Final Journal! Finished Repo, Submitting For Build Review.

Thanks everyone at Blueprint that made this project possible, I'm stoked that it actually works; see you all next time! now time to review some other people's devboards for three hours...

https://github.com/newtontriumphant/moonboard/blob/main/README.md

I also uploaded my demo to YouTube, check it out! :D

https://youtube.com/shorts/RiM_gK4lOYQ

Alrighty, that's all, see ya on the other side ;3

P.S. this step didn't take a full hour, but I've spent over three hours in one sitting getting this PCB soldered, coded, working, and demoed, so I'm just setting this to a full hour to make up for the time I spent coding and other related things that aren't journaled fully. If exact time is required, reduce this journal to 30 minutes. Thanks!

Soldered Headers, Flashed CircuitPython, Coded Demo

Admittedly, this solderjob isn't super, but for the blue turd of death I'm quite glad it didn't blow up! Plus, the board still works, so hats off to me, I guess!

After flashing CircuitPython, I wired and set up a bit of a demo to show the build team how it went!

Instead of a simple blink script, I went with a 2-against-3 polyrhythm, since it only seemed fitting.

I wrote the test code and confirmed it working, time to work on the GitHub!

IT WORKS!!!!

I was so scared that it wouldn't show up when I plugged it in, but thankfully, after just three seconds of waiting that made me want to reconsider my life decisions, the boot drive popped up!!! I'm going to flash CircuitPython to test the functionality of the onboard components, and then I'll make a circuit after soldering the headers.

Thank you Hack Club for making this possible <3

Fixed a few stupid DRC Errors!

I had the wonderful idea to not check DRC until AFTER I wired my board... bad idea... anyways, after taking a break for a few hours, I got to fixing all of my DRC errors. The board looks a lot cleaner now; I also wanted to add a mounting hole but ultimately ruled against it.

Routed The PCB.

You may notice that this is my first ever journal entry for any project to not have an exclamation mark in the title. There is a reason for that. This was a process that can only be described in one word: hell. I had to go through SO many revisions, fix SO many DRC errors, watch SO many tutorials, even ask my friend for help, but it's finally done, the PCB is routed, and I added everything I wanted to add. I've been working NON-STOP since the last journal, which was posted 8 hours ago, so unironically, this took me eight hours of my day... thankfully I had the day off, so I had time to focus solely on this.

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I must admit, I am insanely happy with this design. One day, I'll get this built :)

Started PCB, Aligned Components!

All the components are aligned (finally!) - now, I'll start wiring them; I hope this looks good, I really do like the way the components are oriented!

Assigned The Footprints!

I expected this process to be quite a bit worse - then I realized that I didn't have as many components on my board as I thought, and about halfway through I realized I could use shift to select multiple components to assign footprints to at the same time. ON TO THE PCB!!

Completed KiCad Schematic!

After a long and grueling few hours, the schematic is complete. While it probably wasn't the best way of doing it, I placed every single GPIO label by hand - I'm going to get some rest and tomorrow morning I'll define the project's footprints.

To differentiate my project from others, I also added an internal addressable LED on GPIO25, and a simple analog temperature sensor on GPIO22 (with a 1k resistor to prevent boom).

Started The KiCad Schematic!

It took me an unreasonable amount of time to figure out how to change the "polarity" of the labels (which end was wireable), but otherwise, I think that it's coming along very well! :D

Initial Brainstorming And Research

This will be my absolute first time making a custom devboard (or any SMD PCB), and I'm quite excited. I went with the RP2040, because, besides being my favorite chip of all times, it's extremely easy to work with, and I have a crap ton of experience programming for it.

I'll be using KiCad and roughly modeling the Devboard guide - but with a few of my own unique features.

I must admit, I was tempted to choose a non-conventional connection port (such as a plug instead of a receptacle), but I realized that that wouldn't be as portable nor as usable as my other projects.

The reason I'm making this project is because I need to farm tickets- I MEAN because I wanted KiCad experience :p