4 Sep
2015
4 Sep
'15
5:34 a.m.
On Sep 3, 2015, at 3:36 PM, Sean Caron <scaron at
umich.edu> wrote:
My dad shops out prototype PCB manufacturing to a firm called Omnitrace (
http://www.pcb4u.com). He sends them layouts and they send back bare boards
which he stuffs in the lab ... He says the price is the best he's found,
there's no minimum run size (not sure on the plated edge connectors,
though) and the turnaround is very quick. He had samples of I think an
8-layer board they had done for him recently that he showed me last time we
visited and they were very nicely done. I haven't gotten to the point of
doing layout yet ... all my projects are still on the bread board ... but
when I do eventually run off some boards, I expect to use those guys.
I had similar experience with a different outfit, pcb-pool
(http://www.pcb-pool.com/ppuk/index.html). They are based in Europe; my most recent
shipment from there came from Ireland, though headquarters may be in Germany. They do
quantity one, but of course discounts for modestly larger runs. Multi layer; I've
done 2 and 4 layers. One convenience is that they accept Eagle CAD layout files directly,
they don't need them converted to Gerber format.
They also include (if requested) an SMD solder paste stencil. I foolishly didn't do
that last time, should have. Will next time. There are some good articles around (I just
pointed to one a few days ago) about how to do SMD assembly with solder paste and stencils
using home equipment.
paul