No soldering on phon

When on the touchstone on your desk what is showing on the screen, launcher home or some app?

 

[eventnick]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD/Palm Touchstone-No soldering on phon

Update for you all. Actual technical data measured with test equipment not stupid widgets.

Original:

Ok so theres 23 pages of crap here that I am not going to read through, so apologies if this is redundant. But I performed this modificiation and I have some technical data to report.

I tested several different configurations:

1. inductive coil inside the phone under battery cover
2. inductive coil inside the phone under the battery cover inside a diztronic rubber case
3. finally inductive coil outside of phone inside diztronic case.

Bottom line, the touchstone powered with its 1A charger or even a 3rd party 700mA charger charges the GNex the exact same. The field it generates is more than strong enough to penetrate a rubber case and the battery cover with no loss in charging current.

Measured charging current, consistent across all trials: 430mA. The GNex simply does not want any larger than that though the pogo pins in this configuration.


So feel free use whatever configuration you want but do not expect to see a charge rate greater than 430mA.

I chose to put the coil on the inside of the case allowing me to use several Neodymium N52 Magnets to very securely hold the Nexus to the Touchstone. The standard battery cover would not close when I had inside the phone.

Update: Testing with electrical instrumentation.

Enabling the Force Fast Charging (AC charging) kernel addition has improved the charging current. I have measured a charging current of 640mA with the screen on 100% and about 610 mA with the screen off. This is an increase of about 200 mA from 430 mA or about +50% from before. I tested this with both a 1A supply and a 2A supply so either the phone or the touchstone is limiting the current draw to ~650 mA but either way this is a significant improvement.

 

[eventnick]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD/Palm Touchstone-No soldering on phon

In my opinion it appears that ~650 mA is the maximum we are going to get through the touchstone gentlemen. When supplying 650 mA the touchstones supply voltage drops down to 4.5 V and at that point the phone stops trying to take more current. This limitation is related to how much power the touchstone is designed transfer.

If you charge via the usb port or the POGO pins directly using a standard wall charger you can pull much more current because the charger is able to maintain an adequate supply voltage to the phone.

I would certainly invite discussion or verification of my findings.

To summarize: It appears ~650 mA is the most we are going to be able to pull from the touchstone. The touchstone itself appears to be the bottleneck.

Is 650 mA enough to charge the phone while using Navigation, streaming music and using 4G? We will have to wait for you all to test and report back.

 

[alanhsu]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD/Palm Touchstone-No soldering on phon

Does the Stock Samsung wall charger works with the Touchstone puck?

Basically it shows a 7.1 Volt across the contacts (with pixi coil). When load is connected (by touching the pogo pins) the voltage drops to zero and phone doesn't charge. I tried 2 different pucks and 2 different pixi coil, all the same result.

Perhaps stock samsung charger doesn't supply enough power? Or I need to wait longer for it to start charging?

 

[ScooberJake]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD/Palm Touchstone-No soldering on phon

I flashed franco's kernel and ran the code above. Getting AC charging now. Before I was getting about 0.35-0.4% per minute, my first test with Fast Charge Mod got 0.68% per minute. Definite improvement. Should be good enough for most of what I do even in the car.

 

[nkk2008]

Re: [GUIDE] Galaxy Nexus MOD/Palm Touchstone-No soldering on phon

Does the Stock Samsung wall charger works with the Touchstone puck?

Basically it shows a 7.1 Volt across the contacts (with pixi coil). When load is connected (by touching the pogo pins) the voltage drops to zero and phone doesn't charge. I tried 2 different pucks and 2 different pixi coil, all the same result.

Perhaps stock samsung charger doesn't supply enough power? Or I need to wait longer for it to start charging?

I would be weary of 7.1V. That is too large. I do not know of any reason that a charger rated the same as the palm one should not work (in fact, barring any proprietary stupidity, it should work), but clearly something has gone wrong in your setup.

If you really want to be sure, you can get a palm charger for $5 from amazon. Otherwise, look for other problems.

From what I have read in this thread, the consensus seems to be that we are all getting ~5.6VDC straight from the coil circuitry contacts. That is perfectly inline with the spec that one would expect it to agree with (mainly, USB).

-Nkk

 

[ellesshoo]

That explains why the magnets can be placed in two different positions (inner and outer) depending on which side is placed down and the original non-magnetic discs land somewhere in between.

EDIT: File this under the "Why didn't I think of that before?" category: I just removed the magnet from one corner, flipped it over and placed it next to the magnet in another corner. So why not use 2 magnets in each corner (without yoking them together)? Seems reasonable that this really make it stick to the Touchstone! I'll have to experiment when I get home from work today.

Yea, after posting about the dual magnets I decided as well to go ahead with dual magnets in each corner and just forgo yoking them. I was waiting to find a source for a suitable material to yoke them with but just going with 2 magnets seems fine. The reason I was hesitant to do it without yoking is that the two magnets next to each other will pull the other's magnetic field, while you really want the field going in the direction toward the touchstone. In practice I don't think it is detrimental though. I used a thin rectangular shaped magnet as my second magnet and it does seem to increase both the hold and the guidance on to the touchstone.

The big benefit of yoking is that you effectively increase the volume of a single magnetic entity, the force on both sides is equivalent to using a magnet the size of the yoked magnets combined. However the yoking material would certainly add some thickness. If anyone does this just keep in mind that the magnets should not touch except "through" the soft iron yoke.