Discrepancies in Powerboard v9 manufacturing/assembly data

[Ajay Panagariya]

Hello F110 friends - 

Not sure who's attention this requires, but just wanted to share some strange things about the powerboard v9 files that I noticed while getting some boards manufactured on pcbway.com (minus some components that are unavailable due to covid/supply chain issues). Apologies for the length, I've done my best to include images to reduce the amount of reading.

Please note, I also posted this on the Slack channel but also posting it here in case folks run into the same issue I did,

For reference, all the files referred to in this post are here: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/1paAAmrVMGlvhv1ywrn51DmMieW0aIarS

The pdf of titled 'powerboard_v9_designators.pdf' shows B2 and B1 in the following configuration

But the file in the 'powerboard_v9_gerber.zip' that is called 'Pick Place for poweboard_v6.txt' shows B2 and B1 placement as the following (J1 and L1 included for sanity, to help orient the origin to the lower left of the designators image). In the coordinates in the file, B1 is on the left and B2 is on the right:

 B1 is on the left and B2 is on the right is the opposite of what is in the designators image. I noticed this because pcbway technicians sent me back the following image during assembly, asking me to verify orientation of the battery connector (clearly placed improperly when compared to the powerboard picture in the 'F1TENTH Powerboard V9.0 Data Sheet' file.

pcbway image:

Datasheet Image:

This further begs the question, why are all the gerber files labeled as v6 while the zip file

they're contained in, and all the documentation is labeled v9?

Are some of these files out of date or are he file names just carrying internal names that were never updated in the software files over the course of development?

I've just spent a few hundred dollars getting a few boards made, and I would hate for the

files to be wrong. My guess is its fine, but it's hard to be sure.

Thanks for the hard work, I know maintaining opensource projects is no easy task.

Also, I know halloween has past, but the last spooky bit I will add is the image preview I get when I click on the designators file in google drive shows B1 on the left and B2 on the right. My guess is it's cached somewhere in google's servers, but I guess at some point there there was a version with B1 on the left and B2 on the right.

-Ajay

[Jaroslav Klapálek]

Hello Ajay!

Thanks for info! I will tag Kim at Slack to look into it.

Just quick question -- where did you get this link to this?

Best,

J.

Dne sobota 13. listopadu 2021 v 0:54:21 UTC+1 uživatel apan...@gmail.com napsal:

[Ajay Panagariya]

Hi Jaroslav - 

That is a good question. Since I started working on this project I have been keeping copious notes of my own while reading through the forums. I want say I have seen it in more than once place, but at least one place I saw it was this thread:

https://f1tenth.discourse.group/t/powerboard-for-f1tenth-cars/66

Have I been using the wrong files? I have not been able to find a 'definitive' source for F1Tenth files on the official f1tenth.org website.

[Jaroslav Klapálek]

I don't say you are using wrong files, only that it is interesting to see v9, even though there is no, i.e., v7 :)

On the other hand, I was only aware about this one: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vQpeGA74hmfi7aZCqyUDgmA6UDSbyWWVRLzpCmqXuTEX1TZNTnYAlQf3Kv69imXkLvwF-V_q2LC5tEd/pubhtml?widget=true&headers=false#gid=718958730

(and some versions before, of course)

That can be found here: https://f1tenth.readthedocs.io/en/latest/getting_started/build_car/bom.html

J.

Dne sobota 13. listopadu 2021 v 18:57:18 UTC+1 uživatel apan...@gmail.com napsal:

[Kim Luong]

Hello,

These were/are a trial run of a newer protoboard. The naming conventions were typo in as the boards had to be rushed out. There may be a few samples still at Penn that you may be able to request. One thing to note is that when you order form the manufacturer and they send you the assembly image to check, make sure that the battery connectors are facing the correct orientation.

I no longer work for F1TENTH and cannot provide any further assistance on this.

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[Ajay Panagariya]

Hi Kim - Thanks for the clarification, I think I have managed to handle the manufacturing properly then. I did correct for the orientation when they sent me an assembly image.

Jaroslav, just to clarify - the v9 board is the one that is shown in the official build video, cued up here https://youtu.be/L-V-0zzkl10?t=1096 and pictured below (from the video). This board is clearly different from the v4 board layout.

In any case, my goal was to just build a functional car, which board I use hardly matters to me. It would however be good to get clarification as to which one the community recommends or supports. Thanks everyone for the feedback and historical notes, that helps to clarify some things.

v4 board different than above board in the build video for the car

[Wenchao Liu]

I am in the process of building the v4 board myself. I heard that v9 has surface mount components, which can be hard to solder. It seems to have more different parts too. Have you made one? It seems like you can have it assembled:  F1tenth power board assy - Share - PCBWay.

