Saying goodbye to protoboard

If latency is the issue I do dead-bug protos using Bellin Systems breakouts for small SMT ICs. If total hours is the issue I usually look for a better class of customer. ;)

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

I hardly build dead-bug or living-bug stuff anymore, since many years. If urgent we use Advanced Assembly in Colorado:

For very fast turn-around the client just has to send them a bigger chunk of money.

--
Regards, Joerg 

http://www.analogconsultants.com/

Not sure the turn around time is all that quick, but I get 3 pcbs from advanced circuits for ~$100 (+S&H)

About 7-8 business days from order to delivery. (I put in an order and then go do something else.) You can stick a bunch of different circuits on one pcb, provided it's less than 60 sq in. For more money the'll do it faster.

George H.

Yeah it's more latency the problem, they're OK with paying for hours but I'm just slow at hand-prototyping. I say a week and then constructing the test jig by hand gobbles up far too much of my time, I have a girlfriend who lives ~25 miles away and I end up having to choose between the bench and spending a few days there, which is a lousy choice. The more I can accomplish with solely a laptop the better

5 - 7 days turnaround for a bare PCB would probably be OK.

So make an honest woman out of her and learn to make good protos. ;)

My first engineering job (1981-3) involved making dead bug protos of most of the time- and frequency-control systems of the first civilian direct-broadcast satellite system.

PCBs were laid out fully manually using Amberlith (like rubylith except orange), so ECs cost a lot in both labour and schedule. You got good at prototyping pretty fast.

The finished protos had a bunch of Cu-clad pieces soldered together--real Frankencircuits, but they worked very well in the end.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Well you can get faster... here's an old quote I cut and pasted the 'fast' price matrix. I think this was about a 3" x 6" pcb

3 days is ~$500 (plus shipping time) But size and quantity don't matter that much, it's all setup charges.

Qty Same Day 1-day 2-day 3-day 4-day 5-day E Test(Lot)

1 $1,084.69 $724.69 $586.23 $475.46 N/A N/A $65.00 3 $371.09 $251.09 $204.94 $168.01 N/A N/A $75.00 10 $118.00 $82.00 $68.15 $57.07 N/A N/A $110.00 20 $60.05 $42.05 $35.12 $29.58 N/A N/A $160.00 Tooling NRE = $0 AS A SPEC & PRICING ALTERNATIVE THE STANDARD SPEC MATRIX ASSUMES: See #1 thru #6 above.

Oh, there is also a bare bones 1 day turn, no silk screen or solder mask just copper on FR4. I've never used that, but it might be perfect for you.

George H.

Teach her how to solder?

Long ago I decided that 20 miles was the limit for romance. If the Bay Bridge was involved, 10 miles.

But seriously, little circuits can be done by hand, but anything sort of serious, with surface-mount parts, should be a 4-layer quick-turn PCB.

--

John Larkin         Highland Technology, Inc 
picosecond timing   precision measurement  

jlarkin att highlandtechnology dott com 
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

I live in the suburbs, single women in their 30s are pretty few and far between in the 'burbs. If you want to meet one it means heading into the city, which means driving if you enjoy staying out past 11 PM.

She can solder just fine and actually owns a couple of those Velleman kits you assemble yourself. Problem is after assembling one she says "OK, that was fun! So...do you guys have to like, do that regularly?" and then scrunches up her nose

I get my concentration broken a lot taking phone calls and answering e-mails during the day. I should probably hire someone to do that. Which probably means I need to get a real office instead of a home office. Which means....alksdjkfdksaf. I'm trying to put anything real-estate related off until it's above 20 degrees outside regularly

Awesome, the bare-bones thing looks great

What the heck is "Rubylith"?!

There was a brief period of time when I was both an adult and didn't own a cell phone. I guess I remember having a landline phone in my dorm room in college and using it from time to time.

Seems weird, like you talk to people over a box plugged into the wall like some kind of fax machine for voices

Oh, you lucky person.

I was doing 4X tape on mylar and we had our own camera back in '87.

We were using AutoCad 2 and a E-size pen plotter on a 286 running some early version of windows 3.1 IIRC.

Sheesh, even a print job was a PITA back then, but we slogged along.

Hmm I guess I should check out the cost too.

George H.

In the same way that a handwritten letter is the analog version of an email, It's like the analog version of a gerber file. PCB layout done on tranparent sheets of plastic by sticking tinted transprent tape to it. Often done at 2x or 4x scale to make fine details practical.

--
This email has not been checked by half-arsed antivirus software

Lucky you. I did the PCB for a few projects (like the Dr. Dobbs' famous fat mac upgrade) on MacPaint, with a magnification-variable office copier for the coarse PCBs, and only a copy camera for the fine detailed ones.

And there's an assortment of Bishop Graphics crepe tape around here somewhere...

For those not initiated in PCB "tape up". I took a few photos before I sacrificed my last remaining example of what is now a lost art and which rightfully belongs in the recycling bin of obsolete technology. Good riddance and rest in peace.

(Please ignore the misplace sewing machine photo)

--
Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com 
Skype: JeffLiebermann     AE6KS    831-336-2558

FURTHERMORE, random aside - these software guys always underestimate the complexity of doing anything hardware/mechanical by about an order of magnitude. Fortunately they seem to be OK with mild schedule slips so long as I try to give them enough explanation of the "whys" of things to make "honest men" out of them...

It is understood that all mechanical things can be made from a combination of sheet metal, wire coat hangers and string.

It isn't as if softies can brag about never underestimating complexity!