info card pcb
A pcb in the shape of a standard size credit card with rfid, contact information, and useful references/tools.
Total time taken: 9 hours
July 21st: Getting all the resources + schematic
I am following this tutorial loosely and choosing to use KiCad instead because I love it.
Ultralibrarian was used to get the symbol & footprint of the NFC IC onto KiCad.
For the NFC antenna, I found a KiCad forum post which a kind person has made some footprints.
Okay, it is a bit small, so I went ahead and generated my own nfc antenna with a script I found.
python antGen.py -f card_nfc -n 5 -l 45 -w 30 -c 0.5 -s 0.5 -d 0 -m 0.5 -t 3
Total time spent: ~5 hours
July 22nd: Footprints and Custom Silkscreen
I decided that my info card was going to look a little diy ish. I would be using Krita and handwriting 99% of my graphics for my pcb. It turned out okay.
On the back side, i put some useful/common footprints for me to reference to later on when designing more pcbs. I don't think copper pads on top of an nfc antenna would be great, so i made sure to avoid placing any directly on its path. I also hand drew some graphics on the back too.
My info card should be done now, and is ready for fabrication!
Total time spent: ~4 hours
July 23rd: Price Shortening
I am importing my fabricated files from KiCad into JLCPCB to see how much it costs. My goal is to be under $50 to fit the grant. This is also technically july 22nd but time flies :shrug:
Tariffs are also really a pain.
I changed the PCBA quantity from 5 to 2. It made a difference.
I realized i have an unnecessary extended part, so i will go ahead and use a smaller LED.
I really cant do anything else. For safety reasons and the nature of this being a business card, I chose Lead Free HASL which added +$1.3 USD.
Everything else is made as cheap as I could. * 2x instead of 5x PCBa are being fabricated * All components are basic except for one extended (the NFC IC suggested by the guide) * No other addons
There are no coupons available for me, even the ones that the customer support suggested did not work.
Sadly, I will have to pay the 9 dollars out of pocket.
Total time spent: ~2 hours