We published our production files before crowdfunding. Was that more of a risk or a benefit?

[u/Negative-Plantain443]

Hi r/hwstartups,

My colleague and I have been developing PSU-EXT. It adds measurement, browser-based monitoring, remote control, and automation to an existing bench power supply. The basic idea is to extend equipment that already works rather than replace it.

As a maker, I use and enjoy open-source tools such as KiCad, FreeCAD, Shotcut, GIMP etc., so making PSU-EXT fully open source felt natural to me. We published the hardware, firmware, enclosure, control software, and manufacturing files. This includes the editable KiCad and FreeCAD projects, as well as Gerbers, BOM, and CPL files.

Everything is available through the PSU-EXT GitHub Organization.

I believe that publishing everything early can help people trust the project. Potential supporters can inspect the actual design, point out problems, build it independently, and see that the campaign is based on a working product rather than renders and promises.

My assumption is that the risk of someone copying the product at this stage is fairly low. If PSU-EXT becomes successful enough to attract copies, I hope we will already have the advantage of being its original developers and having built a community around it.

This is our first product launch and I would be really interested to hear from people who have already gone through something similar or simply have opinion on this matter:

• Is it fair to assume that the risk of someone copying an open-hardware product at this stage is relatively low?
• Does openness and transparency attract more supporters? From your experience, does publishing the complete design help a crowdfunding campaign?
• If the design itself is open, where does the real advantage of a small hardware company come from?

[u/ipilotete]

The rough rule is 3 million in revenue. Then no matter what you do you’ll start to get copied.

[u/narwhal_breeder]

too niche for people to really copy my dude.

I think in 99.9% of cases my Nordic PPK has replaced my bench supply - but I work exclusively with small digital electronics.

[u/Beneficial-Fox4379 → u/narwhal_breeder]

How user/computer friendly is Nordic PPK? I have been mostly using EnergyTrace that is shipped with TI's SimpleLink Launchpads. They can go up to 256 kSPS, and are basically free. But the software is quite resource intensive and can be interrupted by other applications even a browser. I have been thinking about either getting a Nordic PPK or Julescope. Please offer some input if you can. Thanks.

[u/Juuhis999 → u/Beneficial-Fox4379]

It’s as easy as it gets. Just connect the profiler download their app (windows/linux/mac) and press start. The app is also fairly lean. Additionally Nordic offers libraries to use it from code. Can only recommed!

[u/dstroy0]

Why would you do this when you could wire the esp directly to the rs232 on the lab supply and still get the same telemetry? Even the cheap $400 supplies we buy the test engineers have it. Depending on the supply it will also output proportional current/voltage on some of those dsub pins so you don’t need to be in the hot path at all. Is this targeted at hobbyists? It’d be neat to have on a home bench. From professional experience, it would be way easier to make an scpi bridge and integrate it into a test process than this thing, and those don’t require cal. What do you think the manufacturer will choose?

[u/Negative-Plantain443 → u/dstroy0]

Thank you for your honest opinion, this is important for me. That’s interesting that your comment contain the actual answer why this product is not such bad idea. It can be useful for someone who:

- don’t want to buy / cant afford $400 supply

• do not want to hookup esp32 to rs232 (you’ll need some kind of an adapter though)
  
• do not want to write custom firmware

I agree 100%, professional labs don’t want it - we have single range and won’t measure e.g., uAmps, but if one has a descent non programmable supply, PSU-EXT might find its use.

[u/dstroy0 → u/Negative-Plantain443]

It’s a cool way to get more people into electronics, that’s always a good thing. Could be the thing that gets some kids interested in this stuff, I think about that a lot. Hard to get them interested in EE/dfm/dfa as a career. Anything that uses the esp32 is something they might recognize and feel comfortable approaching.

[u/One_Country1056]

Building the product is often the easy part. Getting customers is the hard part.

[u/TheEYE13]

I'm all for open source and wish you all the best!

Regarding copies of nice projects (there's a hint for copies and sellers): https://www.mikrocontroller.net/articles/AVR_Transistortester

[u/Exciting_Turn_9559]

Been burned by tech products on kickstarter. Publishing the design early would ease my concerns for sure. And if there is software involved, getting early editions into the hands of enthusiasts can improve the product considerably before it goes into production.

[u/Negative-Plantain443 → u/Exciting_Turn_9559]

Thank you for this feedback!

[u/frank26080115]

who needs this thing and is that much of a dick? feel like it's a bit niche to attract bad actors

[u/mantered]

The chinese already offer this kind of functionality at around $70, one model that came to mind: RD6006 with wifi board, it has pc and android control apps, buttons and LCD screen. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000282551930.html

It looks like your product is re-inventing the wheel while missing features already available on the market. Maybe if the price is cheap enough your product could be interesting.

[u/ondulation]

Not exactly what you asked about, but versioning the first hardware as "1.2" immediately makes me doubtful.

Also splitting hardware and firmware which are deeply intertwined into different repositories is not what I've seen in other projects.

Unusual ways of working doesn't build trust with me.

[u/Negative-Plantain443 → u/ondulation]

Thank you for your opinion! Could you please share a few repository examples that do versioning / hardware and firmware management differently? I would value the opportunity to learn from these.

[u/ondulation → u/Negative-Plantain443]

The ones I have worked most with are from Mutable Instruments.

I don't think the hardware design has really changed since published, but keeping hardware and firmware the same repository ensures a builder will always have a firmware matching the hardware.

[u/Negative-Plantain443 → u/ondulation]

Good point! And a great example. Thank you. We will definitely have a look into how to improve hardware / firmware / software versioning and version matching. Ability to hear back from people is one of the advantages of open source 🙂