i2c/SPI LCD Backpack

Created by lady ada

Last updated on 2016-01-21 05:50:09 PM EST

 Guide Contents

Guide Contents 2
Overview 3
Which LCD to Use? 5
Wait - the backpack has 16 holes, but my LCD only has 14 pins! 5
Assembly 6
Parts Check 6
Terminal Blocks 6
Prepare LCD 7
Attach LCD 9
My LCD only has 14 pins. Which holes do I use? 11
Connect to i2c 12
Install Adafruit_LiquidCrystal 12
Load Demo 13
Changing the I2C Address 14
Connect to SPI 16
Install Adafruit_LiquidCrystal 17
Load Demo 17
Downloads 20
Optimized i2c library 20
Hardware files 20

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 2 of 20

 Overview

LCDs are a fun and easy way to have your microcontroller project talk back to you. Character LCDs
are common, and easy to get, available in tons of colors and sizes. We've written tutorials on using
character LCDs with an Arduino (http://adafru.it/c8r) (or similar microcontroller) but find that the
number of pins necessary to control the LCD can be restrictive, especially with ambitious projects.
We wanted to make a 'backpack' (add-on circuit) that would reduce the number of pins without a lot
of expense.

By using simple i2c and SPI input/output expanders we have reduced the number of pins (only 2
pins are needed for i2c) while still making it easy to interface with the LCD. For Arduino users, we
provide a easy-to-use library that is backwards compatible with projects using the '6 pin' wiring.

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 3 of 20

 For advanced users, this project can be used for general purpose I/O expansion, the MCP23008
has 8 i/o pins (7 are connected) with optional pullups, the SPI 74HC595 has 7 outputs.

Assembled and tested backpacks are available for purchase for only $10 in the Adafruit shop!

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 4 of 20

 Which LCD to Use?

This backpack will work with any 'standard'/'classic' character LCD. It does not work
with graphic LCDs. Character LCDs come in sizes ranging from 8x1 (8 characters, one line) to
40x4 (40 characters, four lines). The backpack will also only fit LCDs that have a single line of pins
at the top, not the ones that have a 2x10 or 2x8 connector on the side. Those are much rarer these
days but just keep a look out for that!

The backpack will work with RGB LCDs (but wont control the RGB backlight, you can do that
seperately from the LCD control) and it won't work with 40x4 LCDs because they have a second
Enable pin.

Wait - the backpack has 16 holes, but my LCD only has 14 pins!
As long as your LCD has a HD44780 driver chip, you're OK. The extra two pins are for the backlight.
Your LCD doesn't have a backlight.

We'll show you which holes to ignore in the Assembly section of this guide.

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 5 of 20

 Assembly
Putting together the backpack onto an LCD is a quick process, and should take only a few minutes
with a soldering iron.

Parts Check
Verify you have everything in the bag, there should be an assembled and tested PCB, a 2-pin and
3-pin 3.5mm terminal block. The backpack does not come with header or an LCD.

Terminal Blocks
The terminal blocks (http://adafru.it/cuW) allow you to easily attach and remove the LCD from your
wiring, which we think is awfully handy. If you dont want the terminal blocks (they stick out a bit) you
can always skip this step.

The terminal blocks come in 2 and 3-pin pieces (http://adafru.it/cuW) . Slide them together.

Place the blocks over the corner area of the backpack so that the holes stick out (unless for some
reason you want them to face the other way)

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 6 of 20

 Solder them into place

Prepare LCD
Next we will attach the backpack to the LCD. First we must put header onto the LCD, if you bought
the LCD from us, it will come with a stick of header. Otherwise, pick up some standard 0.1" male
header (http://adafru.it/cuX)

These photos shows a 10K potentiometer, you can ignore it

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 7 of 20

 If the header is too long, just cut/snap it short so that it is 16 pins

Next you'll need to solder the header to the LCD.You must do this, it is not OK to just try to 'press fit'
the LCD!

