Fri3d 2022 Badge

In the last days before the event we flashed all 700+ boards with the default Micro Python firmware.

both the Micro Python as the Arduino firmware have their own repository, the final firmware is included in the code directory of the badge repository

Toon spent some time to make nice visuals which we can use on our documentation leaflets and presentations.

On the 3th of August we held a sweatshop evening for mass assembling, testing and packaging the badge!

Yesterday we spent a day in the factory to assemble the first badges.

Paste dispensing

Paste is applied using a stencil and a machine to align the PCB with the stencil resulting in a nice and accurate solder paster being applied.

Component stuffing

With a variety of machines: larger pick and place machines for the bigger components and a high speed ship shooter for the passives and SOT23 packages, we managed to do our first test PCB with everything correctly mounted.

Baking 

Once we manually inspect the board for proper placement of the components, the boards goes through a large reflow oven for approximately 7 minutes. 

Quick test to verify component orientations

Before continuing we did a quick test to verify all the component orientations. 

Mass production

As you can see, we've got a lot of boards to stuff this week.

The mass production batch has finally been ordered. AQC will deliver the PCBs next week, the stuffing of the boards is planned for the first of August in More@Mere, the Dekimo production plant. We'll make sure to document that process as well. Our aim is to stuff 750 PCBs in 1 day.

In the meantime Rev.02 of the badge has been verified, some minor changes to the silkscreen have been implemented, we improved the BadgeLink circuit to include a decent level translator based on the BSS138 MOSFET and changed the function of the backlight switch. In Rev.03 you can either turn the backlight on or render it's control to the accelerometers interrupt pin.

The first draft of the block diagram for publication has been created and has been styled by Toon.

Hooray! Revision 02 gerber files have been sent off to our sponsor AQC for board production. Once these arrive we can use the prototyping facility of Dekimo to assemble the first boards of this revision.