KiCad Traces Net classes
I have done the following work on Net classes in KiCad, which is derived from what I wrote about IPC 2221 standard trace widths and Creepage and Clearance a while ago. I have been doing some work on my ROV,…
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UART TX/RX Swapping made simple
When designing boards, one of the things I spend a lot of time checking is if my UART transmit (TX) and receive (RX) lines are the right way round, or switched over. When the design gets to the printed circuit…
LaTeX CV
Every so often I update my CV, I am not a huge fan of Microsoft Word, or other Word Processors. Texmaker is a free open source LaTeX editor that works cross platform, on my Mac it makes generating my CV…
PCB rule business card
I have got my PCB rule business card PCBs back from JLCPCB, so now to check everything works and build one up
Toy from Würth Elektronik
On LinkedIn a while ago Glen one of the reps at Würth Elektronik offered free PCB fidget spinners. I asked nicely if MiniBoyGeek could have one, and as such one was delivered, I am glad I opened the bag before…
3D Print K9
I have been trying to design a K9 for 3D printing for a while, even using Fusion 360 getting the body design has been a stumbling block, On Facebook, there is a k-9 builders community and a link to a…
Making the KiCad Title block data useful
After the Origin issue, another one of KiCad’s slight annoyances is when the contents of the paper space title blocks get out of sync, looking at the support tickets, this is by design, however, it doesn’t stop it from being…
Just how big is tiny?
One of the problems I have when designing PCBs, or working in CAD with a view to 3D printing it is easy to lose sight of how big things on the screen are in real life. A lot of the…
KiCad PCB Grid Origin
When you have been using KiCad for a while to make PCBs, one of the things you will come to find is a pain is that by default the KiCad grid origin is set up in the top left of…
Creepage and Clearance
The IPC 2221 voltage and spacing standards have two general voltage levels for creepage and clearance, which it defines as “Low Voltage” and “High Voltage”, Some of the “High Voltage” would be considered SELV (Safety Extra Low Voltage), the IPC…
IPC 2221 standard trace widths
Using IPC 2221 to work out creepage and clearance track widths for use in KiCad for both Low and High Voltages.
KiCad and the Autorouter
You may have heard the saying “never trust the autorouter”, you may have even seen it written on a t-shirt! Back when I used Eagle ECAD (Before AutoDesk did their thing), there was a built-in autorouter that was a handy…