Brainstorms unLtd

Brainstorms unLtd
"We Specialize In Your Problem"

(That thing you see above is not a mushroom, a cloud, or whatever else you think you see, it is the logo of Brainstorms unLtd, a brain with a lightning bolt going through it).

WHO ARE THOSE GUYS?

The origins of Brainstorms dates back to around 1973 at the Milwaukee School of Engineering.   A bunch of poor, starving college students trying to make a buck (and maybe dream a little).  Sometimes Brainstorms was just a figment of someone's imagination, sometimes it actually made some money.

So, what kind of problems does Brainstorms solve?  Over the years those problems have included audio/visual presentations, live music recording, restaurant management and consulting, direct mail and door-to-door flyer advertising, printed circuit board design, remote door annunciators, wait staff signaling, corporate graphics design, print advertising design, product and special event photography, engineering services management and consulting, computer systems operation, database design, network administration, and electronic CAD system consulting.  What about now?

PRINTED CIRCUIT BOARD DESIGN?

Brainstorms is available to do printed circuit board design.  If you have a circuit you would like turned into a real PC board we are able to help.  We can use PCAD (DOS version - extra charge if this is really wanted) schematics and PCB layout (version 8.7 and last) and OrCad Capture (version 9.2) and Layout.  We still have a copy of PADS PowerPCB version 2 (but no computer with a parallel port for the stupid key).  We also have experience with Mentor (Design Capture/Expedition PCB but do not own it - that's on site or remote access work).  Our current preferred system is Altium Designer (I own it and am on maintenance).  We are not that cheap but we are good (we ask questions to maybe help you improve your design, or at least get it right the first time).  Would you like your design to go to production within 2 design passes instead of 6?  Call us!  We have high speed net access so long distance design is very possible.  Want us to work on-site?  For work in the Milwaukee, Waukesha and surrounding counties in Wisconsin area call us! (on site work at a higher cost).

A brief word about designs and pricing.  If a circuit design is ready to go w/few or no changes the work can be done on a flat rate basis.  HOWEVER, some engineers either don't know when they are really done or don't want to tell management there is more tweaking to do (like the engineer who almost doubled the parts count of the design the day after a meeting with his management where he said everything was ready to go), but a fixed quote is based on a design at a fixed point in time.  Sending new schematics every other day turns off the flat rate and starts the hourly meter running.  I have run into this a number of times and it does not make for good customer relations when I go to management to ask for more money and time because the design keeps changing.  They thought it was done and ready.  They think it is my fault.  No it is their engineer's.  I have worked with many engineers who really know what they are doing and tell the truth, so I know it is possible.

ELECTRONIC CIRCUIT/PRODUCT DESIGN?

Brainstorms is involved with people who do electronic hardware and software development.  These people have many years of experience and have contributed to many successful product designs in the medical, industrial controls,  and automotive, areas.  If you have an idea for some electronics but are not able to handle the design yourself, contact us, we may be able to help.  We are also able to do FPGA and microcontroller based design, perhaps to assist someone just starting out.  - and someone will contact you.

CAD LIBRARIES/TRAINING/DOCUMENTATION?

Over the years we have been involved with a number of different CAD systems for electronic design (mainly PCB).  We have collected a large number of libraries.  Would you like to share?  Let us see what we can do.  We have schematic libraries for DOS PCAD, Viewlogic, OrCad and currently obsolete PCB libraries for DOS PCAD, PADS, and OrCad Layout.  We can also build libraries for Mentor Design Capture (schematics) and Expedition (PCB Layout).  And of course Altium Designer is growing.  Some libraries are rather large, some small but growing, all the non-Altium are older vintage.  The libraries are offered on a use-at-your-own-risk basis.  They may be just what you were looking for or they may only be close.  Either way, they should save you some time.  Lots of user documentation for PCAD, Viewlogic, Pads, OrCad, and Mentor Design Capture/Expedition is also available (ask about the CADSTUFF series).   Are you in a bind with regard to libraries for your system.  We can do that work for you too.  But, most CAD vendors have thousands of components available in their libraries.  Yes they do.  BUT, do they fit your company's documentation standards?  How about your real manufacturing needs?  There are a lot of questions to ask about supplied libraries.  Ask us!

How about an example of some of the theories of CAD / Design / Documentation we present?  Back in 1982 while working with a company which produced their own 2 layer PCBs (remember this is 1982) we discovered an issue with minor changes to a PCB (like fixing a misplaced reference designator on a silk screen) causing the board shop to scrap all tooling for the PCB and create new tooling.  It doesn't take long for this to end up costing a lot of money and time.  So, a system was developed to not only name (identify) each piece of film, but to assign a sort of revision level to each piece of film also.  Sort of revision, as this was not the revision level of the entire bare PCB, but just a particular piece of film.  So as not to confuse people with the use of the word revision meaning different things, the word "issue" was chosen.

Click for a documentation excerpt covering film IDs and documenting PCBs.

ENGINEERING SERVICES MANAGEMENT?

