Ordering PCB from seeedstudio

December 22, 2012 6 Comments

Here is the updated tutorial:

https://liudresllc.com/2017/05/26/ordering-pcb-from-seeedstudio-com/

This is a short tutorial on how to order your PCB from seeedstudio.com

I am not associated with seeedstudio but just a regular customer. They have competitive price and decent quality. They also recently automated design file submission process, although there is still some kinks.

Once you finish designing your PCB with EAGAL CAD, you should use seeedstudio’s CAM file to export the design into several files. The CAM exports many files but only the following are useful and should be zipped in a .zip file, per their sales page:

  • Top Layer: pcbname.GTL
  • Bottom Layer: pcbname.GBL
  • Solder Mask Top: pcbname.GTS
  • Solder Mask Bottom: pcbname.GBS
  • Silk Top: pcbname.GTO
  • Silk Bottom: pcbname.GBO
  • Drill Drawing: pcbname.TXT

Once you have a .zip file, direct your web browser to seeedstudio.com  and you will see their store front:

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Once you are on their web store, look for “Services” on the navigation bar on the left and click it. It will bring up their services page, with three types of service.

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The second one “Fusion PCB Service” will take you to their online PCB ordering page. Click “Fusion PCB Service” and you will see the following page:3

There are a lot of options on this page. I will list what they are below:

  • File: Pick the .zip file that contains your design. I have two zip files, Shield_V1.0.5.zip, and Power_supply_V1.0.2.zip. I will select Power_supply_V1.0.2.zip
  • Qty: Seeedstudio doesn’t make 1 PCB, the least amount is 10 PCBs. Go ahead and pick 10, unless you want 50 or 100.
  • Layer: You will pick 2 layers. This means you will have circuits both on top and bottom of your circuit boards. I don’t see many single layer PCB any more but they were popular decades ago.
  • PCB Thickness: Go ahead and pick 1.6mm. Most popular thickness is 1.6mm. If you want some added mechanical strength on your larger boards, you can go with 2.0mm.
  • PCB Dimension: This is the maximal size of your PCB. Typical sizes they provide are 5cm*5cm (about 2″*2″) for $10 (10 boards), and 10cm*10cm (about 4″*4″) for $25 (10 boards).
  • PCB Color: You can leave this as Green since other colors cost extra $10-$20. It’s just the look. Your PCB will be painted with color paint.
  • Surface Finish: Pick HASL (Hot Air Surface Leveling). It’s a technique that plates holes with hot molten solder and the excess is removed by hot air. You can also pick leadless HASL if you want to go green. You may upgrade to ENIG, which is Electroless Nickel Immersion Gold. Holes will be covered by a thin layer of gold to prevent oxidation.
  • E-Test: For somewhat sophisticated designs, E-testing is recommended. For something simple such as the power supply board, it’s not very necessary.

Say I have two designs, Shield_V1.0.5.zip, and Power_supply_V1.0.2.zip. I will first select Shield_V1.0.5.zip in the file selector, select everything according to the list explained previously (Qty=10, Layer=2, Thickness=1.6mm, Dimension=10cm*10cmColor=Green, Finish=Hasl, E-test=100%),  then push “Add to Cart”.

Then I will push “continue to shop” and be brought back to the PCB ordering page. I will pick Power_supply_V1.0.2.zip and select 5cm*5cm. Similar settings to the other design (Qty=10, Layer=2, Thickness=1.6mm, Dimension=5cm*5cmColor=Green, Finish=Hasl, E-test=50%) and add to cart. I’m not testing these boards 100% since they are simple.

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After everything is added to cart, I would proceed to check out. You need to set up an account with seeedstudio and have a paypal account. Shipping is less than $10 but slow. I average about 3 weeks between design submission and delivery (to Mid-west, USA). You can also pay DHL and save maybe a week or more, although I never used it. I guess that’s it. Well, one bug on their site though: if you select a design zip file and push add to cart, but later remove the item from the cart, you can’t upload the same file anymore. I guess they buffer your file but don’t remove them when you remove your item from cart. You will have to change the name of the zip file if you do encounter this problem. I’m sure they’ll fix it soon.

Oh by the way, since you’ve read this far, I’ll tell you a secret or two:

  1. If you order $50+ at their store, they ship for free.
  2. If you order 10, you will likely receive 11 or even 12 boards. If you order 50, you probably get 51. Sometimes it’s cheaper to order 10 PCS the same design from time to time than ordering 50 pcs, since you get 10%-20% more boards and only like 2%-4% more boards with 50 PCS 😉

Filed under Arduino, Eagle Tagged with

Directional keypad for phi-panel

December 20, 2012 2 Comments

This is a directional keypad I developed for phi-panel, together with the rotary encoder keypad.

There are two sizes, 20X4 and 16X2.

Features:

  • Laser-cut 3mm-thick glossy/matte black acrylic face plate with window to mount a 20X4 or 16X2 character LCD and a 8 push buttons. You choose which side to use, glassy or matte. Brown/white color is removable protective layer on both sides.
  • 4 push buttons are arranged in up/down/left/right
  • 2 buttons above the directional buttons and 2 above.
  • 8 short standoffs for LCD and keypad circuit board, 4 long standoffs for the face plate, 12 screws and 12 nuts, all M3 in size
  • 6 button covers in case you want to cover up the button holes you don’t use
  • PCB for the keypad and 8 buttons

Currently the 20X4 version is out of stock. I only made 2 in a batch of 4 new keypad face plates. If you want the 20X4 kit please respond with a comment.

