Friday, March 29, 2013

LaunchPad- Proto Plate from Ponoko

One of the things that has irritated me when I am working on my LaunchPad and using a breadboard is how both seem to move around a lot...
which is why I wanted to find something to "fix" both down for a cleaner look-feel. 





So, I had a few of these "protoplates" made-- I fell in love with the one from AdaFruit for the BeagleBone and really wanted one for the LaunchPad and had some made.

(I have to thank Bart, if he's on here, for really making my first Ponoko trial-run so smooth). 


2013-03-29 07.44.23



So here is where you can order the sheet: http://www.ponoko.com/design-your-own/products/launchpad-proto-plate-9765 
It's 14 total plates on the Plastic- Acrylic- Clear- 3mm- P3 sized sheet, which comes out to be about 3.50 for each plate- total about 46.50 (Bart had free shipping since he's a regular user at Ponoko). 


LaunchPadBaseLayout-[Converted]


I'm sure there is a more efficient way to arrange these to get more on the same sheet (there was a lot of extra plastic that wasn't used).
This was a trail run for me. 

It comes in a large sheet, where you only need to pull off your plate

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I left the backing on the plate--




Added the breadboard:


these breadboards from Mouser (I get them in packs of 10 so it comes out to be about 4.95 a piece)





The hardest part was to figure out how to connect the LaunchPad to the sheet.


Even though it's nice that the rubber feet were already included... it turned out to be inconvenient.
The BeagleBone and the Arduinos have screws that allow you to use standoffs. 
In this case after trying:
hot glue, epoxy, these scrapbooking "zots" (super strong adhesive tapes in dot shape) and double stick tape and found out that all of them don't adhere to the rubber well. 
What's worked is Crazy Glue. 




Put it on the LaunchPad, set it down and let it dry... 



then I peeled off the backing. 



I'll get to test these in a workshop soon, but so far I like them, but plan on changing a few things. 
It's hard to know which direction is up...
I have two sleds and one is right handed and the other is left handed... I guess if I just removed the logo all together I could have it be either right or left handed 


This is what I think my next one will look like, but I'm completely open for any suggestions!
I'd prefer those to be on the discussion board here: 43oh Forum



Hope that's helpful, I've included the files to make the edits in my dropbox (it's in illustrator and the forum doesn't like the format for some reason). https://www.dropbox.com/sh/6tho7jrplryvyhl/PJAJ22XqpQ