The easiest way we know of doing this is sticking the header into a breadboard and then sitting the
LCD on top while soldering. this keeps it steady.

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 8 of 20

 Attach LCD
Now we will attach the backpack. We will show how to do this in a permanent fashion. If you think
you would like to remove and replace the LCD at some time, you can use a piece of 16-pin long 0.1"
female header (http://adafru.it/cuX) as a socket but be aware it will stick out a lot.

There are two options, you can tuck the backpack behind the LCD

Or solder it so it's to the side, this way it's thinner.

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 9 of 20

 Solder the header to the backpack.

Make sure that as you solder the first pin, the backpack PCB isn't leaning against the LCD, where
the terminal blocks could short against some components. You can put some electrical tape or foam
tape behind to avoid this if you think it could be an issue.

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 10 of 20

 That's it!

My LCD only has 14 pins. Which holes do I use?

The extra two pins are for the backlight. Your LCD doesn't have a backlight. Here's a picture of the
backpack board layout, with pins 15 and 16 located. Just leave those empty. Cut the pin header
down to 14 pins instead of 16, and attach your LCD to holes 1-14 in the backpack.

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 11 of 20

 Connect to i2c
The first option we'll show is how to use the i2c interface on the backpack. We'll be showing how to
connect with an Arduino, for other microcontrollers please see our MCP23008 library code for the
commands to send to the i2c i/o expander. I2c is nice because it only uses two pins, and you can
put multiple i2c devices on the same two pins. So for example, you could have up to 8 LCD
backpacks+LCDs all on two pins! The bad news is that you have to use the 'hardware' i2c pin. You
can't change those pins and you can't use them for reading analog data. If you absolutely need
those two pins, use SPI (see next section)

For this we'll need to connnect four wires: GND, 5V, CLK (clock) and DAT (data).

Connect:

DAT (SDA) to I2C Data (on the Uno, this is A4 on the Mega it is 20 and on the Leonardo
digital 2)
CLK (SCL) to I2C Clock (on the Uno, this is A5 on the Mega it is 21 and on the Leonardo
digital 3)

Install Adafruit_LiquidCrystal
To begin reading sensor data, you will need to download Adafruit_LiquidCrystal from our github
repository (http://adafru.it/kZe). You can do that by visiting the github repo and manually
downloading or, easier, just click this button to download the zip

Download Adafruit_LiquidCrystal
Library
http://adafru.it/kZf

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 12 of 20

 Rename the uncompressed folder Adafruit_LiquidCrystal and check that
the Adafruit_LiquidCrystal folder contains Adafruit_LiquidCrystal.cpp and
Adafruit_LiquidCrystal.h

Place the Adafruit_LiquidCrystal library folder your arduinosketchfolder/libraries/ folder.

You may need to create the libraries subfolder if its your first library. Restart the IDE.

We also have a great tutorial on Arduino library installation at:

http://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-all-about-arduino-libraries-install-use (http://adafru.it/aYM)

Load Demo
Restart the IDE and load up the Adafruit_LiquidCrystal->HelloWorld_i2c demo

Upload the sketch. You should see the backlight turn on when the Arduino resets. If you don't see
any characters, adjust the Contrast trim potentiometer with a mini-screwdriver until you see the text
clearly

The default HelloWorld sketch blinks the backlight as well as updating the text.

If you see the backlight blinking that means your connection to the i2c port is OK but the
contrast is too low or too high, or the LCD data pins are not solidly connected.

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 13 of 20

 Check the contrast first by gently twisting the mini trim potentiometer, if that doesn't help, recheck
your soldering and resolder all 16 of the LCD pins!

