Adafruit Learning System

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MAKER BUSINESS

23 GUIDES | 203 PAGES | 0 FEATURED | 1 POPULAR

MANUFACTURING SHIPPING

Metal Parts from 3D Prints

You can make precise, durable, shiny metal parts using a 3d printer and silicone casting - it's easier than you might think.

This is a tutorial on how to cast low-temp metal alloys using 3d printed molds. The process involves common tools and supplies - a 3d printer, silicone rubber, a hot plate, stovetop casting alloy, and a dollar store skillet. I used this process to generate locking plates for my Flat-Pack camera arm, but the same method can be used to cast more than metals - anything from chocolate to plastic, with the accuracy only limited to the precision and resolution of your printer.

The Well-Automated Arduino Library

Make future-you happy with continuous integration & documenation automation

Writing software is like gardening - the flowers are beautiful but you're going to spend a lot of time weeding! Except instead of weeding, its keeping up to date with new frameworks, operating systems and dependancies. It's a ton of work! So why not make it easy on your self with automation?

Make Beautiful Fritzing Parts with eagle2fritzing

From EagleCAD -> XML -> SVG -> FPZ

Fritzing is an open source CAD-like graphical software for all operating systems that allows full interaction between breadboard, schematic and PCB views. Customers or other enthusiasts can wire up breadboard diagrams and then turn that into a schematic and even a finished PCB! Wouldn't it be cool if you could generate 1:1 perfect Fritzing objects right from a board file?

Windows Tools for the Electrical Engineer

Do the best with what you've got

You're an electrical engineer. And you have to run Windows - because a vast number of utilities and eval tools are Windows only! Or perhaps you're running windows out of choice. No biggie, either way you can make your environment pretty flexible with some tools.

How to Sign Windows Drivers & Executables

Be a trustworthy software distributor with signed drivers and software

Make life easier for you and your customers. This tutorial will go thru the steps of signing basic drivers, and even making a fancy installer! You can also use these steps to sign software such as, say, the installer for that driver.

Continuous Integration, Arduino, and You

Catch those pesky bugs!

Use Travis CI to automatically build and verify Arduino Libraries when you push commits to GitHub.

DIY 3D Printing Filament

Turn failed prints into recycled filament!

by Ruiz Brothers

Break down failed prints to make recycled filament. Its all about sustainable 3d printing. recycling parts to make new filaments saves money and reduces waste!

How we designed an injection-molded case

How to make a an injection molded case for your project.

This is the multi step process we went through to create a two piece injection molded case for the Raspberry Pi.

How To Build A Hardware Startup

A complete guide from idea to market fit.

This guide includes a series of lessons to help you understand your purpose, identify the right market, build a great product, and successfully bring it to market. This is for anyone that wants to turn their idea into a real company.

Standalone AVR Chip Programmer

Program without a computer for speed!

Instead of having a computer that talks thru the Arduino to a chip for programming, instead the Arduino itself programs the chip. This means you can program chips without having a computer involved. The good news about this technique is that it is incredibly fast, you can program chips 10x faster than with a computer and without having to type anything in.

Shop Tips & Tricks

Making manufacturing easy

This guide is a series of manufacturing notes. This is where you will find all the stuff we've learned in our short time of running a company, manufacturing in-house electronics and basically having a good time.

How To Start A Hackerspace: The List

The List: The Essential Hackerspace Checklist

This document is "The List" - it is the direct result of the overwhelming interest in starting Hackerspaces that hit my inbox after co-founding PSOne and HacDC. When so many people asked for help with the very basics of starting and running a successful Hackerspace, I compiled this list to make it as easy as possible for potential Hackerspace founders to hit the ground running (and not forget anything important). Since then, “the list” has been distributed and shared within Hackerspace culture. It has helped with structuring the success of many Hackerspaces - and hopefully with this update and public release, it will serve as a handy go-to checklist for your awesome Hackerspace-to-be.

KTOWN's Ultimate Creating Parts in Eagle Tutorial

Listen up! KTOWN is going to school you right in EagleCAD!

by Kevin Townsend

Creating parts in Eagle isn't difficult, but you do need to understand a few things about how Eagle organizes things internally. This tutorial will walk you through everything you need to know to start making reliable, manufacturable parts today!

Laser-Cut Enclosure Design

Secret Adafruit ninja design tricks revealed!

by Phillip Burgess

A kit enclosure should be more than just a box. This can be a challenge with laser cutting. Here are some tricks and tips for imparting some elegance while also keeping costs manageable.

Eagle Tutorial - How to add a new package to a component

Save time by re-using existing packages and symbols

This little tutorial will show you how to create a new package for an existing device. It's not a beginner tutorial so you'll have to learn how to use Eagle first, but its one of those skills that can save you tons of time

Maker Business & Manufacturing Software - Our Tips & Tricks

The software & services we use for business and manufacturing

Adafruit is a high-tech company, run by fairly young people. All of us working here have spent our lives with computers, technology, and the Internet. So it's not surprising that software and software-as-services (SaaS) are an essential part of running Adafruit. We're constantly on the lookout for useful new tools that can help Adafruit run efficiently, and cleanly.

All About Laser Cutters

Free information and resources for laser cutter owners

Everything you wanted to know about this ultra-powerful prototyping and production tool

How To Start A Hackerspace: Money and Resources

Fuel For Your Fire

If you want a hackerspace where everyone can pull off capers, kickass projects and work on epic (or dorky) hacks, you're going to need the cash to make it happen - all while keeping the lights on at the same time.

How to Make a Pogo Pin Test Jig

by Tyler Cooper

If you end up buying a pick and place to assemble PCBs (or even if you're doing it by hand) you'll need to test out your boards! If you have an assembler do it for you, its still probably a good idea to have a jig you can give them. A good jig will tell you whats going right and whats going wrong. In this tutorial I will show how I designed a very basic jig with a "tested good" audible indicator. The board its testing is very simple but the basic premise can be expanded to large projects with ease.

Creating Accurate Footprints in Eagle

by Kevin Townsend

A guide to making footprints in Eagle that accurately reflect the mechanical outline of your parts

SMT Manufacturing

Our mods, hacks, tips and tricks for SMT manufacturing.

Here are a bunch of tutorials for manufacturing small to medium scale (10 - 10,000) piece surface mount electronics.

Barcode Scanner

This mini tutorial will cover how we use barcode scanners. This isn't necessarily an Arduino project, but it is a tool that we use every day when shipping packages - instead of entering in invoice numbers, we use a barcode scanner.

Digital Shipping Scales

This tutorial will cover digital shipping scales! I know, exciting, right? But really, if you need to sense weights and get them into a computer or microcontroller, these are really easy to find, fairly accurate and easy to use.