Schematic to Stripboard

[mikemio]

After watching Dave's blog I've rebuilt my lab and started to create schematics. I've tried Altium Circuit Maker and it's A-mazing and has picked up some errors I would have missed.

I'm doing one-off protypes for control subsystems based on PICs. I think PCBs and Ferric Chloride fun is overkill for this so I want to use Veroboard or Tripad so that I can get something built quickly and cheaply.

In theory VeeCad can do this but its netlist import doesn't seem good enough.

What's the best way to move from Schematic to Veroboard or Tripad? Circuit Maker has convinced me that a decent schematic tool is the starting point.

I've worked through half a dozen packages this weekend. You'd think that using Molex connectors with Pics would be trivial to design/draw, Circuit Maker drew me an adequate PCB but I know how long it takes to cut, etch, drill etc. so I want to use stripboard/tripad etc. and the netlist imports struggle with molex!

After 20 years Stripboard Magic is not looking too bad :-(

Any ideas?


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[Fraser]

I still have Stripboard Magic somewhere. I can't remember when I last used it but I am still sad that it effectively became abandonware for reasons not known to me.

It is by no means perfect but it could have become a great tool for those wishing to work on stripboard. Such a pity it has gone.

Aurora

[mikemio]

It still stacks up well - but it's half-finished - I'd have to add in  a lot of new components and it doesn't work with Tripad


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[alexanderbrevig]

The two times I've used a CAD to make the strip board design I've just used the package I'm in (Altium or KiCAD) and select 2.54mm grid and only use vertical and horizontal tracks. Vertical on one side, and horizontal on the other. After all is routed and DRC is success I adjust layer colors to transparent and I just print it out. Then lay it on top of the board and cut where horizontal tracks are not continuous and add jumpers for the vertical lines. Does this make sense? For smaller boards I just wing it.

[mikemio]

I've decided to buy VeeCad as a start and see how far I can get with net lists from Altium or DesignSparks.

I tried drawing by hand in Loch... and it was messy, didn't glue wires to components or tracks in a way that allowed dragging stuff around and I miscounted some pins so the final board would not have worked.

VeeCad doesn't have the Schematic Capture built in but it's supported and understands wiring and routing. [emoji106]


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[mikemio]

@alex. That makes sense. I tried to do it yesterday and it was crashing a lot so I gave up. It's a good idea and I'll try again.


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