M5GO Battery Bottom3 (for CoreS3 only) with CoreS3 issues

Coopersmith-24601

M5GO Battery Bottom3 (for CoreS3 only) was delivered today for my CoreS3. Also delivered was a M5GO/FIRE Battery Bottom Charging Base

I installed it and while the battery is working, when I put it on the M5GO/FIRE Battery Bottom Charging Base the USB-C charging input doesn't deliver charge to the battery nor data.

Further, I assumed the LEDs included in the M5GO Battery Bottom3 (for CoreS3 only) would be useable with the RGB function of UiFlow2, but this doesn't seem to work.

Do I need to do something special with the CoreS3 to get these functions to work?

felmue

Hello @Coopersmith-24601

Re charging: the M5GO3 has its own charger IC built-in. A red LED indicates charging and when the battery is full the green LED in M5GO3 lights up. The built-in charger IC cannot be queried by software; is that what you mean by 'data'?

Re RGB: please find an example in the UIFlow2 Project Zone: M5CoreS3_M5G03Bottom_RGB_UIFlow2.1.3

Thanks
Felix

Coopersmith-24601

@felmue

Thank you for that programming example. It cleared up how to use the RGB LEDs and that's great!

However, I still have an unresolved issue with the M5GO/FIRE Battery Bottom Charging Base; https://shop.m5stack.com/products/battery-bottom-charging-base

If I plug a USB-C cable into it, the power doesn't pass power to the M5GO Battery Bottom3 (for CoreS3 only) through the pogo pins and doesn't charge its 500mAh battery; https://shop.m5stack.com/products/m5go-battery-bottom3-for-cores3-only

Just to be clear, I'm also using these with a CoreS3; https://shop.m5stack.com/products/m5stack-cores3-esp32s3-lotdevelopment-kit

I've removed the CoreS3 bottom and replaced it with the M5GO Battery Bottom3 (for CoreS3 only). If I attempt to use the USB-C port on the M5GO/FIRE Battery Bottom Charging Base, just like the power issue above, I also can't use it to send firmware to the CoreS3 (which is what I meant in my previous post by data). It's as if the M5GO/FIRE Battery Bottom Charging Base is entirely useless for either charging the battery or programming. That doesn't seem like it should be the case at all.

felmue

Hello @Coopersmith-24601

glad to hear that the RGB example helped.

The four pogo pins are GND, 5V, SDA and SCL. E.g. power and I2C. See top right corner of schematic - Socket_Power_4P.

Firmware download uses a serial connection and not I2C. In other words the M5GO/FIRE Battery Bottom Charging Base can only be used to charge the battery.

Edit: I just confirmed by opening it: only GND and 5 V are connected at the USB-C port.

How do you know the battery isn't getting charged? Isn't there a red (or green) light?

Thanks
Felix

Coopersmith-24601

@felmue

OKAY! Excellent. THANK YOU. Didn't understand the USB-C port on the charging base.

Figured this all out with your help and appears to need to be fed the power from the included "dumb" USB-A to USB-C cable and not what I thought I could do from an Apple USB-C / USB-C plugged into my MacBook.

Problem solved!

Thank you again!