Brian's HTMAA Diary 2024

Week 05: Electronics Production

Group Assignment

For Electronics Production week, we got a tutorial from Quentin on submiting a PCB design to a board house and making our own microcontroller development booards in the CBA lab.

We then got a tutorial on using the Carvera machine in the CBA lab.

Quentin showed us how to convert gerber files to png images, which is then turned into g-code with mods.

We then got started on characterizing the design rules for the Carvera milling machine.

Individial Assignment

I redesigned and simplified my board design as I realized i didn't completely understand what was going on in my previous board design. The new one instead lights up an LED by using a finger as the switch.

I also wanted to test USB-A port connectivity, although it is only used to power the board, not send or recieve any data.

the coiling copper traces on the lower right is where someone can touch with their finger, closing the circuit and thus lighting the LED.

Here is the final milled board with all the surface-mounted electronics. While soldering I realized many flaws in my design, like the fact I was using a regulator that handles too small of a current output, and also the fingerpad for the switch needing a ground trace.

I plugged the board into the USB port on my laptop, and it did not work. I will probably do some more tweaking to the design and make the board again.