Lutetium
I wish I had a really good use-case for flex. All I can think of is just making FFCs, but you can just buy those from DigiKey. :/
One of the issues with flex is that there's fewer fabs to do it in the US, and 2 of the fabs we've talked to said "Yeah, we do flex fabs and we're also in the us", but they just exported the job to a chinese fab. One literally just sent us the box _from_ the chinese fab directly. >_>
@Thomas Shaddack Voxel8 did that until they realized no one wanted to buy their printer
That's harsh.
> do you see any pcb artists using halftoning?
Here is a wonderful example https://plus.google.com/photos/100779964808096572793/album/6333017586389944753/6333018254399231794
I agree Nick. You can do a lot with origami folding.
The second fab we placed an order, then actually remembered to check "These are fabbed literally in a spot IN THE US, right?" and the answer was no." At least that time we were able to cancel the order.
@Dan Sheadel thats a common problemt these days I'veheard from multiple people in industry
The current fab IS ACTUALLY a US fab, as we hoped and expected. But some delays came up regarding our panelization, requirements, and we had to do some adjustments. The final panel for this is delayed, but still en route! Hopefuly we have news soon.
some US fabs just out source and say they do it here
what's the trick to drill holes in the PCBs without having burrs on the edges?
Here is a link with Flex Beta Service Info + FAQ
http://docs.oshpark.com/services/flex/
lternative solder mask colours? ---> try this code #ff8040
> I wish I had a really good use-case for flex. All I can think of is just making FFCs, but you can just buy those from DigiKey. :/
We've seen some really good stuff so far. Once this is affordable, I think the ideas will come popping out the woodwork.
Hah, wow I cen't believe they just shipped you the box straight from China!
While we're on the topic of flexible PCBS, Robert Marosi asks: What's the most interesting flex-PCB application you've encountered so far?
Dan has written some good documenatation about Castellated Edges here: http://docs.oshpark.com/tips+tricks/castellation/
This was a fun flex test that Trammell Hudson designed https://twitter.com/qrs/status/929513598203830272
We've seen some cool ones!
- 90* angle bends for neopixels and lighting strips,
- Someone is using a couple sheets as a pressure sensor for botton of shoes
- Connectors, obviously
- Glue on fingernail lights
We had the good fortunate to be able to deliver the test flex boards in person to people at Supercon
Is it possible to solder BGA packages and small passives on flex-PCBs
I made a pebble watchband (RIP) for breaking out the signals into a dev kit.
@Andrew Sowa used the flex to make letter shapes for a sign http://andrewsowa.com/projects/#/3h-chicago-hardware-meetup/
@Dan Sheadel love that idea abotu the watchband
Catalan solid flex PCB prototype is a good idea you can build many shapes and used as kit
> Is it possible to solder BGA packages and small passives on flex-PCBs
Solder, yeah. Will they stay there? NO IDEA. One of the things we'll be doing is some in-house destructive testing to figure out these edge cases.
thought. flex for electrodes and other medical electronics that conform to the body surface?
Will OSH Park sell PCB assembly services at some point? This is another question from @Robert Marosi
@Thomas Shaddack I wanna say tons of medical devices have that kind of construction
We see a lot of flex guides for basic mechanical stuff.... but not what our customers are gonna do to it. So we'll be keeping an eye on this, and trying to pester the community for how much luck they get with some of this stuff.
yes you can solder BGA packages on a flix but it should be fixed to something rigid
I think i have to switch my photo with a photo of my scope...
Dan Sheadel says:
We WERE planning to have a rigid back on the flex pcbs, but one of the delays came from that we can't do that. So, we're looking at a Plan B to get people little flex bits.
would it work to put a blob of epoxy over the bga, to provide the rigidity around the part?
One of the current ideas we have is using a laser cutter to ship a small sheet of custom-shaped stickon backs that you can use to put the pcb stiffener on yourself.
that could work nicely. could also work for heatsinks.
these are the flex PCBs to connect "neopixel" RGB LEDs at different angles https://twitter.com/JunesPhD/status/955565312308588544
Butterfly boards! <3
@Thomas Shaddack I've seen BGAs expoxied on the corners in a couple macbook pros I disassembled
the finished arrangement https://twitter.com/JunesPhD/status/935668642477432833
OK, should probably move to the next question, but keep pestering us about flex if you have questions. :)
indeed
Next Question: Will OSH Park sell PCB assembly services at some point? This is another question from @Robert Marosi
are you guys still taking test designs from people ?
> Will OSH Park sell PCB assembly services at some point? This is another question from @Robert Marosi
Maybe! If we do, we'll probably do "jellybean" parts at a low cost. We _probably_ won't ever offer a full turnkey solution though. It's not off the table, but it's a _ton_ of work that's somewhat out of the focus of our normal operations.
We also recognize that just getting a consistent BOM is gonna be a hassle. We're not gonna launch a service that's not somewhat on par with the ease of workflow process we pride ourselves on. And doing that for PCB assembly is gonna be tough.
yeah it would be really hard to also become MacroFab on top of being OSHpark
** late question about flex: where can i find technical mechanical specs, like minimum bend radii, ampacity, flex characteristics, etc?
