From Nokia 5130 to Meshtastic 5130

A summary about the conversion of an old Nokia 5130 mobile phone into a modern Meshtastic node. Retro tech wizardry at its best.

How it started #

The idea came with an old Nokia 5130 phone that spent more than 20 years in a drawer. Still nice looking, too good to throw away.

The final conversion includes the following features:

Meshtastic firmware is plays nice with the following components inside the Nokia 5130 housing:

The following parts have been reused from the Nokia 5130:

Housing front (A cover)
Housing inner (B cover)
Housing rear (C cover)
Keymat
Keypad PCB (UI module UE4S), excluding LCD
Main PCB (System/RF Module UP8T, all components stripped except battery connectors)
Inner PCB separation frame
Screws

This is not a detailed build manual but showing the idea and the way I have done it in that individual built. A schematic is provided down below.

The RAK19007 can be equipped with a core module RAK11300 but in this case the Bluetooth feature is missing and the power consumption is way higher than with the RAK4631.
The Waveshare 1.3inch OLED is connected to the Adafruit TCA8418 with enamelled copper wire. Taking power (3.3V, GND) and I2C.
The 6 LEDs for the original LCD display must be removed prior OLED assembly.

The TCA8418 keypad driver is connected with enamelled copper wire to the Nokia UI module.

The Waveshare 1.3inch OLED needs trimming at the bottom but otherwise fits perfectly inside the inner B cover.

The Nokia rear housing C cover was modified by filling the external antenna hole and the Nokia logo with epoxy.
Three extra holes drilled to fix the RAK19007.
The original connector block was removed from the main PCB, its contacts removed and and glued in its designated place. All caps and openings filled with epoxy.
The SIM card slot opening is not yet covered in this picture. A piece of PVC plastic was glued in in the final assembly stage prior painting.
The two screw holes on the right are closed in this picture but later on reopened to fix the inner B cover in place.

Inside the rear housing C cover the antenna location was trimmed to take a long SMA socket with IPX pigtail.
The lower end, including the original connector block, was trimmed inside to make space for the RAK19007.
A 3mm PVC plastic strip was glued in place, drilled and shaped to accept the USB-C connector, access the reset button and make the LEDs visible outside.
Red circles marking the screws are fixing RAK19007 inside the housing.
Green circles are the two existing screw holes for the inner B cover. They are barely fit without modification to the RAK19007 PCB.

The main PCB stripped off its components except the battery contacts.
Needs to be reused for to contact the battery and to complete the original sandwich assembly of both PCBs and separation frame.

The main PCB needs a cutout to clear the RAK19007 including core and extension boards.

I2C wiring and bluetooth antenna cable are routed below the separation frame through a cutout.
In this picture the separation frame is not yet trimmed to clear the RAK19007 and RAK4631 core board.

Power supply wires soldered to battery contacts prior assembly of main PCB into rear housing C cover.
Main PCB is fixed with its original screw to the rear housing. (red circle)

UI PCB is fixed with two original screws to the rear housing. (red circles)
The inner housing B cover is fixed by the two original lower screws from the back side of the rear housing C cover. (green circles)

In this picture the three screws that fix the RAK19007 are visible.
The SIM card slot is closed with a piece of PVC plastic, glue in place.
The two lower screws that fix the inner housing B cover are still missing. They were installed as one of the last steps.

The keys backlight is activated on tap any switched off after 2 seconds of inactivity.

Mission accomplished.😎

Pin	Line Symbol	Parameter	Connect to TCA8418
1	ROW0	Keyboard matrix row 0	R0
2	ROW1	Keyboard matrix row 1	R1
3	ROW2	Keyboard matrix row 2	R2
4	ROW3	Keyboard matrix row 3	R3
5	ROW4	Keyboard matrix row 4	R4
6	COL0	Keyboard matrix column 0	C0
7	COL1	Keyboard matrix column 1	C1
8	COL2	Keyboard matrix column 2	C2
9	COL3	Keyboard matrix column 3	C3
10	COL4	Keyboard matrix column 4	C4
11	Signal1	Flip interrupt, not used
12	VF_IN	Flash in
13	VF_OUT	Flash out
14	VBATT	Battery voltage 3.0V to 5.1V for lights 60-100mA	3.3V
15	UAGND	Analog ground, connect to pin 22	GND
16	PWRON	Power on key	C5
17	LCDCDX	LCD driver code/data selection
18	SCLK	LCD driver serial clock
19	SDA	LCD driver serial data
20	LCDCSX	LCD driver chip select
21	LCDRSTX	LCD driver reset
22	UDGND	Digital ground, connect to pin 15	GND
23	BUZZER	Buzzer PWM control
24	VL	Supply voltage
25	SPARE	Call indicator LED
26	LIGHT	Illumination control	C9
27	EARN	Speaker neutral
28	EARP	Speaker positive

Source code for the Meshtastic 5130 firmware running on the RAK4631 is available in my Meshtastic fork on Github.

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