{"id":100,"date":"2025-11-01T11:11:33","date_gmt":"2025-11-01T11:11:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/?p=100"},"modified":"2025-11-13T03:19:02","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T03:19:02","slug":"breadboard-modification","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/?p=100","title":{"rendered":"Breadboard Modification"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"One
My breadboard setup with Raspberry Pi Pico installed.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

For a few years now I’ve had a collection of breadboarding modules that I’ve used for prototyping. They’ve all had an Arduino Uno mounted in the top corner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since I started using Raspberry Pi Picos, I came to the decision to replace one of the Arduinos with a Pico. So when I received my latest order I thought this was the perfect time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mounting the Pico, as always, was the main challenge. I first started with a piece of polycarbonate. Cutting it to shape and drilling it to fit on the spacers I already had installed went well enough, till I tried marking out the mounting holes for the Pico. It was then that the scriber I was using cracked the sheet in half and stabbed me in the hand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back to ye olde drawing board.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was getting late and I was on the verge of giving it up for the night, not wanting to be marking out and sawing large chunks of plastic, when I saw the offcuts from the robot bump sensors. They were too thin to fit on the existing spacers, but big enough to fit a Pico.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I drilled one of the bits of plastic with mounting holes at either end and countersunk them so the screw heads would not protrude and interfere with the USB cable. Then I drilled new holes in the base and fitted the carrier to the base.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All of this was only possible because I’d already decided to screw the Pico onto the carrier using some 2mm machine screws I’d had for ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I marked out the mounting holes for the Pico, one at a time. In the end I only drilled 3 holes because it’s fine. I didn’t want the Pico crushed against the carrier so I stuck some self adhesive foam on the top of the carrier to cushion it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I sat down and soldered header pins on one of the Picos and then set about fiddling with the diminutive nuts and bolts. Now I have a test bed for Pico development. The picture at the top shows the Pico in the top left. Then there’s a 7805 power module and a legacy LCD module. Most of the space is devoted to the breadboard itself, while an old X-Box (?) controller joystick takes up the bottom right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new setup works pretty well, but when plugging wires into the Pico, the foam has the tendency to squish, so I might need to investigate an alternative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other than that I’m pleased with the result.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For a few years now I’ve had a collection of breadboarding modules that I’ve used for prototyping. They’ve all had an Arduino Uno mounted in the top corner. Since I started using Raspberry Pi Picos, I came to the decision to replace one of the Arduinos with a Pico. So […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":101,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=100"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":102,"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100\/revisions\/102"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blinkbonnie.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}