Flight Controller Design
Worked for 15 mins 19 sec
I made substantial progress, but I’m blocked from finishing because there are no available ACUs, so I can’t continue executing fixes right now.
What I accomplished:
- Resized the PCB to a compact 50 × 50 mm, 4-layer board.
- Re-placed all 34 components for a compact manufacturable layout:
- ESP32 at board edge with antenna facing outward.
- USB-C, ESD, charger, battery connector, LDO, IMU, flash, buttons, and LEDs grouped logically.
- Cleared stale routing and fixed the USB/VBUS routing precheck blockers.
- Ran full-board auto-routing successfully.
Remaining blockers before the PCB is manufacturing-ready:
- 35 invalid-layer Smart Via errors from the autorouter.
- 1 dangling trace warning.
- 22 generic passives missing manufacturer part numbers.
- Final DRC/manufacturing validation still needs to be re-run after those fixes.
Suggested next steps once ACUs are available:
- Fix/delete or regenerate the invalid Smart Vias.
- Delete the dangling trace.
- Assign real MPNs to the generic resistors/capacitors.
- Re-run DRC/ERC and manufacturing checks.
- Export Gerbers, BOM, and pick-and-place only after checks are clean.
Fix routing errors
Complete BOM MPNs
Run final checks
Export manufacturing files
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Preliminary FMEA — ESP32 Pickleball Tracker
Scope
Design-stage risk analysis for the ESP32-C3 battery-powered telemetry tracker schematic. This is preliminary and should be refined after PCB layout, enclosure design, and prototype testing.
Failure Mode Table
Table
| Subsystem | Failure Mode | Effect | Severity | Likelihood | Detection | RPN | Mitigation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| LiPo battery | Reverse polarity at J2 | Charger/regulator damage, heating | 8 | 3 | 4 | 96 | Use keyed JST PH connector, verify polarity in bring-up, consider reverse-polarity protection before production. |
| Charger | Charge current too high for selected cell | Battery stress/heating | 8 | 3 | 5 | 120 | R7 sets about 100 mA; require protected 100–250 mAh+ LiPo and verify cell charge rating. |
| 3V3 rail | LDO dropout at low battery | ESP32 brownout/data loss | 4 | 6 | 3 | 72 | Firmware brownout handling; consider buck-boost regulator for production. |
| ESP32 RF | Antenna keepout violated | Poor wireless range or certification risk | 5 | 4 | 5 | 100 | Enforce antenna keepout in PCB layout; review against Espressif datasheet. |
| IMU | Mechanical mounting flex/vibration | Inaccurate telemetry | 4 | 5 | 4 | 80 | Place IMU near rigid mechanical reference; validate with known motion tests. |
| Flash logging | Power loss during write | Corrupted log sector | 3 | 5 | 4 | 60 | Use wear-leveling/log records with CRC; buffer and commit atomically in firmware. |
| USB-C | ESD event on connector | USB/MCU damage | 5 | 3 | 3 | 45 | USBLC6-2SC6 ESD array included on D+/D-. |
| Firmware | Wi-Fi active too long | Short runtime / hot battery area | 3 | 6 | 3 | 54 | Duty-cycle Wi-Fi; stream compressed summaries; measure active current. |
Top Risk Actions
- Confirm exact LiPo capacity and protection circuit before selecting final charge current.
- Add reverse-polarity or ideal-diode protection if battery connector polarity cannot be guaranteed.
- Consider buck-boost regulator if stable 3.3 V across full battery discharge is required.
- Enforce ESP32 antenna keepout during layout.
Open Items
- Final enclosure mounting and impact survivability.
- Final battery part number and charge rating.
- Layout-level thermal and antenna review.
Scope
Failure Mode Table
Top Risk Actions
Open Items
