Nairobi 2nd OSHW meetup

After a many month hiatus we finally put together the 2nd Nairobi Open-source hardware meetup. This time we were at the Tav Irish Pub near Nairobi Garage on Waiyaki way. The pub was chosen due to proximility to Nairobi garage and possible use of that venue. As it turned out none of us were memebers paying the $60 per-month fee so we ended up co-opting the pub in Chicago 3H fashion.

PCB Lineup

I had collected PCB's over the last few month from Aisler, OSHPark and PCBWay all shipped to Kenya from Germany, US and China respectively. So we lined up to try various soldering techniques on 0603 Jellybeans and some 20pin TSSOP IC's.

Soldering Demo

The techniques we we tried were the tack, finish and reflow one using the iron and an experimental one with paste and dry-iron I had picked up recently. I didn't have a temperature profile controller for the dry-iron method. So we were just going to wing it by the eye.

Part Placement

We pasted up the boards using screwdrivers and tweezers. Started the reflow till the parts settled. Then simply turned off the iron. I am sourcing a K-Type thermocouple and SSR from KTechnics to get a better handle on this for next time. However the dry-iron does reach sufficient temperature for leaded solder reflow.

Dry iron reflow

By the end of the session we had assembled x2 CS5464 Breakouts. Next step from here will be suitable MicroPython and Arduino drivers to ensure these things actually work. We had a lot of fun over the meetup and I hope to continue having these sessions. Next time one of the participants has promised to bring his Weighbridge Automation and IoT set-up.

Scavenging a Coffee Machine

Following the meetup I have been hunting for accessories to make the dry-iron reflow less of a fire hazard and more controllable. (Un)fortunately the coffee machine at work has been fried by the spikes prevalent in the grid in Kenya (especially during the rainy season), so I have a spare K-type thermocouple I can work into the build. I have also co-opted a tissue holder we had on our dining table to stabilize the inverted iron during reflow.

Stand of opportunity

Onwards to the next Meetup.