[dorkbotpdx-blabber] LED breakout boards?

[montyg at bittybot.com]

Hans,

When I make small circuit boards, I group a bunch together on a single  
panel and pay a little extra for tab-routing (routing around each  
board but leaving tabs between boards to hold them all together) or  
scoring (cutting a v-groove between boards) so they can be easily  
broken apart.  If you're panelizing a single board size, then scoring  
is probably the best option; if you want to mix a couple different  
sized boards on a single panel, then you will probably need to do  
tab-routing.  Scoring is only possible when the cuts go from panel  
border to panel border, unless the fab does skip-scoring, but that has  
other limitations.

I haven't tried any of the above through SunStone yet, but through  
Advanced Circuits (www.4pcb.com), it's usually ~$500 for a lot that  
gives me ~3-6 ~10"x10" panels.

So that's ~4,000 0.3x0.5" boards at 12.5 cents each.  If you haven't  
ordered through Advanced Circuits before, and you can convince them  
you're a business, then you can get $500 off your first order  
(essentially it's free.)

If do want to panelize, check out GerbMerge -- a Python program for  
panelizing a bunch of Gerbers.

Monty

Quoting Donald Delmar Davis <ddelmardavis at gmail.com>:

> Hans,
>
> It sound like you need to design around a breakaway design your prices
> will go down significantly.
> You should hit up monty for some advice.
> Mr goodson you have any advice?
>
> Don;
>
> On May 12, 2009, at 11:34 AM, Hans Lindauer wrote:
>
>> How tiny: as small as possible using a 3mm LED and a standard-sized  
>>   resistor, looks like maybe .3"x.5".  Or maybe a little bit  
>> longer,   with a mounting hole that could be broken away.
>> How cheap: <= a quarter each.
>> How many: I could use about a hundred.
>>
>> I went to Sunstone's site, and it looked like I could get something  
>>   made for somewhere in the neighborhood of 13 cents (15 cents with  
>>   the breakaway hole).  If I make 5000 of them.
>>
>> Anybody else in the market for these things?
>>
>> -Hans
>>
>> Eric Garner wrote:
>>> How tiny? How cheap? How many?
>>>
>>> Sent from my iPhone
>>>
>>> On May 12, 2009, at 12:20 AM, Hans Lindauer    
>>> <armatronix at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Does anyone have a source for tiny, cheap PCBs that will accept an  LED,
>>>> a resistor, and a pair of wires?
>>>>
>>>> Thanks,
>>>> -Hans
>>
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