I really liked the self-serve PCBA that MacroFab and PCB:NG have
Any plans to offer stencils?
They offer stencils laready
no they don't
OSH Stencils
The Proto PCB Stencil Maker home of the Kapton Polyimide and Stainless Steel laser cut solder paste stencils for prototype and batch pcb runs. The source for cheap pcb solder stencils and foils. Serving the maker community since 2013, focusing on SMT and SMD based stencils for solder paste electronic circuits and electronic design applications.
they do
Oshstencils is a different company.
thats not oshpark
@Carrie Sundra and @Jac Goudsmit are wondering about "mouse teeth" on boards. Jac notices their medium run orders didn't have mouse teeth, and Carrie wants to do some small runs without mouse teeth. What ccreates the mouse teeth in your boards and how can they be avoided @Dan Sheadel ?
my bad thought they were the same
Yeah. Doing full turnkey also is a space with a lot of options that exist. We'd rather put that energy into a spot that's more helpful to the electronics community.
Mouse teeth? Same as "rat bites?"
I think so
fyi - OSH Stencils is a wonderful company in Utah
Back to flex real quick:
- No, not doing test boards. We hopefully are done with tests, and if things work out, we'll be just launching the service. If not, we'll probably use the boards we have for in-house testing.
- No stackup is official yet, but http://docs.oshpark.com/services/flex/ has our targets (although it's not updated to reflect the reality that we won't have stiffener)
@darryln please check out http://docs.oshpark.com/services/flex/
@oshpark do they get your seal of approval?
@oshpark thanks
great interview with OSH Stencils for those interested https://theamphour.com/320-an-interview-with-brent-of-oshstencils/
> @Carrie Sundra and @Jac Goudsmit are wondering about "mouse teeth" on boards. Jac notices their medium run orders didn't have mouse teeth, and Carrie wants to do some small runs without mouse teeth. What ccreates the mouse teeth in your boards and how can they be avoided @Dan Sheadel ?
This is helpful to understand those. https://twitter.com/oshpark/status/774837370587795456
The mousebites are used mechanically to keep a panel together.
@Adam Vadala-Roth We are big fans of osh stencils, and I love their metal stencils -Drew
OSH stencils is great and all but I would much prefer to single source pcbs/stencils
For our smaller panels, the biggest cost driver is up-front cost of panel setup. So, getting more designs on the panel is a huge advantage, and is what keeps the prices low. So, we use the little tabs to hold them together.
So why were there no mouse bites on my last 2 medium run orders? Aren't they panelized?
We can fully mill out PCBs when it is a medium run order: http://docs.oshpark.com/services/two-layer-medium-run/
it requires over 100 sq inches, please contact support@oshpark.com for more info
For our medium run, the up-front cost is amortized across more panels. So, we can get the individual orders "fully routed". For this process, the boards are basically sticky-tacked to panel and then milled. It's a bit more time consuming and costly, but it works out for this type of production.
Excellent! I get that the hold the board in the panel, just wasn’t sure which routing you didn’t and which the pcb manufacturer did. Good to know medium runs are a possibility.
*stickytacked to a scrap board, exactly.
@Audi McAvoy asks:
Does oshpark support ODB++? If so, is that preferred over Gerber?
How automated is the Gerber submission process? I didn't have a board outline layer, and it was kicked back pretty quick.
So, because we're doing the full routing process, we _can_ do full routing on individual boards. It's less space efficient though, so we typically do small subpanels of each design, and then fully route the outsides of those (so the customer gets the panel). This works out really well for us, for customer's ease of assembly, and shipping.
@Stephen I wanna know too, we do ODB++ at work for all boards
Cool! Well folks, I guess that means if you get one of my kits with mousebites, it'll be a "L@@K R@RE STEVE JOBS EARLY VERSION" (I should charge extra haha)
Got it. Thanks!
> Does oshpark support ODB++? If so, is that preferred over Gerber?
Nope. OBD++ is a proprietary format, and we're not willing to fork over to get a licence. X2 is free! As is using the default naming pattern of the tool, and we'll pick that up.
The big advantage for OBD is custom stackups (which we don't really do) and component stuff.
> How automated is the Gerber submission process? I didn't have a board outline layer, and it was kicked back pretty quick.
hm... I thought mousebites was the term for the half circle through hold pads on the edge of circuit boards.
> How automated is the Gerber submission process? I didn't have a board outline layer, and it was kicked back pretty quick.
100% . We can send your order to fabrication without human intervention.
We _do_, however, look over a panel for anything that looks super weird. As a dev, nearly 100% of my time is managing the zillions of edge cases caused by tools doing things no one in their right mind would expect.
Like text on a copper layer, off the edge of a board?
Any dirty details about upcoming OshPark hex sticker releases/designs?
Jac Goudsmit asks:
Does OSHPark support (or are they planning to support) chamfering to make edge connectors?
If we wanted, we could actually set Oshpark to full-automated mode, where orders are
- Checked and processed
- Panelized
- Sent to the appropriate fab
- Received
without a human. However, we'd have to obviously have a person ship things.... and we do like to check stuff.
That's impressive!
Dan, if you fully automated the process only the shipper would get to see the those lovely art based PCBs that come through now and then.
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