general pcb question

[nazm]

Hi guys!
I m new to this forum: I stumbled on madbeans projects a couple of days ago. My first name's nazim and i m french and living in the south of france. I ve been doing some diy pedal work for a couple of years now usually based around tonepad or ggg layouts (dist+, blue box, microamp, fulltone ultimate octave, tube screamer of course, proco rat..)
i m beginning to gather all the info to build a sabertooth for a bandmate who really loves the wooly mammoth (trying to convince him to put it on a breadboard so we can tweak but he says he loves it as it is: fool!) and there s a couple of things i dont quite get when i look at the pdf.
1. what is a fabbed board??? from what i gather it is double-sided, meaning there are copper traces on both sides. what's the point??? just to gain some space on the board? seems pointless to me since the single sided version is as small as any pcb can get... there must be something i don't quite understand.
2. my second question is probably even sillier, why are there 2 pcb's for etching at the very bottom of the pdf? is it only so that you can make 2 with the same p'n'p (actually i use a laser printer and photo paper for my pcb's). i mean the pictures ARE identical aren't they??
you ll probably find my questions very stupid, i mean i think i ve got all i need to go ahead and build the pedal but these 2 things are confusing me!!!!
thanx

[madbean]

Welcome Nazim!

In response to your questions:
1) A fabbed board (fabricated) means that it is a design I have manufactured instead of making by hand. These kinds of boards are double sided copper, with solder mask, silkscreen, and plated through holes. Some of the designs are fabricated because I now have too many projects to do everything hand-made. The hand-made boards require a great deal of time and attention and it is impossible for me to manage the volume of orders any other way. Both the fabricated and hand-made boards are high quality--just different technologies. For the second part, fabricated boards usually lend themselves to smaller PCB designs. By routing traces on both sides of the board, you can make layouts that are much tighter than single sided designs.

2) There are two images of the PNP transfer on many of the documents simply as a convenience. When etching PCBs, many people like to do more than one at a time in case one doesn't come out well. I do this too (except in my case, I'm usually etching three or four 8x10" panels at a time full of different designs). The images are identical, as you guessed. These designs are always included in the projects, even for the ones that I sell that are fabricated. This is one of the main features of madbeanpedals: you can etch your own, or you can buy a PCB from me. It's always your choice

Please feel free to post any other questions you come across!

 

[nazm]

Thanks a lot! this is really outstanding work you're doing here! i know i m going to enjoy building some of these projects!!!!