Week 02: Electronics

During this week, we learn to make PCB, including milling the board, soldering, and connecting it to the computer.

Milling the Board

Tracing

As much as I saw some circuit boards lying around, I have never mill one by myself. And I was super exciting to watch it being milled, even though I did not design the board.

The first step is to trace the circuit path on the board, with the 1/64 drill. I used the Roland mill, which allowed me to jog the drill to the origin I wanted it to be. The process was so satisfying to watch.

Cutting

The next step is to cut the shape of the USB drive out from the circuit sheet, using the 1/32 drill. This process was definitely less precise compared to the tracing. But I love seeing the dust piling up from the milling.

Soldering

I did some soldering before, and I have always enjoyed seeing the solder melt and forms a smooth surface due to its surface tension. Thus, I really enjoyed the time when I was taking my time and solder the components. The only part that I was not enjoying enough was looking for the necessary components as they are kept in various places, and it took such a long time to go through all of the labels on the drawers. The long soldering part was the most interesting part, as I needed to determine how much solder is enough, and even among the four. I hope the solder I did would work!

Connected to the Computer

I tried to connect it to the virtual machine in the arch shop with the blue and white programmer, but what I found is that I can see it under the Windows system, in the printers and drivers. But I could not find when I listed the USB in the virtual machine. So I did not program it, and I definitely need to test if it's working

UPDATES: Later I tried it in the Windows system, and I was able to find the usb device. I was also able to follow the documentation to do the following commands.