Altar I has passed several milestones since the last progress report: Compliance testing has gone well, a firmware revision has dramatically improved battery life, and PCBs are being fabricated.

Compliance

Altar I has passed all electromagnetic compatibility tests. This kind of testing pertains to how a wireless device generates, emits or receives electromagnetic energy that could cause interference in other devices and is a critically important test for Altar I.

Now that Altar I has passed those tests, we can confidently move on to ordering the production run of Altar I circuit boards.

Significant battery life improvement

A suspected battery drain issue has been found and fixed in the latest firmware revision. This fix has increased battery life by a whopping 70%, a huge improvement.

But we're still not done — it is believed that this can be further improved. Most likely the battery life gains will be smaller from here on out but we're determined to get the most out of every Altar I charge.

PCBs, part arrivals and assembly

PCBs and electrical components have now been ordered and are being manufactured, another milestone for Altar I. The microcontrollers used in Altar are also en route to the PCB fabrication plant so they can be soldered to the PCBs.

Parts continue to arrive at the Altar I assembly facility. Batteries and clamshell packaging are currently in transit.

The first version of the Altar I assembly jig has also been created. This will dramatically decrease Altar I assembly time moving forward.

What's next

The next big milestone is to receive injection moulding samples. Once these parts are verified we'll be ready to begin the production runs of the final parts — and after that progress to assembly of a small number of final units. In addition, we'll continue to look for battery life improvements in the firmware, and continue to receive freight shipments of components for Altar I.