Hardware Podcasts

A Benchtop Pick and Place with Stephen Hawes

The Amp Hour · 21 Jan 2025 · Episode 686

What this episode covers

Stephen Hawes, founder of Opulo, discusses the development and business of the Lumen Benchtop Pick and Place machine, an open-source device for low-to-medium volume PCB assembly. He explains how the company evolved from a garage prototype to a scaling operation, detailing the technical challenges of software integration with OpenPnP and the pragmatic decision to use Marlin firmware. Hawes also shares insights on manufacturing operations, the importance of dogfooding, and his experiments with making PCBs using fiber lasers.

Most relevant to

companies scaling up

Topics

Mentioned

Companies
Opulo, Formlabs, Stack Overflow, Prusa, Winter Bloom, Beautiful Modules, Micronics
Products
Lumen, Trello, Neoden, Control EO, Open Flexure Microscope
Tools
OpenPnP, Marlin, KiCad, Blender
Materials
Loctite GC 10
Also
Joel Spolsky, Thea Flowers

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