Related Topics
Ridiculous Relay Ratings
On this episode, Parker sifts through marketing gimmicks for component ratings and Stephen discusses dual rail power supply designs.
Kicking Troglodytes Off The Stage
PCB serial numbering? Parker and Stephen cover their thoughts on applying a unique identifier to PCBs in production for inventory and testing control.
How Soft Are Your Diodes?
Parker's pinball controller has gone gold! Revision 3 is being fabricated! Stephen then explores the softness factor of diodes and the SSPS returns?
Other Resources
Circuit Break Podcast
Webinars
Videos
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August 12, 2016, Episode #28
- Stephen has been running tests on the Energon Cube for the SSPS. So far everything is working great. Check out Stephen’s blog post update: Super Simple Power Supply “SSPS” Design (Part 3).
- The FX Dev board enclosure arrived and it looks great. See Figure 1 for some sweet powder-coated goodness.
- Parker has been working on streamlining all the MacroFab Engineering Github Repositories. Most of them should look consistent in layout and information now.
- All the Eagle footprint libraries have been updated with MPN and Populate attributes. Check them out here. Should be adding these features to DipTrace and KiCad footprints by next week.
- Releasing MF-CON-2.54mm-01xXX pinheaders. Check out the house parts section on the MacroFab website.
- Parker posted an article this week on Eagle Part Attributes. This way designers and engineers can easily add the MPN and Populate field to their own parts.
- In Episode 26 of MEP, Parker had a hacked together USB Type C prototype. Now Parker has a full on development board he designed using a FTDI FT230X and a Parallax Propeller (See Figure 2).
- ‘Transient electronics’ research develops dissolving battery. Basically, it’s a battery that has a polyvinyl alcohol-based polymer casing that swells causing it to dissolve (except for some nanoparticles) in around 30min after contact with water. It supposedly can power a laptop for 15 minutes but Parker did some napkin math and found out it was a bunch of crap.
- PokeBall Wiggles when Pokemon are Nearby. Cool project that uses servos inside a 3D printed pokeball to wiggle when it finds pokemon nearby for the Pokemon Go App. Uses Particle IoT’s “Photon” hardware and the Pokemon Go’s API.
About the Hosts
Parker Dillmann
Parker is an Electrical Engineer with backgrounds in Embedded System Design and Digital Signal Processing. He got his start in 2005 by hacking Nintendo consoles into portable gaming units. The following year he designed and produced an Atari 2600 video mod to allow the Atari to display a crisp, RF fuzz free picture on newer TVs. Over a thousand Atari video mods where produced by Parker from 2006 to 2011 and the mod is still made by other enthusiasts in the Atari community.
In 2006, Parker enrolled at The University of Texas at Austin as a Petroleum Engineer. After realizing electronics was his passion he switched majors in 2007 to Electrical and Computer Engineering. Following his previous background in making the Atari 2600 video mod, Parker decided to take more board layout classes and circuit design classes. Other areas of study include robotics, microcontroller theory and design, FPGA development with VHDL and Verilog, and image and signal processing with DSPs. In 2010, Parker won a Ti sponsored Launchpad programming and design contest that was held by the IEEE CS chapter at the University. Parker graduated with a BS in Electrical and Computer Engineering in the Spring of 2012.
In the Summer of 2012, Parker was hired on as an Electrical Engineer at Dynamic Perception to design and prototype new electronic products. Here, Parker learned about full product development cycles and honed his board layout skills. Seeing the difficulties in managing operations and FCC/CE compliance testing, Parker thought there had to be a better way for small electronic companies to get their product out in customer's hands.
Parker also runs the blog, longhornengineer.com, where he posts his personal projects, technical guides, and appnotes about board layout design and components.
Stephen Kraig
Stephen Kraig is a component engineer working in the aerospace industry. He has applied his electrical engineering knowledge in a variety of contexts previously, including oil and gas, contract manufacturing, audio electronic repair, and synthesizer design. A graduate of Texas A&M, Stephen has lived his adult life in the Houston, TX, and Denver, CO, areas.
Stephen has never said no to a project. From building guitar amps (starting when he was 17) to designing and building his own CNC table to fine-tuning the mineral composition of the water he uses to brew beer, he thrives on testing, experimentation, and problem-solving. Tune into the podcast to learn more about the wacky stuff Stephen gets up to.
Special thanks to whixr over at Tymkrs for the intro and outro!
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How Soft Are Your Diodes?
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