A few months ago, i bought a Sonoff NSPanel knowing that i would be able to flash ESPHome on it. I really liked the design of the display. What i did not like was the screw terminals for AC input on the relay box. They are not the best quality and i don’t trust them for installing inside the wall. Also, the switch i originally intended to replace controls an outlet and having only a 2 amp relay turning on an outlet is not a very good idea.
I instead designed a wall bracket for the display and modified it so that it could be powered from a USB cable. I designed a replacement back cover for the NSPanel which has hooks for attaching to the wall bracket.
The 8 pin header that normally connects to the relay box has pins for 5V and ground. So, I removed that header and soldered wires to a USB-C breakout board mounted on the back cover.
Very nice! So smart. I would like to power some of my panels with 5 volt aswell. But I really don’t understand what pins I need to use for the panel to power up. I tried to just connect the 5 volt pin an ground pin but nothing happened. Any guidance here, which pins are needed?
Thanks!
That should be it, only 5V and GND. There are two pins for both 5V and for GND but you only need one for each. You don’t need any other pins as they are for relay control.
If you use screws to hold the USB breakout board in place like i did, make sure those screws are not too long and touch the PCB under. Also, double check your wiring with a meter before powering up if you don’t want to release the magic smoke.
Okay, now it’s working! Just using ground and volt as you said. I changed my 5v adapter to another one I had laying around. I checked the output voltage on the two adapters. One put out 5.20V, the other one 5,17 volts. The one with 5.17 volts worked. I do not know much about electricity and why this would matter but the important thing is that it works. The one working was also 1A and the one not working 2A.
Thanks for your help. This is great if you wanna use your nspanel somewhere else than the standard wall switch places. Which for me is very often! See you around!
