I could have sworn I joined this forum years ago.
But I guess not.
Anyway, I'm sure at least a few of you DIY'ers have seen me around the other DIY forums.
I live in a little place in the middle of nowhere called Stagecoach, Nevada.
Its about 30 miles east of Carson City, Nevada.
And about 60 miles or so from BEAUTIFUL Lake Tahoe.
About me?
Well, I'm gonna take the lazy route there and insert a post I made on TGP when someone questioned my qualifications when I degooped a pedal "made" by a suspicious "builder":
Quote
Ok, brief history lesson for you, not that it matters or is relevant.
BTW, how is it relevant as far as de-gooping a PCB goes?
I didn't realize that I needed to be an EE to de-goop a board.
1981, I took a 2 month course at a local occupational center for electronic assembly. That class was taught by a retired NASA technician.
Over the years I worked for numerous companies as either an electronic assembler or technician (learned the tech end of things on the job and some classes at Pierce Junior college and CSUN (California State University Northridge).
I also read books and did the hobbyist thing as well.
Over the years I worked primarily for military contractors and sub-contractors doing PCB assembly, cable/wire harness assembly, Operated and maintained wave solder equipment.
I also worked at NASA/JPL as a technician doing flight system PCB assembly, Ground Support Cable Assembly, Polymerics technician (Working with epoxies).
During my time as a Polymerics Technician I also de-gooped PCB's.
Yes, I de-gooped PCB's for NASA/The US Government and those PCB's probably cost more than the house you live in.
I worked on the Galileo Space probe, early Mars rover, several space shuttle sub-assemblies and other stuff I'm not allowed to talk about, EVER.
That takes us up to about 1988 and I think that's babbling enough for now.
Did I pass the audition?
Edit:
To continue on...
I built my first pedal from a kit I got at Radioshack around 1981.
It was a reverb pedal.
Of course, me being the tinkerer I am and suffering from what RG Keen calls "BUMS" (Blind Urge To Modify Syndrome), I immediately started to modify it.
Even though I had no clue what I was doing.
Most of the stuff I build is on PCB's which I etch myself.
I occasionally do builds on perfboard or turret board.
Heres a turret board build I did a few years ago:
http://smg.photobucket.com/user/CodeMonk/library/Builds/Baltic-Birch_StompBox?sort=3&page=1
I've been using DIYLC for quite awhile.
And I've been playing around with and learning Eagle off an on for a little while, but still have LOTS to learn about it.
Madbean's library is a wonderful addition to the Eagle library.
I like Rush. Alex Lifeson is my guitar god.
And Southern Rock.
Edit2:
And I noticed that there are a few people from Fresno on here.
I saw my 2nd ever concert in Fresno (my first concert was Johnny Cash at the Los Angeles Forum in 1970).
The Outlaws opening for Boston (The Outlaws made Boston look like a bar band with stage fright) in 1976 or 1977.
I also went to high school in Mariposa.
Blah,blah,blah. So........ you live in a place called Stagecoach, you've worked for NASA, on projects you're never allowed to talk about, and... you're a fan of Johnny Cash. What else have you got? Madbean forum is pretty picky!!!!!!!!!!!
I like turtles
CodeMonk! Good to see you here, man.
I remember that TGP post during the Vertex stuff :P
Welcome CodeMonk!
Josh
Welcome to the gang
Thanks guys.
In between messing with LTSpice, Eagle, and looking at cat gifs, I've been browsing the forum tonight.
Some pretty interesting stuff around here.
I think I'm gonna like it here.
I haven't had a chance to do much building or designing lately due to several major projects around the house/property that's been kicking my ass.
Been doing some stuff for Smallbear, but had to put that on hold until I get some of these projects around here taken care of.
There is some light at the end of the tunnel though and hopefully, I should be able to get back to doing what I enjoy doing soon.
Edit:
Crap, its almost 6am, I should get some sleep.
Welcome to the forum! That's some background you've got there... I bet it could be put to good use :)
Have fun anyway.
P.D.: I like turtles too, have one called "Rey Mysterio" or "simpleza" (spanish word for simplicity). She lives in my gf's country house now.
Quote from: midwayfair on April 03, 2015, 05:10:51 AM
CodeMonk! Good to see you here, man.
I remember that TGP post during the Vertex stuff :P
Me too. I remember those posts being steady and reasonable; always a good thing in maelstrom like that.
Welcome to the forum, CM.
Once you seen one Galileo space probe, you seen them all.... :P
Impressive.
Welcome to the forum CodeMonk!
Welcome!
Edit: what is the average weight of an unladen swallow?
Quote from: Leevibe on April 03, 2015, 08:12:57 AM
Welcome!
Edit: what is the average weight of an unladen swallow?
African or European?
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
All of a sudden, a legit rocket scientist appears! :o
Welcome on board Sir!
Rej
Code is the real deal, I am delighted that he is here! Welcome.
Good to have ya, looking forward to it.
Welcome to the forum! I you are interested in eagle, check out all the great info here, including a great parts library and all of JMKs video tutorials (these are a must watch and will get you 90% there overnight):
http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?board=45.0
Salut capitan!!
Quote from: Stomptown on April 03, 2015, 08:53:54 AM
Welcome to the forum! I you are interested in eagle, check out all the great info here, including a great parts library and all of JMKs video tutorials (these are a must watch and will get you 90% there overnight):
http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?board=45.0
Thanks all you great guys/gals/turtles/cats/etc.
