Vero Board instruction manual?

[R.G.]

With the current mania about vero board, is there a lot of interest in a Vero board how-to guide?

Vero board is a limited, simplistic case of PCB design, and is pretty easy to understand. in that fashion. That's one reason that vero board layouts are so easy to pop out.

[BD13UK]

For Guys like me who dont have the facilities to make PCB's it's very useful, I appreciate that they are indeed limited but your suggestion is an excellent one RG and I'm sure will be welcomed by most.

[James P]

I'd second that RG, as my micro pea brain is finding it a trite difficult to work with strips rather than the usual perfboard which is doesn't really have any layout constraints.

I have got loads of stripboard here though and it's easier to wire up a board IMHO.

I find the start point the trickiest i.e where to position ground or +9v strips etc.

I also believe the reason Stripboard has become popular is because it's a lot easier/cheaper/less messier than PCB making, which I always thought of as mass production territory. Even though it looks fantastic, I never understood why people would want to make a one off PCB with silkscreen part ID's etc. I thought getting into making pedals was about the sounds more than looks, still, whatever floats your boat eh!

James P  :shock:  :shock:  :shock:

[R.G.]

I find the start point the trickiest i.e where to position ground or +9v strips etc.

That one is easy - put them on the upper and lower strips outside the real circuitry unless there is some special requirement to do otherwise.

For why this should be so...
=====warning; deep techie stuff follows=====
There is a concept in PCB design automation of a scored versus non-scored net.

A net is a collection of all the component leads electrically connected by  copper.

Scoring is the process whereby the computer calculates a number for how important it is that a given net be wired first, before other nets, and be less interrupted by other nets being wired first.

In early design automation software, all nets were scored. Then people noticed that power and ground were almost always last in priority order. The reason turned out to be simple - in digital circuits at least, power and ground connect to **every single component**, so they're everywhere. Even calculating their wiring imporance scores was a waste of time. So people figured out the idea of the non-scored net.

A non-scored net is one that is not necessary to score because it connects to so many places on the circuit. Power and ground qualify, but things like reset lines are up there too.

The more pins in a net, the less you need to score it because it's everywhere, and placing the other nets first is more crucial. Two-pin nets are most important to get right. Then the threes, etc. perhaps modified by special signal quality concerns like super high speed or isolation, etc.

With analog effects, the situation is almost as true. Power and ground don't connect everywhere, but lots. Ground connects to more things than power, then power, then (often) a bias voltage. So it makes sense to put those on vero strips that run the whole length of the circuit. There are exceptions, of course; if you have ONE or TWO connections to power, it may well qualify as a point-to-point net in its own right.

But you see the principle - find out what is highly local, like one resistor to one IC pin, and wire those to come out right first. Then run them out to the busses that have to go everywhere.

[James P]

Thanks RG, I understand.

When planning a layout from a schematic, is there a set method that works, i.e from in jack to out jack, from an IC etc, or is it experience that tells you?

Regards

James P

[R.G.]

Actually, there is a fairly straightforward way. My layout book goes through it in some detail.

(for those that are waiting on the layout book, I'm still trying to get it printed - the last guys took my money and didn't deliver)

I alluded to it in my last post. It involves deciding which nets are the most important; ususally this will be the direct signal path and one-pin-to-one-pin nets. The idea is to get, as nearly as possible, zero length of copper conductor between component pins.

Obviously this gets out of hand for big circuits. So you break your circuit down into smaller subsections that you can handle easily. And it's partially interactive, getting a part in place, putting other parts down, then seeing if there is a more compact and less-copper-trace length way to arrange them. This is BTW the way that autoplace and autoroute programs work - they just can't do as good a job of pattern recognition as a human brain.

[MartyMart]

Thanks for the information RG, I've only made about 6 vero-layouts and a few are posted here.
I have tried to place +9v and ground traces as far apart as possible.
If you take a look at "Joe Davissons" vulcan schematic and my layout there is little difference (left to right) in the "layout".
Some require a bit of thinking and some bigger circuits will need to be
"split" into sections, if only for "size" matters on the board.
Generally the layout will look a little like the schem IMO !

Marty.

[vanhansen]

I would definitely be interested in this.  Anything that helps me learn more.  I've messed with a few small layouts on perf going off schematics but that's it.  Vero is new for me but I like how it works.  Now if I could only get some locally.