Sam Hocevar's Project-piCo Hits a New Milestone, Releasing a KiCad Clone of the Raspberry Pi Pico W
Permissively-licensed copy swaps micro-USB to USB Type-C, while a variant with PCB antenna is being held back pending patent expiration.
Maker Sam Hocevar has released a KiCad project that clones the Raspberry Pi Pico W, with one major difference: the outdated micro-USB connector has been swapped out for a USB Type-C port instead.
"This is a continuation of my USB-C [Raspberry Pi] Pico project that previously only had the regular Pico available," Hocevar explains. "I had been wanting to work on some projects with the Pico W, and I went ahead and remade this board in KiCad as well so that its design could be more widely accessible."
While Raspberry Pi makes board design files for the Raspberry Pi Pico range available to download, they're provided in the proprietary Cadence Allegro file format — requiring either payment of a hefty license fee or multiple stages of error-prone conversion to make them accessible to hobbyists. Hocevar's clone, by contrast, was reverse-engineered from the original boards and is provided in KiCad format.
The latest release marks a new milestone for Project-piCo, which Hocevar launched earlier this year with a clone of the original Raspberry Pi Pico — that, unlike the newer Raspberry Pi Pico W, does not include an on-board Wi-Fi or Bluetooth radio module. Like Hocevar's original release, the clone should be functionally identical to the original bar the move from a micro-USB connector to the more modern USB Type-C — and the loss of castellated pin headers, preventing easy installation as a surface-mount module.
Interestingly, Hocevar has designed two versions of his Raspberry Pi Pico W clone but has released only one. "I have one board that looks more like the factory Pico WH in that the antenna is built-in to the PCB," he explains, "and another board that uses a soldered on metal antenna. The reason for this is due to a patent on the PCB antenna technology. To my understanding, this patent is set to expire on March 11, 2038, and I do intend on releasing the other board at this time."
More information is available in Hocevar's Reddit post, while the design files have been added to the Project-piCo GitHub repository under the permissive WTFPL public-domain license.