Livingnote's PCB Lab

[livingnote]

Hey everybody,

I'm Lukas 

PCBs sucked me in back when I was about 12, and it kind of stuck. The idea that you can take a working
schematic and  turn it into a professional-grade device just by painting - drawing - was amazing to me. So I
set out to do that and now I make handmade Hispec PCBs for special true-to-vintage or ultra-sturdy builds.
Later then came front panel lasering and etching and I was well underway to designing gear.

Note when I say "designing gear" what I am referring to is the electronics packaging and PCB side of things-
front panels, enclosures, control boards, backplanes...what fits into what how and why. Circuit design is another
animal altogether 

Anyway, here are some things I was / am working on, for others and for myself:

Crush N Blend Wet/Dry Control

Kalkyl / SGS FET Compressor

My Little Beast SSL Compressor

Analogvibes Vari Mu Limiting Amplifier

Give me a holler if you need a PCB for something 

PCB Quotes & Ordering <– Click here to go directly to the PCB ordering page on the website, where you can upload your files and request a quote.

Here's the price list:

19ct/cm[size=9pt]2 Single Layer, 24ct/cm2 Dual Layer

4-8€ Setup Charge per board (sizes DIN A4 - A3), Single Layer, and 8-16€ Dual Layer

25€ Digital Setup Charge for documents that cannot be directly printed, e.g. converting Eagle or other CAD output
to pictures, or stuff like that in general (resolution issues etc).

Transparencies are retained indefinitely or for 5 years, whichever comes first.

5€ minimum board price.

Immersion Tin 1.50€/Board Side up to 200cm2, above it's 3€

No Silkscreen, Soldermask or HAL as of yet.

Direct manual Photo process, anything black and white can be etched. From JPG to BMP and PDF
there is no old copy of anything you find in a magazine or plan that you can not have made.

Reliable precision down to what in SMD would amount to TQFPs and Minimelfs.

Through plating with mechanical rivets, 20ct/piece.

Also there are on occasion additional charges for specialty cuts.

Quality: Bungard FR4 35µ MIL-grade base material with copper from Aurubis.

Product-ish stuff by me:

Crush-N-Blend

PCB with Rivets, Both Versions – 24€

Push-Pull on/off pot 2x10k lin (alpha) – 20€ including PCB with header positions for connecting to the CnB.

Postage and Packaging:

Unregistered International:

3.50€ up to 50g
5.40€ up to 500g

Registered International:

7.90€ up to 500g

Yeah, that's about it. If you have any other stupid ideas, let me know. 

Cheers

Lukas

 

[rock soderstrom]

Like! (The button is gone )

 

[livingnote]

Cheers

 

[Rochey]

Excellent! Welcome home!

 

[ddt]

Good to see you here again! 

 

[ruffrecords]

Cool stuff. Can you work from Gerbers?

Cheers

Ian

 

[livingnote]

Looking into Gerbv and CAM350 at the moment - does anyone know of any other good software
for converting Gerber to B/W bitmap and the other way round, vector DXF to Gerber?

 

[ruffrecords]

Looking into Gerbv and CAM350 at the moment - does anyone know of any other good software
for converting Gerber to B/W bitmap and the other way round, vector DXF to Gerber?

I use Gerbv for checking all my layouts before send them of to be fabricated. It can export layers as pdf, png, svg or postscript. Attached is a pdf of the top layer of the latest version of the Classic Solo PCB.

Gerbv runs very well under Linux but I have found the WIndows version to be plagued with nag screens etc.

Cheers

ian

 

[livingnote]

Ok cool - I see, no drill holes, that of course makes targeting a little harder. Would be good to learn
the various drill formats too to see if they can't be (relatively) easily converted to something vector-ish.

Ultimately for professional use though clawing my way through freeware and stuff is probably not going
to do it long term, but hey I am open for surprises.

 

[ruffrecords]

Ok cool - I see, no drill holes, that of course makes targeting a little harder. Would be good to learn
the various drill formats too to see if they can't be (relatively) easily converted to something vector-ish.

Ultimately for professional use though clawing my way through freeware and stuff is probably not going
to do it long term, but hey I am open for surprises.

Drill holes are on a separate layer (Gerber file). I just appended that one to show what a typical Gerber exported to pdf  looks like. Drill holes can be shown on the same pdf. The thing about the pdf is it prints actual size.

Cheers

Ian

Edit, I have attached another with drill holes shown.

 

[livingnote]

Alright, that's good. I guess you can do black and white exports too right?

Gonna see that I get some Linux installed here on a stick or something (god save the IT neighbors),
but even with GerbV here I do prefer PDFs because like you said, if the measurements are bang on
that way then that's one less thing that can screw up (and it saves time too). Guess I would have to
charge some kind of a small Gerber Conversion fee for direct Gerber input.

 

[ruffrecords]

Alright, that's good. I guess you can do black and white exports too right?

Yes, the colours are selectable in gerbv.

Cheers

Ian

 

[helterbelter]

Hi Lukas !

Good to see you back here !

 

[livingnote]

Taa

 

[Olegarich]

Pcb-s looks amazing!! Keep rockin'!

 

[JessJackson]

Hi Lukas,

How do we contact you?

Cheers

 

[livingnote]

You can contact me at diy (squiggly thing) livingnote.com

Or just click on my username on the left and in the drop-down menu, select email.

Please do NOT send me PM's unless you have no other recourse because the inbox fills up way too fast.

 

[Hobbyist]

Hi guys,

Just want to show my Gssl with the Crush-N-Blend installed.
Thanks Lukas for the help and great work !

 

[hodad]

I just got some boards in that Lukas did for me--lovely work. He worked closely with me to make sure everything would turn out as expected and got the job done quickly. A great experience start to finish.

 

[livingnote]

Thanks everybody Hey what kind of trimmers are those? Big long things that look like they go way precise.