Picstep stupid question

[daedalus]

I know this is going to sound dumb, but i am going through the parts list of the picstep v4 board, and each part has a reference #, does anyone know which supplier this is for?

The digikey and dontronics ones i have found, its all the others that i need help with.

I would rather get exactly the same parts, as i want to avoid any potential screwups with different part footprints.

[daedalus]

Ok, answering my own question, its jaycar electronics, who seem to be a great source of parts. Im in the UK, and jaycar have FAR better prices then farnell and RS.

Does anyone know an alternative source for LMD18245, as digikey are very overpriced. £10 from digikey UK vs $12 from digikey US, with a $60 shipping surcharge.

Does anyone sell kits of these boards, or bare pcbs, as its going to cost me about £30 each to get the pcbs done for this! At that price i might as well go buy a gecko drive, as it would be cheaper!

[santiniuk]

Hi,

A year or so ago I went through the same problem being in the U.K It really is annoying when you see the price differences.

Farnell was my source for the LMD's, not cheap and I think they have discontinued them now.

Not a lot of help I'm afraid but if your stuck getting the PIC's programmed just shout, I'll help you out no problem.

From what I have seen the Picstep is a great board.

Good luck on your hunt.

[b_cybe]

Personally I got most of the components from www.futurlec.com, there LMD18245 cost $9.90 and the shipping cost ain't too high either (though it may take a week or two before you receive...). Ordered both the LMDs and the PIC from them and have now constructed two (of total 3) PICstep wich is working...

[daedalus]

thanks for the offer santiniuk, but i should be alright as i have an icd2 at work.

b cybe: cheers for the link, that sites great.

where did you both get your pcbs done? did you do them yourselves?

also do you know the dimensions of the boards?

[b_cybe]

The length is 82 mm and the width is 105 mm of the PICstep (so it 82mmx105mm). I also ordered the PCB for the PICstep from futurlec, costs $33 for three PICstep boards plus shipping (you could propably combine shipping with the components if you order from them). Personally I didn't because of the way the customs operate in Norway.
The only problem I had ordering the PCB whas that they meant that the drill sizes in the gerber files were to small for the components, and since I didn't know how to change that I just said that I took the responcibility (guess this were to make sure that I didn't complain if the drill sizes were to small). And sure when I received the PCB some of the holes were to small so I had to get a 0.8mm and 1mm drill bit and manually enlarge some of the holes. Personally I didnt order any silk screen or solder mask to save cost (the boards comes tinned so there should be no problem with corrosion).

[santiniuk]

daedalus,

You won't go wrong with the ICD2. I have recently been playing with one also at work. I still need to learn more on the integration of it with the mplab suite in debugging mode but overall I think it's a great device.

Please disregard my comment about the LMD's and Farnell. I must have been dreaming it as they are showing in stock.... I suspect I got muddled up with another device I used recently.

For pcb's I use the photo resist method however I do admire some of the posts on here showing the milled boards.

Good luck !

[daedalus]

I just checked farnell, and they are ten pounds a piece too, vs $10 from the US. As i will probably get my boards done from futurlec.com, i will probably get the parts from there too.

b_cybe: did you get all the parts from futurlec.com? i cant seem to find any MKT caps on the site, did you use alternative parts? Also what version of the pcb did you make? I only ask in the hope that there may be a newer version with correct hole sizing, as editing this will be a pain.

[b_cybe]

I am pretty sure MKT is the same as metallised polyester film capacitors, I self used them when contructing the PICstep but I did not order them from futurlec (mostly because I forgot... so had to order them from a local store instead).

I made PICstep v4.0 and I think the problem still is there, see http://bildr.no/view/9789 for a screenshot of the drillsizes. As you can see the smallest drill size is 0.020 wich is 0.5mm while I think it should have been around 0.8mm. See http://bildr.no/view/9791 for a image wich shows wich components drill sizes are too small... personally I "hand drilled" the holes that needed to be bigger with either 0.8mm bit or a 1mm bit... I also enlarged the holes for the wires so that i could use (not sure if that was necessary though...).

Don't know if anybody else have had this problem?