Getting to the core

As I've now completed the Reprap'd gun casing I've turned my attention to assembling the Milestag RevH core module PCB. I got these delivered from Lasertagparts to a friend in the USA and brought them back with me whilst on a visit, which avoided significant postage fees (not sure why the postage is significant, they are small and light).

All the electronic components arrived in time for Christmas from Farnell, Mouser and DigiKey. I've had to buy a lot more bits than I require but I intend to make more than one unit (of course!).





I've not assembled any totally through hole PCBs for a while, my last 2 projects were surface mount but I have these to help me with the axial components:



They produce perfect, 90 degree, repeatable bends on axial leads thus:



Which significantly speeds up the assembly process.


I had an problem trying to order 2x3 and 2x2 0.1" headers required for the LCD interface on the PCB. I just could not get them so I doubled up a strip of single 0.1" header that I had lying around cut to 2 pieces of 1x3 and 2 pieces of 1x2.




Here is the assembled PCB:



The next step is to program the microcontroller.