3D-Printed PCB Test Jig
While I write for Tindie, I also sell things on the JC Devices store. My most successful product is the EZ Fan2 board, which is meant to help control a simple fan (or any other small load) with Raspberry Pi devices and other logic-level inputs.
I test every board, and up until quite recently, this meant rearranging wires on an actual Raspberry Pi board to ensure it actually powered a fan. This isn’t that difficult, but doing this procedure over and over can be a hassle. So I did what any enterprising hacker would do, and made my own test jig!
The resulting device, as outlined in the video below, could be considered a straightforward bed of nails tester, with three pogo pins at the input through holes, and two at the output where the load (fan) would nominally go. A simple ATtiny board, meant to mount a pair of EZ Fan2s, runs a modified blink sketch so that when the device under test (DUT) hits the pogo pins, it blinks the LED.
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While one might argue that I likely spent more time on it than it will ultimately save, it makes me happy every time I use it. Perhaps the video will inspire ideas for your testing and/or manufacturing process. If you have a cool Tindie test jig, we’d love to hear about it. Ping us on Twitter @Tindie, or you can find me @JeremySCook.