Monthly Archives: September 2014

Hacking a BV4618 20×4 LCD (Part-3)

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In Part-2 of this blog post series I provided a detailed ‘How-To’ for new users of the  ByVac BV4618 LCD for their Arduino projects. It is clear to me there are plenty of Arduino hobbyists who want to hack LCD’s and need a simple way to wire them up and write to them.

The ByVac BV4618 LCD is a great choice. You can actually get it up and running with three wires – V+, Gnd, and Tx. Writing text to the display is pretty straightforward using the BV4618_S library. The library is useful, but Ol’ Sopwith does not think the class is easy enough to use for beginners.

To solve this problem I extended the BV4618_S class library and created a new class named sop4618_S. The class is brain-dead simple to use and it hides all the complexities of the VT100 code sequences.

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Hacking a BV4618 20×4 LCD (Part-2)

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In Part-1 of this blog post series Ol’ Sopwith described the ByVac BV4618 LCD and how to wire it up to an Arduino Uno. If you are interested in how to program an Arduino to talk to this LCD, pull up a chair and let’s get started.

I wrote up a detailed implementation guide for the BV4618 LCD that walks through the entire process to get the LCD into one of your cool Arduino projects. If you are new to the Arduino and want a quick guide on how to setup the developer IDE you can follow this guide.

Arduino 'How-To' Series

Arduino ‘How-To’ Series

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Hacking a BV4618 20×4 LCD (Part-1)

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My previous post describes my new venture into RFID hacking using a Tastic RFID stealer. The Tastic gadget requires a serial 4×20 LCD to display a proximity cards site code and serial number. I purchased a ByVac BV4618 LCD as a replacement to the LCD listed in the Tastic specifications due to local availability.

  BV4618 4x20 LCD         

As Sopwith always advises, the first thing you need to do with a new gadget is to download the datasheet. You can find it here. The internal controller/driver of the LCD is a Hitachi HD44780. This very popular device can be found in all types of LCD applications. The BV4618 piggybacks on the HD44780 providing a very convenient communication interface.

The BV4618 provides three interfaces. A serial interface provides support for both TTL and RS-232. This means you can connect a MCU such an Arduino or Raspberry PI, or use 12V serial connections to a serial port on a PC. There is also an I2C interface and support for a small numeric keypad.

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Hacking a 20×4 LCD for RFID Research

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Sopwith's Current Project

Sopwith’s Current Project (BV4618 LCD)

Have not blogged much over the summer because the Mrs. and I have moved to London on a temporary work assignment. Anyone who has been an expat understands the complexities of a relocation. Now that we are here and settled, I can get back to my hacking projects. I bought my Rasberry Pi’s with me and purchased a couple of Arduino’s and bench tools at a local Maplin store.

My latest interest is in RFID cards. The use of this technology is exploding. Since I am in the security business, understanding how RFID is used for secure access to large data centers and other secure facilities is important. In my research, I came across an interesting project involving an Arduino Nano. The Tastic RFID stealer is a very clever hack.

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