Using Circuit Boards Incorrectly

[@danmerillat]

If you're concerned about flexing, try ordering the staging plate PCB a few mm wider with a v-score. snap that off, mount it 90° and you have an incredible amount of extra strength for a tiny amount of extra cost.

[@tad2021]

I was going to say just add another alu extrusion, but a PCB based stiffener would like be more cost effective. Even if the stiffener PCB is manufactured separately, it'll still be pretty cheap. Could have provisions to support 2, one on each long edge. Plate the edge of the stiffener and add a long pad to the mount board, and mount it with solder.

[@boxsterpontus]

"Abusing" the ridiculously cheap pcb manufacturers to get some high precision CNCd glass fiber boards for other things than electronics is a powerful tool. With some creativity you can make awesome things and save lots of money.

[@alphaprot2518]

*raises environmental and geopolitical concerns about ridiculously cheap pcb manufacturers* That becomes (at least it should become) a vital part of engineering, too. The engineering mindset comprises imo 1) excitement for your job and pushing boundaries further (Stephen has admirably a looot of that :D ) 2) keeping an eye out for the whole thing (engineering complexity vs usefulness (KISS), lifecycle, repairability, .. all count into this) 3) solve problems not for you but others - and in advance, so that your UX is "WOW! - whoever put that much thought into all this, rocks!"-level (another thing Stephen and his team are great at)

[@lifegeek5742]

FINALLY an engineer who gets what engineering should be! We should take the full brunt of solving every single problem that someone might run into, making it as painless as possible for people to use it!

[@sanketm1663]

Isn’t that a designers job?

[@kingmasterlord]

how is that not minimum standards?

[@Morganmcc6]

Watch out for the nozzle offset calibration. Unless your fab vendor signed up for something crazy, top copper alignment to edge plating is likely going to be ~250um error

[@justalonelypoteto]

I know this is an old comment but I really wondered why nobody noticed, like you can see how rough that edge is underneath the gold, it just looks like a recipe for trouble if not machined flat, not only in terms of consistency but it might well deform over time if there's just a tiny burr sticking out that triggers it in the beginning that then disappears, not to mention the fact that the variability in the copper thickness on the side + plating + edge roughness might well make for more than the 100um variability of the oh-so terrible microswitch, not in terms of use-to-use but machine-to-machine, and calibrating the calibration device as an end user sure doesn't sound very fun, other than that I love the project tho

[@gt_masterman]

The Turmoils of Tinkering: wanting something because it is cool although you have no real use for it and no space... Regardless, its awesome to see how far you have come in this little time!

[@funkmeister123]

Dude, love your infectious amount of excitement you have for your project. Keep it going!

[@LaviArzi]

I don't have any idea what he's talking about, but the enthusiasm kept me watching the whole video

[@Nelo390]

same ngl

[@Ivan-ef1tj]

DUDE! Holy SHIT. I just graduated from an EE and this video popped up in my recommended. Confused for the first minute of your video I look at your page and find that you are developing a PICK AND PLACE MACHINE!?!?! You've reached my "Tools to Buy" list in less than 3 minutes.

[@uniaddict]

I, at the moment, don’t have a use for a pick n place but damn do I love this series and project! Keep up the awesome work! Really smart to ship hardware for “future proofing” the pick n place! More companies need to do that :)

[@theindieg]

I love how excited you get when you present these awesome engineering solutions! Thankyou for the great videos. I will definitely be buying one of these PnP's in the next few months!

[@sai_co5337]

i love the enthusiasm for your parts. idk what this is for or what the parts are but im watching the whole video just because of the energy

[@Medragondot]

"This should be a tool, not a project"; the definition why you will succeed. Nice work, one of the best projects ever!

[@hojirick]

I'm so freaking proud of you and your community contributors. I wish I could be more involved!!

[@draglorde]

Your project is amazing and inspiring! Keep it up

[@fyremoon]

This is an amazing update and shows you are evolving the project as you find problems. If you add toothed break off strips to the staging plate, they could lock into the plated holes to provide strength at 90 degrees if needed.

[@gedr7664]

just a warning (though i think you know this): make the flexture out of petg not pla, pla creeps so will plastically deform over time even within limits of instantaneous load

[@certified-forklifter]

Totally agree, or Nylon!

[@siberx4]

I also find PLA tends to get quite brittle over time when exposed to ambient air, which makes it less than ideal for flexures compared to ABS or PETG.

[@jimmieclark8436]

I second this, because of this, my lowest filament is always PETG

[@scooterareyouready3535]

ABS is a fair bit cheaper and the best of both materials if you ask me. It's far more durable too. Yeah definitely wouldn't trust PLA.

