pert:
I was meaning to post the dupont multimeter probes I made like that to this thread. Mine are dedicated leads instead of having the connectors like yours. I find those super useful and like how easy they are to use when breadboarding a circuit, rather than having some large probe handles with thick wires getting in the way.
In some situations, I use connectors made by the JST people.
Doing this helps keep the number of dedicated cables down to a minimum.
Using the male header end, it's great to plug your cable into the test equipment then straight into a breadboard.
Not having to hold test leads or use alligator clips on breadboards is very convenient.
We all do it now and then.
If you have a few extra plugs and a spare hour, make up a Voltage/Current test cable.
This speeds up testing and gets rid of those ugly alligator clips.
PCB vice.
You may have to tweek the clamps with a file to adjust the fit.
These are obviously for low profile SMD component boards before headers are soldered.
These are handy to hold your PCBs while you solder components on the board.
At $7.00 they are reasonably priced.
The two holes in the base are for securing the fixture to a heavier sub-surface.
LarryD:
PCB vice.
You may have to tweek the clamps with a file to adjust the fit.
These are handy to hold your PCBs while you solder components on the board.
At $7.00 they are reasonably priced.
The two holes in the base are for securing the fixture to a heavier sub-surface.
The problem I have is the needle is 4x bigger than the pad I'm trying to paste. I've resorted to using a toothpick and pluck some out of the end of the needle and dab it where I want it. I've been playing with a lot of 0402 smds and am trying some 0201s on my next board. They don't need much paste. Many of the ic's (LQFP) I'm using really don't want much solder.
Use breadboard helper boards to quickly test your circuit designs and sketch code.
When you come up with a design you often use, make a PCB to plug and play.
Dont be afraid to add stuff you need directly on a board ^^
This is a programming board for the ESP8266-01 that I modified with a button and two wires.
In standard operating mode the esp8266 will run its loaded firmware / arduino code when plugged in,
however holding the button when connecting your device pulls gpio0 to ground allowing you to program the device.
The button is hotglued to the female header. Could do 1 more on the opposite side for device reset..
Funny you say that. I seem to have picked up a nasty cold. As for the microscope, not a desktop unit yet. I'm using 25x loupe glasses. The focal length is a bit tight with a rework gun. I'm looking for a nice microscope like you have.
LarryD:
I was going to suggest that you make one of these:
fettkeewl:
Dont be afraid to add stuff you need directly on a board ^^
This is a programming board for the ESP8266-01 that I modified with a button and two wires.
In standard operating mode the esp8266 will run its loaded firmware / arduino code when plugged in,
however holding the button when connecting your device pulls gpio0 to ground allowing you to program the device.
The button is hot glued to the female header. Could do 1 more on the opposite side for device reset..
Yes, we all add things sooner or later to existing circuits.
You can use small pieces of PCB material, glue them to an existing PCB then add components to these pieces.
Here is a discussion on the process.
Edit:
Try a small drop of 'Super Glue' on motherboard and small smear of 'Super Glue Accelerator' on the bottom of the cutout pad.
Jiggy-Ninja:
If you've got some thing you need to use frequently that requires a complicated wiring arrangement, make a jig on some protoboard so you will know it works every time and not have to fiddle around with troubleshooting it every time you wire it up.
I made jigs for reprogramming chips outside of an Arduino board.
Above are two examples of programming jigs I made. One is a ZIF socket soldered onto a protoshield that lets me use the ArduinoISP sketch on an Uno to program a chip (in this case, an ATtiny4313).
The other is some male headers soldered onto a 6-wide protoboard. The 2x3 header on top lets me plug in the standard programmer ribbon cable, and the headers on bottom are spaced just wide enough to be able to plug this over a DIP package in a breadboard. You just need to grab the right jig and plug it over the chip to reprogram it in circuit. The one pictured is made for an ATtiny85.
I have one of each jig made for ATtiny85, ATtiny84, ATtiny4313, and ATmega328P.
Which reminds me, I need to whip some up for the ATtiny10 and various PICs I bought.
Further to this, here is how I make up a shield like yours.
After coming up with the schematic, I import an image of the front and back of the 'Shield' into a program like Snagit.
I get images of the components to be mounted and size them to 1:1
After placing the components at the best locations for my application I layout how the wires are to be run.
I then print out a 2:1 paper copy.
I solder things up as shown in the images below.
I use wire warp wire or magnet wire to make interconnections. Wire Wrap Wire 30AWG
WARNING the PCB linked in POST # 14 has a circuit error. >:(
**You MUST corrected this error before you plug it onto an Arduino. ** See Post #14 for the corrected image.
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