Random Thoughts at ESawdust

Designing New Chameleon 1 Faceplates

elandon@esawdust.com — 2010-09-07T15:07:38-06:00

Synopsis: The Chameleon 1 enclosure system has been on the market a little over a year now and there has been some good feedback and some trends I’m seeing with it. One of those trends is many customers are buying it for electronic hardware for which we have no pre-fabbed faceplate. I think that’s a great sign as they see value in the enclosure baseplate and shell itself but yet it makes me want to find all the different faceplate needs we’re not covering and start offering as many as we can afford to make.

One of the comments I’ve heard about the Chameleon enclosure is that it would be nice to have a faceplate with just DB9 connectors. Another comment was it would be nice to have a lid with no mounting flanges (more on that later.)

I’ve also learned of some customers who have machined mesh holes in the lid to provide some ventilation for their project.

So, with those comments in mind, I designed a variation of DB9 faceplates and one perforated faceplate. I hope to take at least 2 or 3 of these designs to metal within the next 2-4 weeks. If you would like to influence which designs go to metal please contact me and I’ll certainly take it into consideration.

This is a 3D rendering of a selection of faceplates I’m considering offering soon.

[I did these designs in Alibre Design 12.1 Expert. Rendering done using Keyshot 2 ray-tracing engine.]

If you have ideas for other faceplate designs we should do, please let us know. Same for the Crib for Arduino - I expect we’ll be offering a DB9 faceplate for the Crib product line also (FEZ Domino and Arduino / Arduino Mega), but I don’t have a time-frame yet for it.

The requested Chameleon lid with no mounting flanges is already in design mode and we’ll be releasing that in approximately 4-5 weeks.

We keep expanding the Chameleon enclosure system to make it more functional all the time and appreciate all our customer’s feedback. Stay tuned...there’s more interesting attachments coming that are on the drawing board right now.

Landon Cox
www.ESawdust.com

A Case for Beagle Board xM

elandon@esawdust.com — 2010-08-24T07:15:42-06:00

[8/24/2010] - Today ESawdust released a new enclosure / case for the Beagle Board xM - the Dog House for Beagle Board xM

The Beagle Board xM is a brand new open system featuring the ARM Cortex-A8 with a TMS320C64x DSP Core, laptop like performance, and all the peripheral connections you’d expect on a PC such as USB and Ethernet - all this embedded in the form factor of a slice of bread.

ESawdust first came out with the original Dog House for Beagle Board back in March 2010 and it was the first commercially available metal enclosure (case) for Beagle Board. We’re happy to announce another ESawdust first, Dog House for Beagle Board xM, is now immediately available directly from ESawdust or soon to be available through Sparkfun and other authorized distributors as well.

As with previous Beagle Boards, the enclosure challenge is how to enclose a board with connectors on three sides in a way that produces the fewest seams, is easy to assemble and really protects the fragile connectors such as the audio jacks. The Dog House for Beagle Board xM three-piece design meets all of these requirements.

Additionally, the Dog House provides built in standoffs so alignment of the board is perfect every time and there is no drilling required.

Assembling the Dog House for Beagle Board xM is very fast - watch the video below to see how it’s done:

If you have questions or would like to resell this product, please contact us:

Landon Cox
www.ESawdust.com

Thinking Behind "Dog House for Beagle Board"

elandon@esawdust.com — 2010-03-09T07:45:56-07:00

We’re pleased to announce the availability of a custom enclosure designed specifically for the Beagle Board - we’re calling it the Dog House. It’s available now on the ESawdust store and will be available shortly through Sparkfun as well. Here’s a quick shot of the components included in the package:

Challenges to Beagle Board Enclosure Design

This enclosure was one of the more challenging designs we’ve made because the Beagle Board has eight external connectors packed on 3 sides of the 3” X 3” board. We went through three production-quality prototypes and destroyed one Beagle Board before we got it right.

Challenge #1 - Fragile Connectors

The Beagle Board audio connectors are surface mounted. Unfortunately, this makes them very susceptible to damage and is the very reason why an enclosure for Beagle Board is so important. It’s also why we felt strongly this enclosure needed to help reinforce the audio jacks as much as possible.