Is your design department a mess?  Does your design department just need a little help?   Changing CAD systems?  Trying to integrate MRP data?  Trying to get a handle on design documentation?  Workload increasing?  Besides working in small to large company engineering groups, we spent some time with a CAD system VAR in past years and got to see a number of company's operations first hand.  We have some ideas on things to do and especially things not to do.  - to discuss your situation.  Even though management thinks CAD system operation and administration is no big deal and every engineer can take care of his own boards (or every technician can layout a board in their spare time), effective CAD system use requires a great deal of administration and knowledge.  An engineer has lots of important things they should be working on, let someone else do the board (or at least let someone else assist and offer training to get the board done better and faster than before).  Why should a company waste money on specialists like PCB designers or CAD administrators?  Is it better to waste money on late product introductions?  How about spending the money in the lab trying to get the prototype working?  How about spending money on design changes when production is trying to get ramped up?  How about product warranty and service costs?  Spend the money now or later (in the design product life cycle) but you will spend it.  By the way, as we have said many times in the past, the money paid for a CAD system is trivial compared to the costs associated with training, using, administering, and maintaining the system.

ENGINEERING COMPUTER SERVICES?

Your company is networked, right?  There is some sort of IT department (could be only one part-time person)?  There is at least one computer acting as a server?  Well, what about the engineering department?  Engineering, has special computing needs.  Engineers need and use (or should be using) lots of specialized software ranging from database systems, documentation management, all sorts of design and analysis software, graphics, programming, etc, etc.  The computer hardware needs of engineering often dwarf the hardware needs of all other departments in the company combined.   The files generated are more numerous and much larger than any other application area.   Yet, engineering often has to play by the same IT rules as the secretarial pool (sorry secretaries).   A well run, leading edge engineering department should have its own specialized network server handling the software, design library, and development needs of the department.  Do you want to give this a shot?  We can help.  We have functioned as a department computer administrator for a number of different companies.   This can range from helping to set-up and configure a dedicated server to helping select the necessary software for the users, to training on some of the software, to integrating the software use into the department work-flow.  Yes we can even work with your IT staff to get things running smoothly.  -

SO?

This Dave guy currently heads up the Brainstorms operations.  So what gives him the idea he can do all this stuff?  Well, for starters, at various times over the last 37 or so years, he has done all this stuff at a number of different companies, and very successfully too.   He spent 2 years working with a local VAR of design software developing libraries, custom software and doing user training.  He has been an officer of ECAD software user groups.  He has served on an advisory committee for a technical school when they had a PCB design program.  And, yes, he has even been published (National Computer Graphics Association Proceedings 1983 and even reviewed by the CAD Report).  For more information, see the services info sheet listed below.  Also see Dave's personal resume on the employment page.  For more details - .

One more thing.  Brainstorms is not some bargain basement operation with quality to match.  Dave and the others have worked with some of the best companies and worked on some of the best designs imaginable.  Our work does not come cheap.  However, you get what you pay for.  You want really low prices?  Fine, we will not ask any design related questions.  We will not question any practices.  We will work 8 hours per day (max of course, minus lunch, breaks, holidays, snowstorms, sniffles, etc).  We will not go the extra mile.  We will give you just what you are paying for.  By the way, how much do you pay for a plumber?  To get your car fixed?   To your lawyer?  We ask questions about what you want.  You will go to production with a board from us in 1 or 2 passes, not 5 or 6.  How cheap are the cheap guys when it takes 6 passes for your product to reach production.  A recently published article stated PCB re-spins (another pass of the PCB including bare board, assembly and test) costs almost $9000 for each pass.  Add to that the time lost in getting the product out the door (how much do the lost sales cost?).  In all fairness to the low cost operations, often the problems with a design are the result of the customer not knowing what they really want, not having thought out the design process, saying one thing and meaning another, saying they are ready for a board layout and still making schematic changes weeks into the supposedly 2 week layout.  That's why we ask questions.  Lots of questions.  We have gotten burned by people who really want more than they say (yes, make all the changes on this list - what, you didn't change the thing we didn't put on the list, well you should have known by looking at this drawing over here that we wanted more things done than we said...), therefore we look bad.   We will make sure you get what you need and maybe didn't know you wanted.  Again, that does not come cheap.  Besides, would YOU work for minimum wage?

Sorry for the digression in the last paragraph.  We have discovered a number of people who seem to want charity work done for them.  Besides needing to eat, the people involved with Brainstorms and related companies are some of the best in their field.  Do you want the best people working on your project?   Or doesn't it really matter?  Give us a chance.  Check us out.

A number of years ago I was involved in doing some printed circuit design work for a company who normally used another much cheaper vendor.  Well, that vendor was very busy and couldn't get to the clients work for some time so they came to us.   The design had a problem which we asked about but were brushed off ("How dare you question my design, I'M THE ENGINEER").  Of course they paid extra to get the problem (that we had asked about) fixed later.  Anyway, after the project was completed and heading for production we were invited to a review meeting with the client.  They told us our work was excellent.  That we asked a lot of questions and even found problems in the design.  Their normal vendor never asked any questions.  But they again reminded us we were very expensive.  I   asked how many passes the PCBs went through for our design to be ready for production and they said 2.  I then asked what the average number of design passes were necessary with their normal vendor.  They said 5 or 6.  I asked who really was cheaper.  There was silence and a lot of strange looks on faces in the room...

Want to see info on the services available from Dave/Brainstorms (in resume form)?  Click here!

Don't want to start with email, but prefer telephone contact?   Dave can be reached at 414-529-5583.