Test fixture for Jackpot PCB





0.9mm endmill, helical drilled out 1.1mm holes,

How cute is this thing!? Now I have some soldering to do.

8 Likes

Plugs are for suckers!!!

Need a mount, some clamps, a lot of soldering, and blamo slam a little test code through it and 100% test each Jackpot. :crossed_fingers:

5 Likes

That’s a great start! Plus using one of your own machine designs to build fixtures for the board you designed to make your machine better- that’s got to be a great feeling.

What’s your plan for the test flow? Jackpot board only, or Jackpot with ESP32?
Can you do all the programming while on the fixture?
What software and test IO are you using to check out the GPIOs?

2 Likes

Currently I fully assemble them flash and test $ss on every single board on power supply power no USB. Every 10th board or so I plug in steppers and move them. I randomly test input pins as well.

With this fixture I will run test gcode from a sd card to move all five steppers both ways, trigger each output, and probably make a bank of buttons to test the inputs. I might also test the module header gpio with some leds as well.

If we hit some point that I find zero issues I will drop down the testing a bit.

3 Likes

Pre-Covid I met a guy at a hacking conference that fell into a rabbit hole on pick-and-place machines and has gifted the world an open-source pick and place machine (called OpenPNP) to use for PCB production.

During the course of it he built a testing station for his PCBs as well, but harnessed a pre-made device and modified it - maybe there are some insights to gain to alleviate some of your manual testing or just enjoy a nerd nerding out about how cool things can be :smiley:

I did build something way smaller than this to test circuit boards of coffee machines and these pogo pins will make your life so much easier!! Best of luck with your testing and building :slight_smile:

4 Likes

Very cool. You might consider some alignment pegs (3d printed, or using studs) so that you don’t need to line up the electrical pins. If you make the alignment pegs taller than the pogo pins and cause them to stick through your mounting holes on the Jackpot, that would help the boards come into alignment before they come near the pogo pins.

1 Like

I assumed that’s what these holes were for:
image

2 Likes

Oh, good point, that could be it. I assumed those were to mount the test rig to the table.

1 Like

could be… hard to say now.

I thought it looked like they lined up with the Jackpot mount holes

image

But hard to tell for sure at that angle

1 Like

Yup back up alignment pins. I am going to try a corner alignment fixture first. I if need more I will add the pins

4 Likes

Ryan might know that guy :slight_smile::

I love watching him. He so much passion.

2 Likes

Oh, wow. Haha. Well… certainly a connection I did NOT make before from just reading the name :joy: Oh well… It makes perfect sense.
Even better that Ryan already has personal connection to him and can tap into his knowledge :joy:

And I urgently need to listen to all other episodes of that podcast… Thanks for pointing that out.

3 Likes