DigiKey
3 HN recommenders · recommended in 3 months, 2020–2022
11:10 · 518K views · Apr 3, 2018
Shawn Hymel of DigiKey introduces KiCad and explains how printed circuit boards are manufactured. It is the first part of a beginner series that builds a 555 badge project.
Recommended as a friendly starting point for people who want to learn PCB design with free tools.
3 comments from Hacker News
I am a MechEng by background and taught myself how to design PCBs. Disclaimer I am not a pro but have put a couple of boards into production and have worked closely with pros. > Do professionals do a lot of breadboarding? Depends on the complexity but yes there is often a fair bit of breadboarding, usually differnt parts of the circuit in isolation. So first step is (if you haven't already) to get familiar with the basics of electronics and the best place to start with that is The Art of Electronics[1] I would then recommmend checking out DigiKey's guide to KiCAD [2] which gives you everything you need to get started with a good software package that is user by pros. It has it's quirks but at least you don't have to pay for it (or get involved with Autodesk in anyway). Choose a simple project to get started. Breadboard it with a development board (e.g. ESP32 DevKit[3]) and then make a schematic of that using you CAD. You can then turn that into a PCB (again using the DigiKey guide) or you cna just try to recreate the dev board. Arduinos are pretty easy to recreate using through hole components. Also don't be afraid to just straight copy things and tweak them to your needs. From there you can find a vendor to get your PCBs on PCB shopper [4]. You can easily get 5 boards delivered to you in under a week for $40 including shipping. Also if you can afford it the going rate of a top EE in the UK is around £500 a day (you can probably find some decent ones for £250). Get in touch w
I'd second that unless you really just want to make a PCB from a simple breadboard design with simple parts once and never do it again. But the few hours learning Kicad will be much more rewarding. Here's one of many tutorials: this video
Digikey actually makes really nice YouTube tutorials on how to use KiCAD: this video When I had to design a board I used that.