The Problem: Hardware iteration is still painfully fragmented.
A single prototype can involve board fabrication, drilling, parts handling, paste, placement, inspection, reflow, debugging, and then another round of waiting when something changes.
I started this project because I wanted more of that cycle to happen close to the engineer instead of being broken across separate tools, vendors, and delays.
The Machine: Bring more of the prototype cycle onto one desktop.
The system combines board handling, fabrication, drilling, via formation, deposition, component placement, inspection, and reflow into one compact machine.
The goal is not to recreate a factory in miniature. It is to automate enough repetitive work that revising hardware feels more like part of the design process and less like restarting a logistics chain.
The Goal: Spend more time testing ideas, less time fighting the workflow.
I want engineers, labs, classrooms, and small teams to be able to move from an idea toward a working board with fewer handoffs. The more tedious parts of fabrication and assembly should increasingly be handled by the machine.
The Bigger Picture: A node in a decentralized manufacturing future.
This project connects directly to my Distributed Manufacturing Control work. The control architecture focuses on how independent manufacturing capacity can be coordinated across a network. The PCB Fabricator focuses on the other side of that future: smaller, more autonomous production tools that can live directly where design work happens.