And thanks for the kind words Brian.
I checked out one of JMK's Eagle videos last night.
Quite informative.
He presents the info quite well.
BTW, here is one of the folders on my system:
C:\Guitar\Eagle\Tutorials
Size: 3.60 GB (3,868,232,085 bytes)
Size On Disk: 3.60 GB (3,871,449,088 bytes)
1,243 Files, 52 Folders
Videos, PDF, HTML formats.
Although some of the videos are dupes, MP4 converted to AVI (or the other way around).
Haven't had much time, especially lately, to watch or read most of them yet though.
I hope to get to it soon though.
And it looks like I have a few more videos to add/watch/study courtesy of JMK.
I've of course got the Madbean library, just grabbed the 2014 library last night (Boy was I out of date :) ), as well as the Gaussmarkov library.
And I've also got mmoltertx I can grill for info now and then.
He's pretty damn good with Eagle as far as I can tell.
Pretty smart guy.
Edit:
And I wish I were a rocket scientist.
All that stuff fascinates me.
I didn't design any of it, I just put it together.
JPL was a REALLY, REALLY cool place to work.
I've also built radar detectors, automated sprinkler systems, AV systems, thermal printers, and all sorts of stuff I can't remember.
It was the 80's when I got started with electronics and I was living in the San Fernando Valley.
There were Zillions of electronics manufacturers down there.
If you could solder, there were jobs to be had on damn near every corner.
Hell, at one time I was working day shift at one place (7:00am - 3:30pm), swing shift at another (5:30pm - 2:00am), and 12 hour shifts on Saturdays and Sundays at another place.
Welcome to the board Code. I'm one of the people that is stuck here in Fresno. Small world for sure.
Cody
Quote from: selfdestroyer on April 06, 2015, 09:46:47 AM
Welcome to the board Code. I'm one of the people that is stuck here in Fresno. Small world for sure.
Cody
Noticed in your sig you did a PCB tutorial.
I did one myself a few years ago.
I've posted it on a few forums.
Heres a dropbox link to a PDF of it if you are interested:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/70950813/CodeMonks-Buillding-your-own-PCB-tutorial.pdf
Theres an updated version here: http://www.mylespaul.com/forums/pedals/319688-tutorial-making-your-own-pcb.html
5th post has a picture of an updated etching "tank".
Quote from: CodeMonk on April 07, 2015, 06:10:09 AM
Quote from: selfdestroyer on April 06, 2015, 09:46:47 AM
Welcome to the board Code. I'm one of the people that is stuck here in Fresno. Small world for sure.
Cody
Noticed in your sig you did a PCB tutorial.
I did one myself a few years ago.
I've posted it on a few forums.
Heres a dropbox link to a PDF of it if you are interested:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/70950813/CodeMonks-Buillding-your-own-PCB-tutorial.pdf
Theres an updated version here: http://www.mylespaul.com/forums/pedals/319688-tutorial-making-your-own-pcb.html
5th post has a picture of an updated etching "tank".
Thanks for sharing your process. Its amazing how many ways there are to come to the same ending goal.
Cody
You should consider trying the bubbling part of that.
While you do have to keep a close eye on things, it really speeds up the process regardless of what chemicals you use.
Great to see you here, what an introduction! This place is getting richer and brighter by the minute...
OK, guess who is back.
I got such a nice welcome before, especially from Brian, I kinda feel guilty about disappearing from everything DIY, pedal, and electronics related.
About 5 years ago, I was getting a bit overworked. Mostly doing pedal and amp repairs, developing and making prototype PCBs for small companies, and everything except WORKING ON MY OWN PROJECTS.
Letting my personal projects, that I had spent quite a long time planning, designing etc. take a back seat, along with the usually BS that comes along with age, health issues and family problems, well, I needed to step away from everything for awhile.
About 3 years ago, I sort of restarted my life. Got a steady job (although currently on medical leave, hopefully just due to pinched nerves). Been working at the Tesla Gigafactory for the last 3.5 years. Mostly working on the Powerwall product. Occasionally they put me in charge of some new area to get it going. No extra pay, but they pretty much let me run the area the way I want and leave me be. That's worth a few extra bucks an hour to me. 12 hours shifts kinda suck. But alternating 3 and 4 day weekends are cool. I usually spend my first day off sleeping.
Anyway, for the last 2 months, I have been continuing work on a project I dropped 5 years ago, that I had spent almost 2 years developing. Yeah, Its a pedal. I had to learn a lot of new things when I started this thing. Bought books, read this and that, and probably annoyed R.G. Keen a bit :). And I had to do other crap, not just that. I did need to eat.
I'm not gonna give any details about it yet, but I do hope to have some prototypes built within the next month. I have almost all the parts (just need knobs). and I have to move a wall here to give me some working room.
All prototype boards are already designed in DIYLC and I will etch those as soon as I have some working room.
I started working with Diptrace about a week ago. I like it way better than Eagle so far. I have my main board designed in it already.
And speaking of Diptrace...
@rullywowr you still have your 3D Diptrace library?. All links i found here are dead :(
I hope to be popping in here now any then as time permits.
And I no longer live in that little place called Stagecoach. I live about 60 miles away from there in a place called Wadsworth, Nevada.