[Ajay Panagariya]

Hi Wenchao - I have a few extra v9 boards and am happy to provide them to you at cost (~$115 each plus shipping). They are more or less ready to go, you will need to mount the toggle switches though, but they are through-hole parts they are much simpler. Also missing is the Balancer port, which is a nice to have but not necessary. I can include some extra toggle switches if you want. The reason these aren't already mounted is when I dealt with this back in November the lead times for the switches and balancer ports was several months.

If you want my extra boards, feel free to reply directly to me or message me in the F110 Slack. I am using one of them now on my car, and haven't had any problems with it. Also, to answer your question, the link you provided is the same design I have (except in your link it looked like they also got a balancer port - though it's possible they added it themselves after delivery)

[Wenchao Liu]

Sorry about this late reply. For some reason, I didn't see a notification; I need to check on that.

The funny thing my order of the V4 version just arrived from China. The total is around $20 with 5 pieces. If you order here in America, it'd be around $30 for 3.

The rest of the components costs about $40.

 If you sell it without the switch, $115 is a good price.

Can we tell me how you made yours? I will be soldering my components on.

 

[Wenchao Liu]

[Ajay Panagariya]

Hi Wenchao - I ordered from PCBWay in China. I think a lot of the components have come down in price too, back in November/October supply chain issues were much worse. I let PCBWay do all the mounting of the components, I don't have those kinds of skills and don't have a strong desire to learn to solder surface mount components at my age :)

 Your board looks really good!

[Wenchao Liu]

Haha. Thanks. Why does it look "really good?"  I think it looks normal.

Soldering surface mount components is tricky. You can use an oven-like device or a hot air station. 

I actually might want your extra boards someday. Keep in touch.

I will try to post instructions on how to make one. I updated the sheet too, as some components were not available.

Why did you decide to go with V9? I heard the main difference is V9 has 5V output.

[Wenchao Liu]

I just heard that the Nano needs 5V. That'd be a good reason to use V9. However, why can't we just add a regulator for that in the V4, since we already have one that regulates down to 8V? How doable is that?

[Wenchao Liu]

Speaking of adding 5V output, what is the purpose of the 8V output? Maybe we can just replace the regulator, instead of adding one.

[Ajay Panagariya]

To be honest I can not remember why I went for the v9 board over the v4 board but I suspect it had something to do with the difficulty of sourcing even the most basic parts last October. Last October supply chains were still very distressed, it was difficult to get very very basic components.

I can't recall what I was thinking at the time, but I from a practical perspective the experience of getting a board manufactured and assembled in China was a more valuable experience to me than assembling the board myself (I've done this type of thing many times and I already know I am not great at it). The v9 board also let you switch from battery to wall plug, which is a nice feature for a test setup.

[Wenchao Liu]

Well, if supply chains were distressed, it should be more difficult to get the V9 board, because it has more components. However, I can see how it might be easier to have the V9 board done, as there's the pick-and-place file. V4 doesn't have surface mount components, so it is not as hard to solder. I hope to get a tutorial video on YouTube soon.

Your email showed in my email, so I can contact you that way. Did you get mine too?

Have you used the 8V output? If anything, I don't know why it's not 9V.

[Wenchao Liu]

Haha. Never mind. I just realized V9 doesn't have 8V, so it's weird that V4 does. I am so confused.

[Ajay Panagariya]

Yes, please feel free to reach out by email.

v9 board also had supply chain problems. You can see my spreadsheet where where I was tracking leadtimes from digikey https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1K7jcffQsXkS3m9sGZ6--rWEbe2hxWcRuJ2l3-2o8gKE/edit?usp=sharing

I had also bought a few parts on ebay in the hopes to get them faster, but they did not arrive for 2+ months. By the time they got to my house I had forgotten about them. Getting the board made with *most* of the parts took me ~2.5 months from realizing there were lead time issues to getting the boards delivered to my front door. In the end I still had to supply a few parts on my own (they didn't have toggle switches or balancer ports).

[Wenchao Liu]

Nice sheet. I have a similar one: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1tbXGLgL5GAHyR6L9F-SnwSzdjveUt-EyJ4-mb8ZAkkw/edit?usp=sharing. I am getting into automating the sheets, so I could get such information automatically. Man, it sounds so painful. Mine was quite easy.

Did you have to mail components to China? I thought PCBWay would have them.

I sent you an invite for Google Hangout.