3 Sep
2015
3 Sep
'15
9:24 a.m.
Hi folks,
as you might remember I made about 20 OmniUSB Omnibus to USB adapters. Since a
few month they're all sold.
The last days I got some inquiries for more. So I think of making a new batch.
As my board supplier has doubled (It was so cheap before..!) the price for gold
plated contact PCBs, the board will be more expensive in the end. And I
massively underestimated the labour...
And I'll overhaul the design.
The original board description:
http://pdp8.hachti.de/projects/omni_usb/
The facts about a new board:
- Exactly same functionality
- Smaller
- Still gold plated contacts
- Still KL8E compatible
- Power supply parts will be moved away from the PCB's edge
- USB connector will be moved away from the PCB's edge
The board will cost (fully assembled and tested) EUR 105 (without VAT for
overseas buyers) and About EUR with VAT for anyone in the EU.
A still to design cusom handle (I think of laser cut acrylic with wood) to make
the board the original size will be available in the EUR 25 range.
If YOU are interested, please let me know. I'll make my decision with regards to
the feedback I'll get from this posting.
I need at least 10 seriously interested people to make it happen again.
Kind regards
Philipp
3 Sep
3 Sep
11:45 a.m.
On Thu, Sep 3, 2015 at 10:24 AM, Philipp Hachtmann <hachti at hachti.de> wrote:
As my board supplier has doubled (It was so cheap
before..!) the price for
gold plated contact PCBs,
If you don't mind sharing, which supplier is it? Is the connector
plating hard gold over nickel? How many microns (or micro-inches) of
each?
Many of the PCB fab companies I've queried either won't do hard gold
at all, or not for short runs, or charge a fortune.
I intent to make some short-run boards for the Apple II and Intel
Multibus in the not too distant future, and while a non-gold edge
connector is OK for one or two prototypes, it's not satisfactory for
general use.
12:36 p.m.
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.
Best,
Sean
On Thu, Sep 3, 2015 at 2:45 PM, Eric Smith <spacewar at gmail.com> wrote:
On Thu, Sep 3, 2015 at 10:24 AM, Philipp Hachtmann
<hachti at hachti.de>
wrote:
As my board supplier has doubled (It was so cheap
before..!) the price
for
gold plated contact PCBs,
If you don't mind sharing, which supplier is it? Is the connector
plating hard gold over nickel? How many microns (or micro-inches) of
each?
Many of the PCB fab companies I've queried either won't do hard gold
at all, or not for short runs, or charge a fortune.
I intent to make some short-run boards for the Apple II and Intel
Multibus in the not too distant future, and while a non-gold edge
connector is OK for one or two prototypes, it's not satisfactory for
general use.
4 Sep
4 Sep
1:37 a.m.
Thanks, Sean. I'll have to inquire as to whether they offer hard gold
over nickel for edge connectors. I know of a bunch of relatively
low-cost PCB fabs, but they generally either don't offer hard gold, or
only on large runs, or only for really big bucks. The actual cost of
the gold on a hard gold edge connector is only a few dollars, which
doesn't justify adding >$50/board on a short run, IMO, but that's what
I've usually been quoted.
Note that "hard gold" is much different from electroless nickel
immersion gold (ENIG), which is a much more commonly available surface
finish that is used on an entire board surface, but NOT suitable for
edge connectors. ENIG uses a very thin gold layer (about 0.1?m gold
over 2?m nickel) that will wear off the the edge connectors in only a
few insertions. Hard gold for edge connectors is typically 1-2 ?m of
gold over 3-6 ?m of nickel.
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
3173
days inactive
3174
days old
4 comments
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participants (4)
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hachti＠hachti.de -
paulkoning＠comcast.net -
scaron＠umich.edu -
spacewar＠gmail.com