Sensepeek PCBite Board Holder and Probes

PCBite solves the problem that turns board debugging into a circus act: you have two hands, and you need to hold the board, two probes, and still reach the oscilloscope knobs. The board is clamped between magnetic holders above a steel plate, and the probes stand on flexible arms with magnetic bases — put a needle on a pin and it stays there.

After that you can watch the screen, change the timebase, solder next to it or photograph it without the probe sliding off and the board wandering away.

What the set is made of

This is not a boxed kit but a collection of Sensepeek parts, put together to suit the job:

• Two base plates, both steel and magnetic: a large A4 and a small A5. One side is matte, the other mirror polished — the polished side is good for filming and for finding a dropped SMD part.
• Magnetic board holders, four per plate. The board rests on them by its edges and hangs above the plate, so you can solder and probe from both sides. They move anywhere, because they hold by magnet.
• An SQ200 oscilloscope probe — an ordinary 10:1 probe with a spring-loaded needle instead of a hook, 200 MHz bandwidth. There is one of it: to watch two channels, the second one has to be held by hand with a normal scope probe.
• Four needle probes and their leads — for a multimeter, for power, for anything with banana plugs.
• A tube of spare needles.

Combine them however the job needs: the small plate with two probes under the microscope, the large plate with four holders for a long board, or both plates side by side when there are two boards.

What it is good for

• Watching signals on a scope without holding the probe
• Sitting a multimeter and a supply on four points at once and holding nothing
• Holding a board while soldering and reworking, instead of a “third hand”
• Chasing an intermittent contact: the probe does not move and neither does the board
• Working under a microscope — the small plate is there for exactly that

The 10:1 probe is made for a 1 MΩ input, which is the Micsig TO3004 oscilloscope standing on the same bench.

How not to break it

• The needles are spring-loaded and thin. They make contact under light pressure; pushing harder bends and breaks them. There are spares in the tube, but they are not endless.
• 300 V RMS CAT II is the limit, and it only applies with the finger guard fitted. Mains circuits are not measured with these probes.
• The plate is steel and conductive. The board belongs on the holders, not lying on the plate.
• Bend the flexible arm by the arm, not by the probe cable.

How to use

1. Take the plate that suits your board, place the four holders and clamp the board by its edges.
2. Stand the probe's magnetic base on the plate near the point you want, bring the needle to the pin with the arm and press lightly.
3. Put the probe ground on the board's ground with a short lead, not a long tail — at high frequencies a long ground loop shows you pickup instead of your signal.
4. Set 10:1 on the oscilloscope if it did not detect the ratio itself.
5. When done, take the probes off, fold the arms and return whatever you took from the shelf to its box. Replace a bent needle from the tube and tell us, so that new ones get ordered.

Where the parts live

The electronics bench usually has the small plate, four holders and a couple of needle probes on it, which covers most jobs. Everything else, the large plate and the oscilloscope probe included, is in a plastic box on the shelf. What comes out of the box goes back into the box.

Access

The set is in the hackspace room, so a plan that includes hackspace access is required. No induction is needed.