
Fusion – One-stop prototyping service for PCBs - elijahparker
https://www.seeedstudio.com/new-fusion-pcb.html
======
TaylorAlexander
I've had over 8000 PCBs produced through Seeed, including 4000 assembled
PCBAs, and I'm generally pretty happy with them. I can run a global
electronics business out of my apartment because of Seeed.

We did have one major production issue where a critical part was substituted
for an out of spec part without authorization and without anyone at Seeed
knowing about it. [1] That was very frustrating. But once I came up with a
software fix, Seeed had their local rep Erin (who is amazing) take the 3000
boards I had, set up a programming station I provided in her basement, and run
a 30 second programming and calibration routine on each one. The boards work
now.

So yeah. Even with as easy as Seeed makes it, production issues happen. But
I'm sticking with Seeed for future production runs.

Seeed if you're reading this, can we get an option for silkscreen color on
your fusion service? Thanks!

[1]
[https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/flutterwireless/flutter...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/flutterwireless/flutter-20-wireless-
arduino-with-half-mile-1km-ran/posts/1612110)

~~~
honkhonkpants
The fact that you can send drawings to be fabricated and get hard goods in the
mail days later has been true for years. You could have been running a global
electronics business from home for fifteen years now. So what do these guys
add over players like pcbexpress, or the innumerable Chinese shops?

~~~
ajford
The small batch multi-layer boards haven't been as affordable. Also, many of
the board houses won't work with small batches for anything above 4 layers.
Now this isn't an issue when you're running a full business (assuming said
business is large enough to have the capital to invest in a large enough order
of boards).

This is great if you're running a small prototyping lab or doing some one-off
or freelance work, since it'll be much easier to get these multi-layer boards
in small enough batches.

~~~
honkhonkpants
The prices do seem lower. A 100mm^2 6-layer board is half the price at seeed
compared to pcb express.

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paddi91
Shameless plug here, we're just working on getting a PCB & assembly service
like Seeedstudio to Europe. What we're trying to achieve is to get close to
prices from China but with zero quantities. That means you don't have to take
care of stock, as soon as you need one we manufacture it. Beside that all
manufacturing is done in Germany and we take care of logistics.

Anyone interested take a look at
[https://go.aisler.net](https://go.aisler.net), if you'd like to participate
in our beta assembly just drop me a line at patrick@aisler.net

~~~
jwr
Finally, something being done in Europe! Sign me up. I've been using Seeed,
ITEAD & OSHPark for my hobby stuff, and MacroFab for work stuff (eyeing
closely PCBng which gets a lot of things right, but doesn't support all my
components yet), but all of those have the same problem: shipping. You either
pay with time (3 weeks to get your boards back) or with money (>$60 for quick
shipping).

I believe there is a lot that can be done to reduce the cost of electronics
assembly and I'm very happy to see something happening here in Europe.

~~~
Libermentix
Hi jwr,

co-founder of paddi91 here. What your are saying is essentially what has
driven us to start investigating into this.

We come from the Open source hardware and hobby electronics world, and have
backgrounds in mechanical engineering and information technology. So we
wondered how we can add a European flavor to it: Lots of high quality
manufacturers here in (central) Europe, but with a focus on High-End High-
Scale series production, both for PCB and PCB assembly. We collaborate with
them, automate most of the production process for them, and thus are able to
offer competitive prices for low quantities.

We started investigating into this because we want every OSHW project to be
reproducible by others. So that if you are an author and publish your designs
with us (we synchronize with github if you want), other people (and the many
others that are not able to design or assemble the project) can receive a copy
of the current version. And since not everyone can assemble by themselves, we
try to make it as simple as possible which is the reason for the PCB Assembly
pilot. Here we use similar tools to automate everything. It should therefore
be affordable to re-produce any project on-demand. Seriously, if you want to
help make open source electronics more accessible come and join us with your
project for the assembly beta, the more projects, the better, as it improves
the test-suite ;-) feel free to either send an email to patrick via
patrick@aisler.net (my co-founder) or contact me directly via felix@aisler.net

By the way: the cost parameters for assembly would be the following: cost of
the pcb x 2 + cost of parts. no minimum quantity required. All boards come
with green soldermask, white top and bottom legend, and will have ENIG surface
plating. We only use high-class FR4, 1.6mm TG150 material.

~~~
jwr
So, I did a quick check, and you're currently over 4x more expensive than
OSHpark for 2-layer PCBs, but the assembly proposition looks much more
promising. I will definitely keep an eye on your project.

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2bluesc
I used their 2-layer service a while back it wasn't impressed, primary issues
were solder mask wasn't up to spec, silkscreen was rough, and some copper was
removed from areas that should have met their spec.

I wound up going with pcbway.com on the same gerbers and have used them many
times since.

~~~
MitchellAu
Have you tried to ask them to re-do? I have not met this situation, what I
received is good. I like the flexible logistics way Seeed offers. Sometimes it
is expensive to pay for $20 express shipping fee for $9.9 board.

~~~
2bluesc
Didn't ask for a redo. Had it been just silk screen maybe.

I had sent my prototype gerbers to two places. Pcbway was better quality and
cheaper. As a result, I gave them the rest of the production order.

