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[on:]

Haydio, long time no see.

I designed this simple little matrix. I just love those things, but I can't find any in white, so I did my own. ^^


The schematic seems to be good (at least that's how I wired my other handmade matrices).


Here's the populated and wired board.

I have a question, though.
The footprint for the LEDs includes the tiny triangle symbole with the bar on top of it on the Silkscreen Layer.
BUT : I got vias (yellow) under these triangles, and it causes a conflict with the soldermask.



How can I remove the symbol from the footprint without having to modify the whole package ? I already smashed the LEDs so that I can get rid of the unused texts, but damn, this symbol... ^^

Any advice ?

Ho, and I'd really like to hear from you about groundplanes, etc... This is my first board designed, and it's gonna go to seeedstudio as soon as I get your approval ^^

Cheers

[Reply #1 on:]

Hi,
Melka

I think eagle can't do this, it can change/move/delete...>name,>value in symbol define only, but not the line or other marks.

Or, you may modify your symbol file for the triangle, and refresh it in your design. ;D

Albert

[Reply #2 on:]

Many (some?) PCB vendors automatically apply the soldermask to ALL the layers, including the silkscreen, just so that vias and pads don't end up covered when they shouldn't be.  Check with seedstudio...

Otherwise, modify the library.  I'm not sure it's a good idea to have silkscreen under flat SMT components anyway...

[Reply #3 on:]

This doesn't help you, but any chance you're going to use seedstudio's propaganda service?  I'd love to pick up one of these.

[Reply #4 on:]

Thanks for the tips, people
I think I'll redo the package, then... ^^

Oracle : yep, that's exactly what I'm gonna do. I think I'll add some kind of 5 pins connectors, so that you can daisy chain the Shields + some small features if I have any ideas to make it even better. I'd be glad to hear from you what feature you'd want. Anyway, I think it's gonna hit China next week.

Does anyone sees any error in this schematic / board ?

Cheers

[Reply #5 on:]

I think this would kill your intent, but what do you think of putting the ATmega168 on your board instead of a shield.  If you bring out the ICSP header it will make it easy to program via the Arduino environment, at least for people with an AVRISP.

[Reply #6 on:]

Hi

Sparkfun has an Eagle tutorial that shows exactly how to do this:

http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/tutorial_info.php?tutorials_id=115


Michele

[Reply #7 on:]

oracle : hum, might be interesting... A standalone led matrix... I'll try to do that for a next revision, but I plan on doing another one with a TLC5940 to have grayscale. As the TLC is available in SMD, I'll try to put it on the other side of the board, so that you have a side with only the leds, and the other with the chips. A square board ^^ I think I'll add the ATmega too, so that you can program it either with the AVRISP, or by using the FTDI bitbang mode with your actual arduino.
I'll tell you all when I've done some progress on this future rev. 2 ^^

michelef : thanks, I forgot about this page ^^ Anyway, I modified my package so that I don't have the symbol on the silkscreen, I'll add it by hand (all the LEDs are wired the same way... one symbol sould be enough)