From Breadboard to Production PCB in 72 Hours

JLCPCB's SMT assembly service has changed what's possible for a solo builder. Here's how I went from a working breadboard prototype to assembled PCBs in my hand in under a week.

Day 1: schematic capture in KiCad, ensuring all components are in the JLCPCB basic parts library (C1, R1, U1 designators, standard values). Day 2: PCB layout, DRC, gerber + BOM + pick-and-place export. Uploaded at midnight. Day 3: order confirmed and in production. By day 7 the assembled boards arrived.

Cost for 5 assembled boards with ~40 SMD components each was $47 shipped. The only manual step was soldering the through-hole connectors. The first board powered up and worked. This pipeline has made physical iteration as fast as software debugging.