Gents,
Was mentioned in this month's IEEE Spectrum:
It's not something for urgent projects, you can't have more than four layers and no really small drill sizes but it sure is cheap. Seems like this is run by Sparkfun.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
I've used it and it's fully in compliance with the old saying "Good, fast, or cheap. Pick two." No complaints at all about the board quality (two-sided) and the prices are certainly good. Actually, I received twice the number of boards that I had ordered at no extra cost, presumably because it was used to fill out the panel. They did take a while to be received, though!
-- Rich Webb Norfolk, VA
Sure, it's only for projects along the lines of "I always wanted to have ...", not for urgent client stuff.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
Just got a quote from
Cheers
Do you plate holes too ?
yg
-- http://ygdes.com / http://yasep.org
Geez. I could do those in two days with $10 of materials.
Tim
-- Deep Friar: a very philosophical monk. Website: http://webpages.charter.net/dawill/tmoranwms
weeks.
It can be done.
But why. For such small quantity 5 boards they are prototypes. If you want a proffesional look you could do it but I just use wires.
Unfortunately, no. Or not yet. Need to find some conductive ink first, then I'll see if I can generate enough "throw" with copper plating. If it works, it'll be pretty fackin' sweet :-)
Tim
-- Deep Friar: a very philos>>> Just got a quote from
Hmm, interesting product. Looks to be silver powder in a superglue and solvent base. I bet acetone would be a good solvent in lieu of the ethyl whatevers they're using.
I wonder if it accepts solder.
Tim
-- Deep Friar: a very philosophical monk. Website: http://webpages.charter.net/dawill/tmoranwms
The pulsarprofx has a conductive ink pen for trace repair, soderable. Product #CW100P , Priced at $15~$18.95
According to the writer it is reliable he reflows with it on.
Thanks, sounds like a good deal. Unfortunately they seem to do RoHS boards which I avoid whenever possible. Most of my projects are non-EU or exempt.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
Wait a few years and then (try to) write that again. When you have your degree, a 11-12h job, wife, kids, a mortgage, not one minute of truly free time, and you just got a call that your son turfed his bike on Old Mill Road and is in the ER ... :-)
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
Well.... don't order them RoHS then! What, you're going to boycott them because they *can* do RoHS? :)
-- John Devereux
When I went on interviews after I graduated a lot of the places did their own in house prototyping and small production runs several had there own Pick & Place machines etc. These were I'd say medium to large companies. With anywhere from 10 to over a hundred employees.
For a one man operation yea you wouldn't have time for prototyping or it wouldn't be cost effective. If you have a staff with say a couple of Tech's it could be part of their jobs.
You can't really factor in design time and artwork your doing that anyway or you're not engineering anything.
For me to transfer the artwork to PCB and etch the boards mentioned it would take 2 to 3 hours. This DOESN'T include drilling holes other then four for alignment (top/bot) and populating the boards.
If you have a proper etchant tank its not like you have to waste time watching the boards etch (unless you're into that stuff). Put them in the tank set the timer and go about other stuff.So a total time of 1 hour to an hour and a half of your time would be spent fabricating the boards not unreasonable. You would probably waste as much time getting quotes.
My first employer als ran a full SMT assembly line but that was when there were hardly any shops that could do high-density SMT.
No, that's part of engineering. But I always farm out the layout and then provide guidance on the iffy parts like switchers and RF.
I stopped doing that once I had my degree. No time for that. Holes are another matter these days. I wouldn't know how to reliably get dozens of teeny holes per square-inch into a packed SMT board with TSSOP and stuff on there, let alone plate them. You can't do that with wires if underneath a DFN package etc.
Not really. The last run for a client: Sent Gerbers, BOM and such, cc'd client and asked that my client be cc'd on quotes, invested time about five minutes. Client said they liked the 10-day full turn-key, sent over credit info, probably five minutes on their part. Fab house bought all SMT parts. 10 days later fully populated boards were on my lab bench and they even threw in a bag of trail mix so I saved the 15 sec round trip to the kitchen :-)
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
No, will have to ask. But what I found with several shops is that their standard procedure is RoHS and if you deviate from that there'll be steep extra charges. Then I'd prefer a place that has a standard non-RoHS process. However, often I was able to negotiate the $500 or whatever non-RoHS surcharge away.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
AFAIK, it is RoHS that is the non-standard option, just like you want. If you go into their quoting system you will see that you have to change the defaults for both PCB material and PCB finishing if you do want RoHS.
Myro are the Canadian office of a Chinese manufacturer AIUI. I have been dealing with them (from the UK) for over 7 years with generally very good experience. Some of the pooling services might give better pricing on prototypes but have their own restrictions. With Myro you can have non-standard board thicknesses, routing shapes, panelization, scoring, solder resist colours etc. I have even had them make multiple designs on the same panel, they don't seem to mind as long as they are pre-combined in the gerbers, in fact there is an option for that on the quote form.
-- John Devereux
This is a good strategy.
But do you think it'll even be possible in another, say, 5 years? Today pretty much all the parts are meant for RoHS processes, so I'm thinking that since running RoHS and non-RoHS means having to keep two reflow ovens around, over time most all CMs will just go all-RoHS? (Especially for commercial products -- for the military/NASA/etc. where price is no object, I expect niche "leaded" assemblers will stick around... just as there's already a niche market in de-balling lead-free BGAs and re-balling them with leaded solder, often at a cost close to or exceeding the original price of the part!)
---Joel
Thanks, I looked at the text on the main page which states RoHS. But it is good to know that one can bow out sans penalty.
That is nice, others do not like it or slap on a penalty if you combine designs. Some of my design just look like two because there is a 10mm isolation barrier with absolutely nothing on it.
Hopefully Canada doesn't mean it has to go through customs twice, China
-> Canada -> USA.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
Possibly. But that would be sad.
BGA is another story. I avoid them when at all possible because they are causing so much grief. Having a stiff ceramic-like chip with solder pads on a structure such as FR-4 that is by nature somewhat flexible has IMHO always been a rather sick concept.
The consequences were as predictable as the real estate bubble bust, pretty soon expensive stuff failed and BGA fix-it shops sprung up in lots of places. Some folks called me a Luddite for shunning BGAs, many of them stopped saying that after some time :-)
For the same reason I prefer MSOP over DFN. Strangely, the DFN packages are usually more available.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ "gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam. Use another domain or send PM.
ElectronDepot website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.