Allsky camera - pisky

My build of an Allsky camera, involving a Raspberry Pi 4, R-Pi HQ camera, 180 degree fish eye lens and some assorted bits!

The build is primarily to capture some Aurora as I have never actually witnessed it.
The software is here...
https://github.com/AllskyTeam/allsky

Components:

Raspberry Pi 4 (I had one not being used)

R-Pi HQ camera https://thepihut.com/products/raspberry-pi-high-quality-camera-module
Fish eye lens https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32913271661.html

5amp  R/C BEC https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hobbywing-Ubec-5a-2-8s-Air/dp/B0BD2QK65N
POE inject/extract modules, can't remember where I got mine as had them some years.
Something like this will do the job https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ouitble-Splitter-Injector-Ethernet-IEEE802-3af-Black/dp/B0FKHGKJY6
CAT6 patch cable https://www.amazon.co.uk/VOIETOLT-Ethernet-Outdoor-Weatherproof-Waterproof/dp/B0BLH6KG7D/?th=1

I 3D printed various bits to mount the whole lot into one assembly for easy mounting in the case.
12v DC is injected into the CAT6 cable in the house and then extracted at the camera end and fed into the Radio Control UBEC providing the 5V for the R-Pi.
The CAT6 cable is nearly 30 metres long.

Ignore the wifi cable and antenna, it didn't work out too well so was removed.

Heat from the R-Pi (and fan when activate) is ducted up into the plexi glass dome to prevent frosting

 

Cheap yellow Display + si4732 flexprint

After my first attempt with a Cheap Yellow Display (CYD) ended with the CYD having an unresponsive touch panel here I made a second one with a different CYD which has a much better resistive touch screen.

3d printed a case for it to fit in, whcich involved direct wiring as there was no room to use the plug in connectors/wires.
The case is not my design, I got it from here: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:7047135
The software is from here... https://macsbug.wordpress.com/2026/01/

I used this CYD for this build and ammended the gpio pins in the software to suit.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FHZW8MTC

Using a Quansheng si4732 v5 FPC Modification Module for K5 shortwave

Fabricated a small board to hold the Quansheng UV5 v5 HF mod flexprint, HXJ8002 audio amplifier and speaker.  Soldered a small piece of desolder braid over the si4732A10 chip to help against interference.

Hard wired the cables as there is no room for connectors

Finished radio, works OK apart from some small audio noise, maybe the i2c bus??
Left antenna is VHF and right antenna is SW/MW/LW

Cheap Yellow Display + si4732

Using an esp32 Cheap Yellow Display (CYD) and si4732 to make a HF/VHF radio receiver.

I am using a 2 x USB variant of the CYD and a v5 K5/K6 si4732 flex PCB as used in modifying a Quansheng K5 for full HF/VHF.

By using the software from 'macsbug' you can have a functional radio receiver for not a lot of money.
Code is here...
https://macsbug.wordpress.com/2026/01/
Download the code for the 2 USB version (right click and save as)

I have modified my CYD by removing the onboard LED and cutting some track on the two connectors, P3 and CN1.
I cut the trace(s) from P3, just under the green wire - IO35 and also from IO22 to CN1.
I also cut the track IO22 track near CN1.
Doing this allowed me to wire IO16 and IO7 from the old LED to the P3 and CN1 connectors.
I adjusted macsbug code to match the new wiring.
I used much as macsbug has posted on Facebook...

Click images to go SUPERSIZE and then click the X at top right to close the large image.

Compare the connector PCB tracks to my CYD board, there seems to be more than one variant of the 2 x USB board.
I am going to call my type "CYD2USB-v2" as it seems different to the earlier versions shown on the internet?

My one as in the image, is from Amazon, here
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0F24X83FC

In macsbug code, I have adjusted it to suit my wiring, in particular, IO21 is used by the board for the LCD backlight, so cannot be used in this scenario.

code change that suits my board...

CYD2USB_2.8_All_Band_Radio.ino file, around line 85

#define I2C_SDA     27  // SI4732-A10-GSR I2C SDA

#define I2C_SCL     22  // SI4732-A10-GSR I2C SCK

#define RESET_PIN   16  // SI4732-A10-GSR RESET

The code is on macsbug site, here...
https://macsbug.wordpress.com/2026/01/

Specifically, the file is located as in this image...

There seems to be an issue with my particular board as macsbug's touch code does not work correctly and the screen touch is very wrong making it impossible to touch any of the buttons correctly.
I am not the only one with this issue.
I'm hopeful we can find a solution to this as my CYD touch does work OK using a completely different use case/software.

I used a v5 K5/K6 si4732 flex PCB as used to modify a Quansheng handy-talkie to HF Rx and hacked it onto a bit of circuit board using enamelled copper wire and some headers

More to follow as it happens...