SPEBlox-Long (10BASE-T1L) - 10Mbps, 1km range, single pair ethernet

SPEBlox-Long is a communication device that provides 10Mbps at extremely long cable runs up to 1,000m (1km) over simple twisted pair copper cable.

This technology uses the 10BASE-T1L specification, and this board aims to provide a cheaper and simpler way of achieving reasonably low bandwidth communication over very long cable runs.



SPEBlox-Long is 31mm x 31mm and provides a standard 10BASE-T ethernet connection on Picoblade header (much like our other products). The 10BASE-T1L (single pair ethernet) connection is placed onto a screw terminal for full flexibility of cable types. The board is powered by any voltage from 5-60V and draws around 500mW (0.5W) of power at full operation.

SPEBlox-Long is perfect for the following applications:

• Tethers for under water robots
• Factory communication infrastructure
• Any application requiring a simple, low cost, robust connection between physically disparate devices 
  

No customer configuration is required on SPEBlox-Long, however an STM32 microcontroller is embedded onboard for communication management options.

This board is shipped with the following cables:

• A Molex PicoBlade to Tinned Leads, 4 way, 300mm for power input
• A Molex PicoBlade to RJ45, 4 way, 300mm for ethernet connectivity
• A Molex PicoBlade to Molex PicoBlade, 4 way, 300mm for interconnection with our 10/100BASE-T switches

The single pair ethernet connection can be made via the screw terminal using any single pair cable. We recommend using 28AWG, or any CAT6+ type conductor pair.

What cable should I use?

10BASE-T1L is a little more sensitive that 10BASE-T or VDSL when it comes to cabling type. We've found it important to use good quality CAT5-E (or higher) cabling with a known differential impedance of 100 Ohms. The general rule is, if the cable comes with a published specification sheet, then it's likely a high quality cable. You do not need to use shielded CAT5-E, though if your environment consists of lost of EMI, shielded cable is better.

Here is a link to the type of cable we use in our 1km test, and here is the test data of that cable.

Specifications

Custom Cables

All our boards are shipped with the required 0.3 meter power and data cables included, so you do not need to purchase extra cables. However if you need custom cable lengths for your application, you can order those here.