Many exquisite open source hardware projects are done by an electronic engineer and PCB design engineer with Altium Designer as a R & D tool in daily work. The performance of a new generation of engineers who are thriving is also very bright. The University of New Zealand, the University of Canterbury, the University of New Zealand, Jared Sanson, recently completed an amazing open source project - open source OLED watch.
Jared sprouted this idea because he has an OLED display, but there is no way to drive it. Later, when he was designed with Altium Designer, he suddenly realized that it could not waste this display. So he decided to transform the OLED display as a smart watch platform and install low power Bluetooth and various sensors.
When this project is started, Jared decided to use the PIC24F microcontroller because it has sufficient processing capabilities to drive the OLED display. He hopes that the size of the PCB can be perfectly adapted to the size of the OLED display, which has brought huge challenges for the design. Since the components that can be used are strictly limited, he has to use 0603 packageless passive devices as much as possible. At the same time, since the device without welding BGA package, Jared turns to select a QFN package chip that is easy to weld. In order to reduce costs, Jared must limit the structure of the board within 2 layers, thereby causing a wiring on the PCB board. The last few wirings spent on the PCB board, which is almost as long as Jared.
During the project, since Jared's school network cannot access Altium Content Vault, Jared cannot easily obtain applicable components, so he decides to make most of its components first, and then perform PCB design. When receiving the first version of the PCB, Jared found that the microcontroller's package size is small due to the forgetting to check the package of the chip used, and the package size of the microcontroller is small and must be redesigned.
Although all kinds of challenges, Jared believes that Altium Designer has brought him a lot of convenience in the project. He believes that the 3D PCB view of Altium Designer is very easy to help the designer clearly see how each component is impact on the overall thickness on the PCB board, and how the battery below the PCB will be installed. Jared uses a simple 3D body to create a simple components such as buttons and SMD passive devices, and import the STEP model to the complex components such as USB sockets to accurately install the USB socket to the PCB.
This open source OLED watch project takes a Jared one year, and now it has been able to really show time, and track his university curriculum. Jared plans to continue to modify the schematic to reduce power consumption, and simplify design make it thinner and gradually improve this project by solving the current problems. Jared also plans to raise funds to turn the project into assembled kits. For the enthusiasm of open source hardware, Jared issued project-related PCBs and firmware in the way of open source hardware licenses, making it easy for other engineers to learn and use in their design projects.
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