NRF24L01+ PCB, with larger components (0603)

Other Hardware General Electronics
1

Here is a like to the Sparkfun NRF24L01 break out board. I added this exact layout to my own custom board and it's working great. However, I'd like to get away from the 0402 size. I made the same schematic and board layout, only using 0603 components instead of 0402. Would there be any reason this won't work fine? I don't much much about RF interference, etc, but my layout is almost identical to Sparkfun's.
Here's a photo of Sparkfun's board:

600×600 156 KB

Here's a photo of my layout with larger components.

2

The larger size resistors have a higher power dissipation rating , which simply means they are rated for more power than you need so no problem there.

3

Our firewall is blocking your layout here at work, but there is no reason this shouldn't work as long as all the connections are made the same.

4

The larger components mean the stray capacitance and inductance will be different (very significant at 2.4GHz),
so the antenna matching LC network will need tweaking for proper matching - unless you have good RF test
equipment you have trial and error to do this... The thickness of the PCB and width of the traces is also very
big factor at these frequencies for an antenna matching network.

It depends how narrowband a network was used in the design you've copied - if its relatively
wideband you may be lucky and it works the same. Narrowband and you may have detuned
completely out of the band.

5

The larger components mean the stray capacitance and inductance will be different (very significant at 2.4GHz),
so the antenna matching LC network will need tweaking for proper matching

That's what I was wondering about.
When I populated my board, which I copied the schematic from Sparkfun's, I noticed all those 0402 land patterns were rather large. Now looking closer at their eagle files, and the actual components on the board, I don't think they use 0402 components, even though they are marked as such in the eagle files. See the attached two photos. The eagle file calls all those resistors and inductors 0402, but theirs are much larger. Using the NRF24L01 chip as a reference, I can tell they are actually 0603 size.
My first board I made with 0402 seems to work very good. I don't need a long range, though. I think I'll use the same layout, and just use 0603 on future revisions.

6

One more note:
At first, a little googling told me those inductor with the mark on them, it doesn't matter their orientation. But now I'm reading that if they're used with other inductors (like this antenna) it might matter.

7

Usually with inductors its the relative orientation (whether at right-angles or inline) that
would matter most - right-angles gives least coupling. Not seen inductors with a band at
only one end though.