How I Made a Cheap PCB • Hacker News Board

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#11

Post by david-given » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:00 PM UTC

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #5

ZenoArrow wrote: post #2

Not really much of an article is it, could be summarised as 'How I ordered a cheap PCB by choosing one of the many companies offering to build cheap PCBs'. I was expecting a little more DIY from the title.

Same here! But I think that is the point of the article. The best way to make a cheap PCB is to just buy one. And he's probably right. There are definite advantages to etching a PCB at home - if you make a mistake that you only discover on assembly, you can make a new run in hours instead of weeks - but soldermask, small vias, and small features are much easier at a real plant. And you won't beat the prices. He recom…

Do you know any places that do assembly as well?

My soldering skills are approximately good enough to do 0.1 inch pitch pins about 90% of the time, which isn't really good enough for surface-mount, and most modern microprocessors don't come in anything else.

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#12

Post by reitanqild » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:01 PM UTC

My big question after reading this is what the project is and if we are going to see it on DEF CON.

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#13

Post by deutronium » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:02 PM UTC

lucaspiller wrote: post #10

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here! But I think that is the point of the article. The best way to make a cheap PCB is to just buy one. And he's probably right. There are definite advantages to etching a PCB at home - if you make a mistake that you only discover on assembly, you can make a new run in hours instead of weeks - but soldermask, small vias, and small features are much easier at a real plant. And you won't beat the prices. He recom…

Does anyone have any recommendations for a PCB fab in Europe? i.e. where I don't need to wait 4 weeks.

I've had PCBs from China take a little over a week, if you checkout http://pcbshopper.com/ you can specify the delivery time you want to pay for.

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#14

Post by pgvoorhees » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:03 PM UTC

reitanqild wrote: post #12

My big question after reading this is what the project is and if we are going to see it on DEF CON.

Expect some kind of power analysis. I'm guessing key extraction of some kind.

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#15

Post by alex_hitchins » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:03 PM UTC

This surely must be some sort of service utilising space capacity akin to OSH Park.

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#16

Post by alex_hitchins » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:05 PM UTC

lucaspiller wrote: post #10

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here! But I think that is the point of the article. The best way to make a cheap PCB is to just buy one. And he's probably right. There are definite advantages to etching a PCB at home - if you make a mistake that you only discover on assembly, you can make a new run in hours instead of weeks - but soldermask, small vias, and small features are much easier at a real plant. And you won't beat the prices. He recom…

Does anyone have any recommendations for a PCB fab in Europe? i.e. where I don't need to wait 4 weeks.

BoldPort (https://boldport.cratejoy.com/) recently had some excellent boards made up with European Circuits (http://www.european-circuits.co.uk/).

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#17

Post by ZenoArrow » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:08 PM UTC

david-given wrote: post #11

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here! But I think that is the point of the article. The best way to make a cheap PCB is to just buy one. And he's probably right. There are definite advantages to etching a PCB at home - if you make a mistake that you only discover on assembly, you can make a new run in hours instead of weeks - but soldermask, small vias, and small features are much easier at a real plant. And you won't beat the prices. He recom…

Do you know any places that do assembly as well? My soldering skills are approximately good enough to do 0.1 inch pitch pins about 90% of the time, which isn't really good enough for surface-mount, and most modern microprocessors don't come in anything else.

You don't need to have great soldering skills for surface mount components. The easiest way to solder surface mount is the "solder stencil + solder paste" method (for want of a better term). You create a solder stencil to match the pin layout, place it over the PCB pads, apply solder paste, place the component on top then melt the solder (if you'd be doing multiple batches it's easy enough to modify a toaster oven to do this).

Solder stencils are also easy enough to create, especially if you have access to a laser cutter.

Are there any hackerspaces near where you live?

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#18

Post by bhickey » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:09 PM UTC

david-given wrote: post #11

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here! But I think that is the point of the article. The best way to make a cheap PCB is to just buy one. And he's probably right. There are definite advantages to etching a PCB at home - if you make a mistake that you only discover on assembly, you can make a new run in hours instead of weeks - but soldermask, small vias, and small features are much easier at a real plant. And you won't beat the prices. He recom…

Do you know any places that do assembly as well? My soldering skills are approximately good enough to do 0.1 inch pitch pins about 90% of the time, which isn't really good enough for surface-mount, and most modern microprocessors don't come in anything else.

How do you feel about using a toaster oven? I've had some success using a DIY reflow oven and pick-n-place by hand. Haven't tried 0201's, but 0402 resistors and 5mm QFN packages go pretty well.

Just don't use lead free solder.

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#19

Post by diskcat » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:12 PM UTC

madengr wrote: post #3

Nice, instead of supporting the PCB business 5 miles away, send it to China. The copper not on your PCB is probably floating down some Chinese river, hence "Dirty PCB".

>Nice, instead of supporting the PCB business 5 miles away, send it to China.

I don't see why he should support somebody who charges 5x the competitor.

Im not gonna pay $20 for a jar of peanut butter because the factory owner lives 5 miles from me.

Re: How I Made a Cheap PCB

#20

Post by alex_hitchins » Thu, Mar 31, 2016, 12:14 PM UTC

ZenoArrow wrote: post #2

Not really much of an article is it, could be summarised as 'How I ordered a cheap PCB by choosing one of the many companies offering to build cheap PCBs'. I was expecting a little more DIY from the title.

Well, it is listed under "Ramblings". I don't think it was written as an article, it's just a blog post that could help out someone looking to do the similar.