Plugged in wrong way into Pi...

When i plugged my picoborg reverse onto the pi's GPIO pins i unplugged them then accidentally plugged them in again the wrong way round.I turned on the pi , and it made a noise and let off a burning smell. Has this damaged my Picoborg or will it be okay? The Pi seems to recognise it and the software works but i haven't tried it with and DC motors yet...

Many Thanks

piborg's picture

Burning smells mean that something got rather hot, it is a good posibility that some damage has been done to the board.

The board talking with the Raspberry Pi means that the control chip is probably okay.

Are there any black marks on the board, or any components which look damaged in any way?

Most of the board appears to be fine , the main parts look ok. There is no singe marks on the board will it affect the conniption terminals though?

is there any easy way to test the board is ok?

Also the sound i heard was like a fuse going i think, not 100% sure

There was no smoke just a burning smell , i switched it off straight away

piborg's picture

Given what you have said the board may actually be okay.

The best thing to do would be to attach a low current supply to the PicoBorg Reverse while it is not connected to the Raspberry Pi.
A 9v battery or similar would be suitable for this.

Give it a minute or two and see if either of the drive chips (the large black components) get hot.

If either of the chips get hot disconnect the battery immediately, the board has suffered some damage.

If they do not get hot then you can try connecting the board up to the Raspberry Pi and some motors.

The Control chips do not get hot, i have also realised i was not providing a minimum of 6 volts to the board which is probably why i can't get my motors to work. I have tried all the python tests and the board is reporting no faults.

Many Thanks

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