Dev Blog #3
Today I spent about 2-3 hours adding 3D models and fixing footprints for the PCB control board for Casper the auto positioning telescope.
The picture attached is off all the parts on the board, but nothing is in the right spot yet.
At first I got into the flow using digikey’s database as well as Mouser Electronic’s website to find 3D models and footprints.
I figured out how to upload the footprints/models to KiCad and got most of them all in, the plan I had in the previous dev blog worked and
adding the 3D models helped with fixing a few of the footprints.

When I came back to working on it later I noticed that a bunch of my work had vanished. After a bit of investigating I found that when a 3D model
or footprint is uploaded to KiCad it locates it through the path of where the file is stored. When I had tried to organize the mess of files on my computer after downloading all the footprints/models, the paths changed so KiCad could not find them.
This meant I had to go back and redo a lot of work, this time making sure the files were stored in a more permanent place.
After that everything seems fine. Next step will be to layout and make traces for the actual PCB.