Our original goal was to make a two-piece design where the top-lid would bend or stretch over the connectors and then bend back as it’s fastened to the base. Great concept, we put it in CAD (Solidworks) and we had one made by Advantage Manufacturing here in Colorado Springs. Bad reality though: in trying to place the lid over the audio connectors, we ripped them and their traces right off the board. Minus one Beagle Board.

Setbacks represent opportunities. We knew, like Edison, one way in which wouldn’t work so we were farther along than before but down one Beagle Board and the design and manufacturing expenses of the prototyped two-piece design.

Wrapping the Beagle Board safely and securely was our #1 objective and this is the reason we went to a three-piece design.

You can see the nice snug fit of the Dog House face around the audio connectors in this next shot:

We think this will help keep your Beagle Board safe from everyday wear and tear on the audio jacks. The three-piece design also, surprisingly, had the side benefit of being easier to assemble than the two-piece design.

Challenge #2 - Board Placement

We wanted to be able to easily align and attach the Beagle Board to the base plate as well as reduce the number of fasteners like standoffs, screws and nuts that were required for the package. So, we designed in four built-in standoffs which let you press the board onto the base.

I was suspicious at first about this mechanism - I thought maybe the board would wiggle or have some play once it was attached. Again, a full manufactured prototype was the only way to know for sure, so we had another full-up prototype made with the built-in standoffs.

To our delight, there was no play, no slop whatsoever with the press-on standoff design. That was a keeper even though it makes the enclosure more expensive to manufacture.

The one caveat is that the first time you press the board onto the base, it can take a pretty firm press and you have to make sure you’re not pressing down on any connectors. You press the board down, one corner at a time. But I can guarantee you, it’s solid.

To take it off, wrap some electrical tape around a screw driver so you don’t scratch the base or damage the board, and simply pry each corner up. After a few times of pressing it on and taking it off, it’s much easier than the first time but it still remains as secure and wiggle-free.

So, the builtin standoffs were a win because it reduced the hardware needed to install a board, made it faster to install boards, and finally, made for a perfect board alignment with the faceplate each time. There’s consistency if you needed to do 50 or 100 of these.

Challenge #3 - Tight Faceplate Alignment

The final major challenge in this enclosure was getting a faceplate on three sides to fit well.

It’s really straightforward to fit a single faceplate to a board similar to what we’ve done with the Chameleon 1 enclosure system. But clean fitting, multi-sided faceplate design with the fewest number of parts and seams was a big challenge.

In order to accomplish this, we ended up with a rather unique baseplate design that provides secure corner mounting but recessed edges so the outer skin can nestle against the edge connectors as closely as possible. You can see in the image below, the underside of the Dog House baseplate - the slightly recessed edges with the clover-like corners support the mounting holes for the board.

This design let us provide very secure mounting of the Beagle Board as well as a very good faceplate fit with just 3 components in the enclosure system - a baseplate, a corner faceplate, and a lid.

We’re pretty proud of the design and its functionality. Will Apple’s industrial designers be calling us any time soon? Negatory. On the other hand, even the state-of-the-art Digifab techniques would run into similar challenges as we did in wrapping this board.

In the end, we went through three full manufactured prototypes and 2 major design revisions before introducing this product to you. We think the extra work will be worth it in the form of a very functional enclosure for your Beagle Board.

I hope you enjoy the product as well as this background on some of the thinking behind the Dog House for Beagle Board.

For more history on enclosures designed by ESawdust, check out “Thinking Behind Chameleon 1.”

You'll Know When LBS Has Arrived

elandon@esawdust.com — 2010-02-19T14:06:55-07:00

I just filled the first ESawdust order I’ve ever sent to Bangkok, Thailand. I was curious just how far it was from Monument, CO to Bangkok, Thailand so I turned to the trusty Google Maps and went for directions:

Needless to say, I was disappointed I couldn’t get walking directions to Bangkok. Note to self: That could really leave a guy in the lurch. Google needs to step it up.

As amazing as it is to get an order from half-way around the world, the world is definitely not flat or small. At 1.7 pounds, the FedEx shipping (Priority International), duties and taxes for the order was twice the value of the items.

Landon Cox
www.ESawdust.com