Naive Business Card

Description

In my journey of learning Electronics and PCB design, and with the philosophy “fail fast, fail often” in mind, I wanted to challenge myself with the Hackaday's 2024 Business Card Challenge. I created a very simple business card with a couple of LEDs whose blinking frequency can be adjusted by a trimmer.

Project repository: https://github.com/lorenzopalloni/naive-business-card/
I used KiCad 8.0.

Among others, I want to thank Shawn Hymel, Philip Salmony (Phil's Lab), and Charles Platt, from whom I have learnt a ton.

- KiCad Tutorial, by Shawn Hymel: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3bNyZYHcRSUhUXUt51W6nKvxx2ORvUQB

- KiCad 7 STM32 Bluetooth Hardware Design (1/2 Schematic), by Phil's Lab: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkHFoxe0mrU

- Make: Electronics: Learn by Discovery, by Charles Platt: https://www.amazon.it/Make-Electronics-Learning-Through-Discovery/dp/0596153740

Details

The business card features two LEDs whose blinking frequency can be adjusted using a trimmer. This project was designed using KiCad 8.0.

Project Repository: https://github.com/lorenzopalloni/naive-business-card/

Project Logs

Collapse

I cannot believe it actually works! O.o
Lorenzo Palloni • 07/16/2024 at 12:30 • 0 comments

I ordered only 5 PCBs, because I wasn't 100% sure they would work. My main concern was the thickness of about 1 mm. Eventually, soldering was easier than expected. Though I fried the first one after almost 2 hours of soldering, the second try actually worked out pretty well and only took me half an hour this time.
I received my custom PCBs after a couple of weeks after ordering them from PCBWay.
I took another shot, tuning some parameters of my Samsung s23 Ultra's camera in Manual Mode. Surprised by the quality change, I wanted to show the difference.

This is the one I fried.

While the second one, after a bit of troubleshooting, turned on!

I also did a short video demo, which I put on YouTube and in the project details here on Hackaday.
I ordered my first PCB! :D
Lorenzo Palloni • 06/29/2024 at 13:59 • 0 comments

It's official, I placed the order on PCBWay!

I'm eager to see if the board will work. 😬

The cost was pretty low: $6.5, and with a discount coupon, it was just $1.5. Including shipping, I paid about $10.0.

I chose a thickness of 1.0 mm instead of the default 1.6 mm. The cost was the same, but I'm worried that the PTH components might be too heavy for the thinner board.
How it started
Lorenzo Palloni • 06/29/2024 at 13:25 • 0 comments

At the beginning, I started outlining the business card in my e-paper tablet, using a ruler to understand the actual size.

I wanted to stay simple with the electronics involved because I'm quite a newbie in this field. So, I thought about combining a couple of examples I saw in the book “Make: Electronics” by Charles Platt and the Shawn Hymel's tutorial on KiCad. Eventually, I came up with the following circuit on a breadboard. Not just any breadboard, but the Ben Eater's favourite: the BB830. :)

Some components needed to be measured carefully. So, with some datasheets at hand, I spent quite some time figuring out the exact sizes.

Ah, this is how the board looked in the KiCad 3D viewer: