How are you going about Production Programming for nRF51 parts?

[Marc Nicholas]

Howdy,

We're gearing up to program about 4,000 nRF51822s. They'll get the BLE version of DFU plus a stable version of our own code. For future production runs, we'll likely have our partner in Japan program the devices on the assembly line.

So, my question is: how are you handling your programming? Are you literally doing boards one-at-a-time with a SEGGER and a pogo-pins or similar?

Our PCBs are panelized as 5*5, so I've toyed with the idea of building an X-Y slide with stepper motors to fly a programming head across the boards. Buying 25 SEGGERs so that we can push 25 sets of pogo-pins down on to an entire panel is cost prohibitive.

Our world is also slightly more complex in that we create custom stickers that are unique to each programmed device, too :)

Thoughts? Current strategies? Horror stories? Please share! :)

-m

[John Kelley]

I've been developing a similar jig using pogo-pins and a custom board with a FT2232H to power each board and provide serial communications. I'm also planning on using the second channel of the FT2232H to program the nRF51822 using JTAG but I haven't developed the software for this yet.

Our panelization is 2x8 which makes it a bit easier to develop an affordable solution - especially if we can use the FTDI chip for both serial and JTAG.

[Marc Nicholas]

Our solution right now (still being built):

• Some Sparkfun Koala protoboards to supply an FTDI for testing UART
• Same board provides ~100mA 3.3vdc
• Prototype area on board houses a TI CD74HC4067 multiplexer chip

If I can get the SEGGER working with a Beaglebone Black, then I'll have that orchestrate the test firmware flash, testing of the device, success alert (Super Mario theme song), incrementing the multiplexer to the next device, and visual display of which devices have failed.

If that doesn't work, the same protoboard will just become a single programming and testing station :)

Will let you know how we get on (and post pics!).

-m

[RRRR]

How is gong with your Mass production tools ? I hope to hear your reply.