Magnets and Pogo Pins

This is info requires NDA (or some sort of contract/agreement) with MOTO I assume, that is why all the schematic sheet pages from the MDK related to the pogo pins hav been erased in the public schematic. So you need to contact moto directly and ask for the conditions to receive this information.

Thanks guys.  The mu metal is a good tip.  For the rest, I guess I'll have to wing it.

I did some searching for pogo pins and found the Mill-Max 0965-0-15-20-80-14-11-0  They are intended for surface mount, but it sure looks like I could use them in a through-hole orientation.  With a 1/16" thick board, that would allow me to have a circuit board that mounts flush against the back of the phone.  At ~70g of force x 16 pins, the magnets will have to resist somewhere around 2.5lbs of force.

Or maybe it should be 24 pogo pins?  Do we know what those extra 8 pogo pins are for?  The ones that contact the gold bar.  Are they necessary?

Anyway, I also ordered some 8mm x 1mm N52 magnets to test out.  I don't think they'll be quite strong enough on their own to resist the pins, but I can stack them up and see what works.

1) the 8 pins at bottom are GND, those are REAL pogo pins, soldered throught PCB

2) from the 16 pins, 2 are also GND

3) the 16 "data pins" are NOT pogo pins, it is complete assembly where the terminal have spring to the side

4) if you do a commerical product that uses those 16 pins connector on moto-Z you are very likely to receive a C&D letter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cease_and_desist  from Lenovo, so please think about it, you should contact Motorola, really

And yes I wish too that those 16 pins would be OPEN in similar way the 80 pins are..

I'm not sure I see what you mean.  Any moto mod has to use those 16 pins.  Are you talking about trying to access them directly instead of through a microcontroller? I can see that moto is not really promoting that approach.  Although doing so could make for some interesting mods.  I could envision some really tiny mods, that didn't cover the whole back of the phone, but rather had a footprint just bigger than those 16 pins.

Anyways, It's not an issue for me.  My mod needs a microcontroller, and I would probably just use the same one they've used in the MDK.

The reason I was looking into pogo pins, is because I thought they might limit how thin a mod could be.  The ones I pointed out above are only 0.076" long when compressed.  That should be short enogh for me.

Yes, but you receive the MOTO mod MDK full schematic ONLY when you sign NDA with MOTO !!

Rigth now the path is:

1) you developr using MDK, eg you develop PERSONALITY MOD, and use the 80 pin connector (not 16 !!)

2) you "ask" for additional info when you are ready for REAL MOD development

3) moto will review and grant you access to additional documents

you want to skip point 2, but there is no legal way of doing. Of course for casual hacking you can do anything you like...

But for commercial product development you have play by the rules

Antti covered things pretty well.  The point of the MDK is to provide a prototyping platform so you don't have to worry about obtaining all those parts.  After signing an evaluation agreement we provide that level of access as well as a sampling of parts.  If you're confident and ready to begin on a real product, you can certainly skip the MDK stage and sign up at Partner with Moto.

Lawrence, did you get a response yet?  I'm pinging the Business Development team on our end as well.

Ok, that's good to know.  I'm certainly not trying to skip the MDK stage.  I am just getting the lay of the land and checking for things that might be show stoppers down the line.

Thanks for checking in with Biz Dev for me.  I have not heard anything from anyone yet.

--Lars

Ok, that's good to know.  I'm certainly not trying to skip the MDK stage.  I am just getting the lay of the land and checking for things that might be show stoppers down the line.

Thanks for checking in with Biz Dev for me.  I have not heard anything from anyone yet.

--Lars