Assembly and Testing

Assembly and Testing

Overview 

The assembly and testing of self-designed PCBs requires some extra equipment. Much of this has already been thought out on the Rapid Prototyping Elektronik page and in particular on the associated spreadsheet/list. I would like repeat some of the recommended items here. Another good reference for this is the Soldering Workshop presented by Binary Kitchen, Regensburg.

The kit for each attendee

• Lötstation
• Löt
• Schutzbrille
• Lötrauchabsaugung
• Metallschwamm
• Seitenschneider
• Pinzetten
• Drittehand
• Entlötpumpe und Entlötlitze
• ESD matte
• Lampe.

Advanced Gear

• Heißluftlötstation
• Reflow-ofen

Some of this equipment is already in ZAM. However, there is not enough to run any type of soldering workshop and the safety equipment is as yet not available - solder fumes extractor and safety glasses.

We could build our own Solder fume extractor. Binary kitchen have theirs as a kit. There are plenty of other examples on the Thingiverse. In my case, I created one from a PC cooling fan, an off-the-shelf case, a 12 V LED lamp and a flexible hose from a fire-lighter. I imagine we could come up with something in the middle.