This ATmega328P-Powered Vise Upgrade Takes the Effort Out of Clamping Your PCBs
Designed with button controls and handy fans for fume extraction, this project is a neat upgrade to an already handy tool.
Pseudonymous maker "kkambos" has turned to an ATmega328P microcontroller and a small motor to fix an annoyance in his projects: The time it took to manually wind the jaws of a PCB vise open and closed.
"It takes over 30 seconds of turning the knob to fully open or close the vise manually," kkambos explains of the problem that gave rise to the project. "It's been a first world problem of mine since I got this thing. Now with the motor, it only takes about 8 seconds and all I have to do is hold a button down."
The project is built around a custom PCB with a Microchip ATmega328P microcontroller and an L9910 H-bridge motor driver, programmed using the Arduino IDE to accept four button inputs: Two to wind the jaws of the vise forwards and backwards quickly, and two more for slow movements when finer-grained control is required.
As an added bonus, the device also includes four small fans - designed to blow solder fumes away from the work area while the vise is in use. "All in all," kkambos says, "I'd say the 30 hours I spent on this project were well worth it to solve one of the most inconsequential problems in my life."
Originally, the plan was somewhat more complex: A system by which the vise would automatically wind until it clamped the PCB then stop. "I decided against it however because it was just an extra layer of complexity for minimal 'gain,' kkambos explains.
"I reasoned that if I had that feature, I would still have to hold the PCB/object in the correct spot and wait for the vise to clamp it. It's not like I can press a button once and let go of everything. So at that point I figured there's not much difference between pressing the button once or holding it until it clamps because I'll have to hold the PCB in place the whole time anyway."
The PCB design and schematic have been published on Imgur, while the source code is on GitHub under an unspecified license. More information is available on the project's Reddit thread.
