diy-CAD - Creative Circuit-Board Design Tool for Gär Lämpli (發酵小燈)

[dusjagr]

Session Title: diy-CAD
Date: 25.3.2017
Attendees (who was there?):

• Shan He
• Akshai
• David
• Aakriti
• Tara
• Andrew
• Alexis

Bar Session 23.3.2017:

• Richard
• Paz
• Puneet
• J. P.
• some other peaople

Overview of topic (3-6 sentences):
We have been testing the new workshop that i developed for GOSH, called diy-CAD (do-it-yourself Children Aided Design), specifiically for the Gär Lämpli project (fermentation lamp).
The core idea of the workshop-kit is tool for creative designs of printed circuit boards, introducing basic concepts of Open Hardware being something to re-design for your own use. going from an open/shared schematic and bill of materials to a manufacturable board, using SMD (surface mount devices) components.
The design tool is mostly pen and paper, where the footprint of the parts are scaled 400% and can be freely rearranged, and then a copper layer can be painted to draw the functional board design by hand.
This was the first time the kit was tested and i am very thankful for feedback if this is useful at all, or other uses of it.

Files and other documentation about it:
the kit is described here:
http://hackteria.org/wiki/Gär_Lämpli#diy-CAD_.7C_A_Creative_PCB_design_tool_for_Children-direct-to-manufacturing
and can be downloaded printed from this pdf:
https://github.com/8BitMixtape/8Bit-Mixtape-NEO/blob/master/boards/NEO-Coconut/GärLämpli_laminates_kit.pdf

already discussed in an earlier topic in this forum, a kit to make kits with kids…

Interest in a "how to solder" skillshare?

hei greg, lucky you, only 15h… i’ll be on my way for more than 40h!! ahja… making these kits and packing hands-on tools. it’s some kinda weird embodied knowlegde, beyond lists. afer 10 years of geek experiences in SGMK, i can doing with my eyes closed, sleep-deprived, drunk or in any other state of mind. and the more you forget, the more creative the prototyping lab will be and we’ll need hacks around to get what we want. i am preparing this “kit to make kits with kids” for the smd-soldering h…

Notes:
Please help me with some reflections and improvements of this kit.

here some photos:
a 360° view of the workshop setting:

Log into Facebook

and the stuff we created:

Anybody has some photos from the session in the bar?

I will now scan the designs and make .pdf and .gerber files. hopefully we can etch the boards tomorrow and take them home as souvenirs.

more soon…

[dusjagr]

Time has passed and I continued getting more experience with the diy-CAD creative PCB design tool…

Edited Docu on Hackteria Wiki and make a dedicated GitHub Repository

I just did a workshop in Hamamatsu on my way back from Chile, and this time in a more relaxed and friendly atmosphere, without the crazyness of GOSH all around. This time it worked very nice, we also had enough time and space for the session.

It definately needs more time for an interesting learning and making experience. In Take-Space we had almost 8 hours, relaxed with friends and kids visiting, food and drinks in between, and the creative and diverse output was really nice.

we then continued to make/etch the pcb’s and soldered them…

We then applied “just” the soldeirng the kit workshop in Tokya at the bioclub meetup in Fabcafe, hoping to “sell” those kits to the Shibuya hipsters, but they didnt even donate enought for my Shinkansen ticket! (i really should have joined the business model discussions…)

Coming back to Taipei, i then personally took the effort and prepared the Unagi (fish) file for Manufacturing, adding some extra features and logos, it’s already available on kitnic

And being in the flow, i also designed a little box to put the Thermometer / Fermentation monitor into a nice little “I want it!”-Gadget. it’s all open schmopen diy hardware for not-very scientific temperature measurement…

so i hope more people are picking up the diy-CAD design tool, or also just the kits we developed using it. I thnkn it can have it’s role in education, fun, for geeks/adults aswell as complete newbies to open hardware & pcb design. the full process gives them an amazing experience from drawing and having first time a pcb made in their hands in one (long) day.

this educational workshop project, specifically with attiny85 audio prog bootloader, is maybe not the most suitable, if its just about creative pcb making, other sound toys, synths and blinke shit might do the trick. but then on the other side, the audio programmable attiny, also called CocoNEO, is a very powerful low-cost µ-controller science/toy with much broader possible applications, similar to other data-loggers available by publiclab @jeff and many others.

you find more details and files on the hackteria wiki

happy to hear some feedback from the GOSH participants on how and where this workshop tool can be implemented.

greeeetttzz,
m