[@siberx4]

@@scooterareyouready3535 ABS can be a bit tricky to print without an enclosure due to warping, but the parts in question are probably small enough to be ok

[@SarahKchannel]

Dont make the foot 3D printed, use two PCBs that slide together for form a 90 degree offset stand, with slots in the platform to fit-in. Closer tolerances, same material properties, plus 4 solder tacks could hold it to the platform.

[@tad2021]

This.

[@shibbleswentworth]

Little bit of Prusa with the calibrations, little bit of Elon with the structural/functional components and future updates by software. Love it.

[@shazam6274]

GEE-NEE-US! There are more than a dozen great design ideas in the boards and clamps described in this video. The best thing about this and your company is that you are focused on making a tool, not a hobby project to continuously fiddle with; repeating everything multiple times until its "good enough" (looking at you: 3D printers). Keep going! I'm a retired EE with over 50 years of design and manufacturing experience. Made my first PCBs in the '60s, Set up my first SMT line in mid '80s. Now if you could only do something about the dour, unexcited delivery in your videos, though. 😁

[@stumcconnel]

Great job on all the iteration, dude. Seriously impressive looking project!

[@ericblenner-hassett3945]

Nice use of boards as integrated system of systems. You might want to look at the SMD practice board kits as they may be cheap enough to include 1 per unit when bought in bulk, farther down the line. The alternative is still looking at the kits, with the parts you currently order, make one yourself as the ' benchie ' for it.

[@vaisakhkm783]

In the future i am planing to start a startup... so then i am defenetly ordering some of your machines

[@fabianmuhlberger6153]

Great Stuff! I'm following your progress for a while now and I love the idea of the test board, not only for testing the PnP but also for testing reflow/soldering if the board is electrically connected. I bought a bunch of PCB training boards for my first audio amp and wasn't pleased with the quality. I suggest making a kit including all the components, this would make a great start to SMD soldering and might be cool merch too ;). Best Fabian

[@benbionic]

Imagine if you had a board layer that was a coil that you use to heat up and reflow after PNP. It'd have to be in the board design of whatever board you ordered but really cool if you didn't need a reflow over or to even take it off the pick and place.

[@G11Marksman]

Neat stuff! We have just been using custom made standoffs for our panels.. mounts them in the same way our paste printer does, and we just have tight tolerances on those holes. Automated calibration is definitely the biggest weakness of the machine so far, so this is awesome news. However... Not everyone uses black boards with white mask and gold pads. Possible to include other color combo options? (Though surely I suppose I could order my own...)

[@theoldknowledge6778]

So cool!! It's nice to know that you are doing things to make the kit even more affordable

[@shannon-daylereilly7112]

Been watching this come to life from your firsts videos !! Well done !

[@tobiwonkanogy2975]

I love the idea of an expandable machine for any axis that can build nearly anything with the right parts . the pcb uses are way cool

[@PixPMusic]

damn, TIL about OpenPnP. Very happy to know this exists

[@snotvlek4721]

"Now that we're regularly shipping kids"

[@solveit1304]

Maybe merge calibration PCB and "benchy" PCB together to make it as one unit. You will cut costs on manufacturing.

[@petermuller608]

Unlikely, since the calibration PCB has a bunch of expensive features like increased height, gold plated edges and gold plating in general whereas benchy is as cheap as it gets

[@randycarter2001]

A feature of my design was reference corner. It was bolted to the frame plate. The other supports were going to be magnets for easy relocation.

[@breakalegfpv9532]

I wish I knew what you were talking about, you seem so excited about it.

[@DanBowkley]

With the build plate, could you make PCB trusses to run on the bottom and solder or glue them on? That'd add a ridiculous amount of rigidity.

[@tcarney57]

You're in imminent danger of using up your life's quota of fun, enthusiasm, and good ideas before you hit 30. If you do, what will you do for the remaining 60 years?

[@azazeldeath]

For the first board. And idk if this will be possible. But id also add a lcb green patch for calibration too, maybe a few other colour circles

[@MrZomhad]

So sick man! Really excited for the feeders :)

[@canadaplease7981]

The software of this project is what blows me away more than anything

[@thiagoennes]

you should go for a double 1.6mm fr4 instead of a 3mm, and use 6mm spacers to connect them, effectively creating a 9.2mm thickness board. Remember, stiffness increases as the square of thickness! maybe a large laser-cut spacer, like a gasket?

[@karim1485]

*cubic :)

[@gedr7664]

you need to have a whole bunch of connections along the length to make them “one” otherwise you will only get a double increase

[@gedr7664]

it’s better to do 3mm because there’s no parts. best part is no part

[@KarriKoivusalo]

It would have to be a bonded core, spacers wouldn't do much to improve structural height.

[@thiagoennes]

@@gedr7664 yes, I meant to say many spacers, and thus connections... Indeed the best part is no part. But in this case, the double board would be way stiffer than the 3mm. And stiffness is a highly desirable feature here... he used to make that part in steel!

[@Belginator]

You could sell that plate to other pmp companies

[@jbrownson]

Love following your project, very impressive

[@robertmotion]

Great video. Question, I'm replacing my ebike motor pcb board. The replacement has 7 holes/copper rings for wiring. Bu my original has 6 - 5V, GND, SP, H1, H2, and H3. The replacement has an additional ring for wiring labeled "K". What does K stand for in this case? Keyswitch, ohms, resistance? Can't find any information or diagrams online. And if I solder/connect the "regular" wires, will I have a problem if I leave "K" unsoldered? No info online + could use the help. /bklyn 👑

[@LordPhobos6502]

I'd never heard of this machine till this video popped up... but oh boy am I sick of manual-handling smd parts! This machine sounds great! Does it handle cut tape parts well, and how small? I get a lot of cut tape as it's rare for me to need 5000 of any one component. Looking forward to seeing more on this lovely PnP! 😁

[@ergindemir7366]

How do you measure the dimension errors in your pcb?

[@LetsPlayKeldeo]

I had KZbin on Autoplay and I got really confused when somebody told me that they are shipping kids hahaha

[@theAGanimators]

Pretty creative stuff there! Any future plans to offer an RLC test option to verify the first couple of parts off each reel to confirm proper feeder setup?

[@alphaprot2518]

Tbh I think that is on the "adds more unneeded complexity that is not really necessary" list - if you keep track of your reels and make them individually identifiable, that would be a better starting point imo.

[@octogames6823]

Plastic dogs, nice.

[@AndyMcBlane]

Great video, thanks!

[@trejohnson7677]

This is amazing.

[@grey1185]

Truely amazing

[@BradenEliason]

I'm curious what other uses could be build into the build platform. Like could you get positions of things placed on the platform using a row and column matrix. Also, is the foot for the platform adjustable?

[@Waitwhat469]

Would using QR reference points for automatic pixel to millimeter conversion work? So you would have a center QR code that says something like (the bottom right corner of this box is point 0,0) and another QR code 5 millimeters always store the code for (the top right corner of this box is point 0,5), and have the camera adjust until that is accurate with the view as well?

[@kingyachan]

Fiducial Fiducial Fiducial Fiducial Fiducial Fiducial Fiducial Fiducial

[@harryman01]

Any news on the feeders ?

[@xero110]

Honest criticism, really, no offense. Back the camera up and interact with the comments a little. Thanks, great info in these videos.

[@derekkonigsberg2047]

I know the challenges are completely different, but I wonder how long before you start to work on a reflow oven to go with the PNP. All the options in this price point are either junk of questionable quality, or have a very DIY nature to them. (Something with similar capabilities to the "converted toaster oven" but as a more polished kit than the current offerings, would likely be a good solution.)

[@oswynfaux]

Why not put all the calibration on one side of the board

[@Corianas_]

You really are a wonder. Have loved seeing this come from nothing to here.

[@metalmangamer]

Is this thing still open source

[@Samuel-eu1ts]

Really cool

[@getgoodorstaybad6849]

SO COOL

[@30elias28]

at first i thought youre shipping kids

[@certified-forklifter]

congrats

[@benedictevans8223]

🌹 promosm

[@AlexApol]

he is the soyjack meme

[@grhinson]

What lens are you using for this video?

[@der.Schtefan]

"Incorrectly"? No. Creatively, yes! Like you always are!

[@jimmieclark8436]

you should add a small QR code that has the measurement of the boxes in it. That way, it can scan that, and just know visually what the mathematical measurement is. It also allows you to change, or use other measurements in the future.

[@jimmieclark8436]

I am currently working on something very similar for a cnc machine for engraving. I'm mounting a camera to determine the sizes etc. of the plates put on the machine for auto alignment and calibration. I have been thinking about this stuff a lot, and found some of your points very helpful. I have a huge desire to build my own machines in the near future (when I get more shop area), and would love to help with your project. I have over 20 years in software development, and hardware (firmware and pcb design). Been following you for a while, do you guys have discord or something I can join? Thanks.

[@0LoneTech]

Aruco is designed for that.

[@justinaspetkauskas3794]

I love this concept

[@mathieub3953]

BUT PCBs are a pain in the butt to recycle compared to steel. Please consider the whole lifecycle of your product from production to recycling.

[@KarriKoivusalo]

I don't think the boards in these machines are going to amount to any significant fraction to the amount of boards they are meant to produce.