Initial tests are all positive with phi-panel functions with new firmware. The directional keypad is very nice if you don’t need the 0-9 numbers provided by the matrix keypad. There is no more setup menu you can call up with the escape key.

It took me forever to make those white connectors. The female crimp end was so hard to make that if you add just a bit too much solder the spring is soldered on and can’t accept pins. These are not the best ways to connect the keypad to phi-panels. I did it only because I want to switch between keypads between photos and videos so I don’t have to tie up two assembled panels with keypads.

In the kit, I included regular male headers. You can simply solder wires to the pins or use male headers and wire wrap to the pins for connection, much easier than the white wafer connectors.

I am writing documents for these keypads but you can already purchase these kits and tinker with them. It’s pretty easy to hook them up to phi-panels or your arduino in case you don’t want a phi-panel.

Videos (20X4 version):

Still shots:

Filed under Announcements, Arduino, Gadgets Tagged with , ,

OLED displays

December 18, 2012 2 Comments

There are several popular character OLED (organic light-emitting diode) displays among Arduino fans. These displays have a lot better contrast than LCDs, needs no contrast adjustment, and are brighter, but more expensive. The wiring of these character OLED displays seems to be compatible with HD44780 LCDs but there might be some timing issues with the ones Adafruit sells:

http://www.adafruit.com/products/823

They need modified LCD library supplied by Adafruit and also need the R/W line to be controlled by Arduino instead of simply grounded. A phi-panel backpack user has recently purchased their displays and other ones from Newhaven. There might be a need for the backpack to support these displays, with a modification of the existing PCB and or firmware, or even a new PCB design. I am wondering if there is enough demand for this modification. Just write me a comment if you are interested in the phi-panel backpacks supporting these display. I will also update this post when I receive word from that phi-panel backpack user regarding their test with these OLEDs.

Filed under Announcements, Arduino, Gadgets Tagged with ,

Phi-panel firmware erase

December 16, 2012 Leave a comment

I have developed a simple firmware erase program that phi-panel users may use to erase original firmware and load new firmware. Before this, you CANNOT upload the same firmware version your panel contains and expect it to reset all the settings that a user may have messed up. Now with this program, you may erase the firmware and the firmware version stored in EEPROM so after loading a new firmware, the firmware will rewrite EEPROM with default settings. I wonder why I have not done this earlier 😉

Here is a direct link:

http://code.google.com/p/phi-panel/downloads/detail?name=firmware_erase.hex&can=2&q=

Filed under Announcements, Arduino, Gadgets Tagged with , ,

Rotary encoder keypad for phi-panel

December 14, 2012 Leave a comment

phi-panel-backpack-keypad collage-1-small

Here is some information for the rotary encoder keypad for phi-panel:

There are two sizes, 20X4 and 16X2.

Features:

  • Laser-cut 3mm-thick glossy/matte black acrylic face plate with window to mount a 20X4 or 16X2 character LCD and a rotary encoder and push buttons. You choose which side to use, glassy or matte. Brown/white color is removable protective layer on both sides.
  • One rotary encoder with click-able shaft
  • 6 tactile buttons with black caps
  • 8 short standoffs for LCD and keypad circuit board, 4 long standoffs for the face plate, 12 screws and 12 nuts, all M3 in size
  • 6 button covers in case you want to cover up the button holes you don’t use
  • PCB for the rotary encoder and 6 buttons

Initial tests are all positive with phi-panel functions with new firmware. The rotary encoder really makes it so much easier to quickly scroll through a long list or increase and decrease numbers quickly.

It took me forever to make those white connectors. The female crimp end was so hard to make that if you add just a bit too much solder the spring is soldered on and can’t accept pins. These are not the best ways to connect the keypad to phi-panels. I did it only because I want to switch between keypads between photos and videos so I don’t have to tie up two assembled panels with keypads.

In the kit, I included regular male headers. You can simply solder wires to the pins or use male headers and wire wrap to the pins for connection, much easier than the white wafer connectors.

I am writing documents for these keypads but you can already purchase these kits and tinker with them. It’s pretty easy to hook them up to phi-panels or your arduino in case you don’t want a phi-panel.

Here are some videos:

Still shots:

20X4 kit

phi-panel backpack 20X4 rotary encoder keypad front long menu angle

phi-panel backpack 20X4 rotary encoder keypad back

16X2 kit

phi-panel backpack 16X2 rotary encoder keypad front long message menu

phi-panel backpack 16X2 rotary encoder keypad back

Filed under Announcements, Arduino, Gadgets

CPU trading continues

December 3, 2012 7 Comments

I have been trading my arduino hardware kits for vintage CPUs. I’m glad that it continues to bring me vintage CPUs and my kits to those that need them. So once again, if you have vintage computer processors, Pentium or older, I am interested in trading my kits with yoru vintage processors. Here is the last trade I made:

cpu trade Nov 2012The top center processor is an IBM blue lightning 486 processor. It is the first in my collection. I still don’t know what the small chip is.

Filed under Announcements, Arduino Tagged with

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