I'm trying to develop circuitry for Eurorack synthesizers, but it is a total mess. I have the typical solderless breadboard but I have to use alligator clips to connect to the patch cords and I have to have an external power supply with all the wires that that entails. I can get this working, but it is very fragile and I can never hope to bring it to a gig to test it in real-life.
There must be a better way! But, I haven't found anything using Google or on this forum. Any help here would be much appreciated.
Stripboard seems to be pretty popular in the DIY synth community.
I was so frustrated by the same problem that I decided to create a solution. And it proved to be really useful. I'd never go back to the old way. I even used it to develop a really cool module called The Spankulator.
I've made it all open source, so you can build it yourself from the BOMs and Gerbers that I provide on Git:
Here's a photo of the PBJ EU.
Please feel free to leave any questions you may have. I'd be happy to try to answer them!
For a prototype like that I like to use wirewrap sockets on "island of holes" perfboard. 30 AWG to connect stuff up, add screw terminals to connect offboard wires. Solder the corners of the socket, or use wirewrap strips. Very solid platform until you can get around to making a PCB.
Sockets and socket strips
30 AWG wire
Wirewrap tool with stripper built into the handle
I prefer Velleman ECS1/2 (hunt around for a good price).
Quality board, very even hole spacing, good pads to solder on to.
Here is a timekeeping/score keeping project built up with all of the above
ProMini eventually replaced the Uno, I think I had accidentally zapped the Promini in this picture when a 12V wire came loose and touched something.
I had changed the design for the digit displays a couple of time before settling on a MAX7219 to drive them. Just unwrapped the wires and rewrapped with different control chip.
Point to point soldering with 26 AWG wire would have been really messy to do that. Unwinding wire off 0.025" square posts is a snap.
Even wirewrapping onto LED legs was easy.
Perfect! Just what I was looking for. Thanks!
I still have that wire-wrapping tool. Thanks for reminding me about this technique.
Ok, hopefully that will move you to a more stable setup.
I used ExpressSCH to document that design, laying out the parts and capturing the schematic. Had to keep track with the 6 different boards and then adding 2 smaller boards when I added a little more functionality.
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