LED hourglass for self-assembly - Made in China - Review.

Hello my dear readers.

One of the gadgets I found in the test package I received from Gulson was an electronic self-assembly hourglass, the so-called DIY Kit.



For the price of about eleven zlotys, we can buy ...
Exactly what? Because for me it is a completely useless gadget, but more on that soon. First, to avoid lynching, let me quote Kamil and then insert a screenshot:

gulson wrote:

The modules were chosen on the basis of what most people from all over the world order. If people order an electronic hourglass for timing, it means it's popular for some reason, and we need to see why! There are modules from advanced to beginner.

I was expecting something useful (boiling eggs, etc.), that is, the ability to adjust the time, some pipek / beeper / buzzer, as he called it, reminding that time is running out and that it has already expired. I was quietly counting on even the simplest sensor, detecting the rotation of the hourglass by 180 ° and thus resetting it.

Meanwhile, we get:



As you can see not much .

We also have a diagram and a list of elements (I don't know why, but it is).



The list shows that the set includes:

1. 57 LEDs, blue in this case.
2. STC15W201S chip pcs one.
3. PCB with dimensions of 84mm x 41mm.
4. DC Jack 3mm x 1.2mm. With a plus inside.
5. ISP connector in the form of a four-pin goldpin strip.
6. 5mm x 5mm microswitch momentary button.
7. Power switch - miniature switch.
8. The power supply of the system is 5VDC. We can put them on the DC Jack socket (then the switch works), or on the goldpins, as in the pictures. In this case, the circuit breaker will not work.
9. The system starts at a voltage of 2.6V. At full voltage, it consumes 14mA.
10. After assembly, a few more components remain, namely ceramic capacitor 334 and three diodes.

After assembling. (And it took me a lot of time for such a small circuit. That's because of quite a lot of LEDs placed close to each other.) The circuit looks like this:




After connecting the power, the hourglass starts in the default mode, let's call it slow. When we hold the S2 button for a few seconds, the second mode will be activated, let's call it fast. I have absolutely no idea what this gadget would be used for. Well, he gets tested and described, they do their job.

Finally, two more videos of the action.

Slow:


Fast:


As you can see, this is not any useful length of time. I have no idea why this crap is so popular on Aliexpress, or what people use it for.

Best regards.
CMS