What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?
This week I made significant progress on the PCB design process. I successfully completed the component capture phase in Altium, finalizing the selection of all major components including the NMOS transistors I identified last week and the power management ICs. I spent considerable time verifying that all component footprints in Altium match the actual available parts to avoid any manufacturing issues down the line.
I also obtained assembly quotes from three different PCB fabrication houses and made the decision to go with a hybrid assembly approach – having the fab house handle the fine-pitch surface mount components while I’ll manually assemble the through-hole components. This strikes a good balance between reliability and cost considerations.
The preliminary schematic design is now complete and I’ve begun the PCB layout phase. I’ve established the board outline based on our mechanical constraints and started placing the critical components like the power management section and the main switching transistors. The layout is progressing according to the hand-drawn sketch I developed last week, with some minor optimizations for better signal routing.
I also coordinated with Apollo this week to ensure the PCB design aligns with the software interface requirements and timing constraints we discussed during our brainstorming sessions.
Is your progress on schedule or behind? If you are behind, what actions will be taken to catch up to the project schedule?
My progress remains on schedule. The component selection and preliminary schematic phases were completed as planned, and I’m now transitioning into PCB layout on track with our project timeline.
What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?
Next week I plan to:
- Complete the PCB layout and routing in Altium
- Run design rule checks (DRC) and resolve any violations
- Generate and review the manufacturing files (Gerbers, drill files, pick and place files)
- Finalize the hybrid assembly plan and coordinate component ordering
- Begin preparation for the PCB fabrication submission to meet our manufacturing timeline
The goal is to have the PCB design fully ready for fabrication by the end of next week so we can maintain our hardware development schedule.