Once you're done, you can remove the blinking LED backlight code:

lcd.setBacklight(HIGH);
delay(500);
lcd.setBacklight(LOW);
delay(500);

Changing the I2C Address

If you want to have more than one MCP23008 device (like more than one backpack+LCD) each one
needs to have a unique 'address'. You can set the address by jumpering the A0 A1 and A2 solder
jumpers. By default, no jumpers are soldered, giving an address of 0. If you want to have an
address of 3 you would solder A0 (bit 0) and A1 (bit 1) for an address of "011" = 3 in binary. Then in
the code change:

// Connect via i2c, default address #0 (A0-A2 not jumpered)

LiquidCrystal lcd(0);

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 14 of 20

 to

// Connect via i2c, address #3 (A0&A1 jumpered)

LiquidCrystal lcd(3);

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 15 of 20

 Connect to SPI
Another option for connecting is to use SPI, which is a simpler protocol. The good news about SPI is
that its very simple and you can use any 3 pins to connect. You can share the data and clock pins
with another device as long as they remain outputs, the latch pin should only be used for the
backpack. So if you wanted 3 LCDs, for example, they would all have the same data and clock
pins, but the latch pin would be different, for 5 pins total

This library does not use the Hardware SPI library, which means you can use any 3 pins!
However, if you are using the hardware SPI port (such as for Ethernet, WiFi, an LCD, etc. etc)
you cannot share those pins with this LCD!

The first thing you will need to do is to enable SPI. To do this, solder the SPI Enable solder jumper
by heating up the pads with a soldering iron and soldering a blob onto both pins:

This will switch the backpack over to SPI mode instead of i2c. If you want to go back to i2c, use wick
or a solder sucker to remove the jumper

Next we will connect 5 wires, 5V, GND, DAT, CLK, and LAT. To match the example, CLK goes to to
Digital 2, DAT to Digital 3, and LAT to Digital 4. Once we have the example sketch running you can
of course change these to anything you'd like. Connect 5V and GND to the 5v and Ground Arduino
power pins

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 16 of 20

 Install Adafruit_LiquidCrystal
To begin reading sensor data, you will need to download Adafruit_LiquidCrystal from our github
repository (http://adafru.it/kZe). You can do that by visiting the github repo and manually
downloading or, easier, just click this button to download the zip

Download Adafruit_LiquidCrystal
library
http://adafru.it/kZf

Rename the uncompressed folder Adafruit_LiquidCrystal and check that

the Adafruit_LiquidCrystal folder contains Adafruit_LiquidCrystal.cpp and
Adafruit_LiquidCrystal.h

Place the Adafruit_LiquidCrystal library folder your arduinosketchfolder/libraries/ folder.

You may need to create the libraries subfolder if its your first library. Restart the IDE.

We also have a great tutorial on Arduino library installation at:

http://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-all-about-arduino-libraries-install-use (http://adafru.it/aYM)

Load Demo
Restart the IDE and load up the Adafruit_LiquidCrystal->HelloWorld_SPI demo

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 17 of 20

 Upload the sketch. You should see the backlight turn on when the Arduino resets. If you don't see
any characters, adjust the Contrast trim potentiometer with a mini-screwdriver until you see the text
clearly

The default HelloWorld sketch blinks the backlight as well as updating the text.

If you see the backlight blinking that means your connection to the SPI port is OK but the
contrast is too low or too high, or the LCD data pins are not solidly connected.

Check the contrast first by gently twisting the mini trim potentiometer, if that doesn't help, recheck
your soldering and resolder all 16 of the LCD pins!

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 18 of 20

 Once you're done, you can remove the blinking LED backlight code:

lcd.setBacklight(HIGH);
delay(500);
lcd.setBacklight(LOW);
delay(500);

© Adafruit Industries https://learn.adafruit.com/i2c-spi-lcd-backpack Page 19 of 20

 Downloads
Optimized i2c library
FalconFour posted up a ultra-optimized high-speed i2c library, check it out for better
performance! (http://adafru.it/aP1)

Hardware files
Eagle CAD format schematic and board layout file (as well as a PNG of the schematic) are all
available in the GitHub repository (http://adafru.it/aP2)

© Adafruit Industries Last Updated: 2016-01-21 05:50:10 PM EST Page 20 of 20