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mmastrac
Has anyone used their service to build fully-populated boards? I've been
dabbling in making boards as a hobby but really don't like the soldering bit
at the end. I'd be happy to pay a bit more for it to be done by machines.

~~~
chrisBob
Their assembly is reasonable at a few cents per solder joint. I am pretty sure
the machine they use is a hard working guy with a soldering iron though. I
used it on a small project because they can put down surface mount passive
components for less than the cost of the shipping I would pay mouser.

If you can live within their parts library there is no reason not to use it.

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Etheryte
Since I've ever only done rather simple boards: when would you actually need
16 layers? How complex of a component are we talking about when it would be
feasible to use that many layers?

~~~
DigitalJack
Anything with RF sensitivity can benefit from isolating ground layers. You can
use layers for managing thermal effects. Vertical isolation of signal groups
to reduce cross-talk. Horizontal space restrictions.

And then of course, signal count and density. Many FPGAs have a thousand or
more pins.

~~~
stephen_g
We find 4 and 8 layer boards are the best for most of our RF designs
(depending on frequency, complexity, etc.) - more layers than that and your
dielectric layers start to get too thin and then your tracks have to be super
narrow to hit a 50 ohm impedance... But of course, that also depends on what
type of substrate you're using, etc.

But for complex digital boards, 16 (or more) layers is common.

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schwarrrtz
Seeed also does a fair bit of open source work - I've used their CAN library
and the associated Arduino shield fairly extensively, and it's worked out
quite well. Would recommend.

[https://github.com/Seeed-Studio/CAN_BUS_Shield](https://github.com/Seeed-
Studio/CAN_BUS_Shield)

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NguyenJobs
Hi guys, for those electronics aficionados, just to let you know I've been
using with great results Fusion PCB to produce my own designed PCBs. I was
very impressed with the result, very high quality PCBs and very good personal
customer service. Despite it's a manufacturing house based in China, the
process was very smooth, I had constant feedback from the production line, in
case I wanted to correct or change things, the quality standards and testing
was more than I was expecting, and the shipping was really fast. In the end
they offered me some extra coupons, which was the cherish on the top of the
cake. If you're thinking on printing your PCBs, I couldn't advise more

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jwr
I find it amazing that OSHpark manages to be price-competitive with Chinese
PCB services. If you need small 4-layer boards with ENIG finish, OSHpark is
hard to beat!

~~~
elijahparker
I use OSHpark for smaller projects since it's impressively cheap and fast, but
for complex projects I've had issues because OSHpark does not e-test the
boards. Seeed has e-test for no additional charge and I've never had faulty
boards from them (though cosmetically OSHpark generally does better)

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elijahparker
I've used their service in the past when it was limited to 4 layers and have
always been very happy with it. I had to find a new source for my last 6-layer
board that was much more expensive.

~~~
blackguardx
pcbcart.com has always been my choice for chinese PCBs. They have really good
capabilities compared to budget board houses.

~~~
ajford
I've never heard of them, but they look pretty competitive on pricing above 4
layers.

The benefit of the budget board houses is when you need a small run of boards
for prototyping. OSHPark is great when you want a few 2layer boards under say
6 sq inches. DirtyPCB is great for 2 or 4 layer boards under 15sq inches
(10cmX10cm size). You can get ten 4-layer boards at 10cmX10cm for $50, where
as pcbcart has that for $250

~~~
blackguardx
It isn't just layer count. Look at the trace and space capabilities as well as
smallest via hole size and annular ring size.

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SkookumCoocher
I currently use goldphoenix. How do they compare to them?

~~~
orthecreedence
> The only other time I've had PCBAs made in China was through GoldPhoenix and
> I was very unhappy with the quality of soldering

From TaylorAlexander in sibling comments, who has used both services.

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MitchellAu
I am very satisfied with Seeed's service. I used to place an order of 2 layers
PCB for $9.9. Their engineer even helped me inspect one of the bugs. Really
out of my expectation. I left a msg in the user voice for 6 layers PCB( it was
unavailable at that time). After 15 days, they send me email say it is online
now. Quite impressive for how they care customer's advice.
[https://www.seeedstudio.com/new-fusion-
pcb.html](https://www.seeedstudio.com/new-fusion-pcb.html)

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honkhonkpants
I hope I never see the day I have to route 16 layers.

~~~
revelation
Technically routing gets easier with more layers available. If a 16 layer
board cost the same to manufacture as a 2 layer one I would just always use
that.

Of course today they are still magnitudes more expensive so generally such a
high layer count means you are routing evil high frequency signals..

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GrzegorzCzapla
I have used Fusion PCB in SeeedStudio twice. Firstly, I order a 4 layer 5mil
board which is looked great and beautiful. Secondly I ‘ve got a 2 layer board
with clear silkscreen, perfect alignment of all layers, do not have a single
electrical problem.And I receive the delivery within 6 days from USPS, quite
satisfied with it. The low price and the high quality is really impressive.
Couldn’t ask for more. I will go on using Fusion PCB in the future surely.

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Keyframe
Regarding material, are there standard dimensions for FR-4 (and other
materials) boards out of which PCBs are manufactured?

~~~
brandmeyer
The standard boards are pretty large, but they do come in a variety of sizes.
Once you are in volume, the cost of the PCB itself is pretty small. Board
houses will almost always want to panelize themselves, partially because their
machinery will be set up for a particular size. The machinery is adjustable,
but the adjustment itself costs them some labor, so they would rather stick
with a single panel size until the production run gets very large or the board
has special needs.

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s800
I've run a few scenarios through the pricing tool and it seems very
competitive (medium size four layer stuff).

