Barry,

I just put a prototype into use that does exactly what you are looking for.
It uses 2 16f877a's.  One for controlling the process and one for actually
programming the PICs.

It can program up to 16 pics with the press of one button.  We build our
circuit boards as panels (10 individual circuits in one panel) The
programming PIC connects to one circuit board pic at a time using test
probes ( a bed of nails) and dumps code to the chip.  I use a clamp to apply
pressure to the top of the board.  This pushes it down onto the bed of
nails.

For my purpose, all of the code that goes in the production pics wil fit in
the 16f877a's rom, so I just put it in upper memory and then read it one
byte at a time and clock it out to the production pic.  I also read it back
and verify it at the extremes, and indicate success with an led for each
circuit.

All of this fits in a box and uses a 16 to 25 volt wall wart to power
everything.  Last week I programmed over 700 circuits in 50 minutes.

In the near future it will be able to accept new code through a serial port.
Right now, whenever I need to change the production code, I pull the
programmer chip, and re-program it.

Hope this helps,

Jim Monteith

> From:         Barry Gershenfeld[SMTP:barry_g@ZMICRO.COM]
> Sent:         Monday, April 12, 2004 3:26 PM
> To:   PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
> Subject:      [PIC]: Production programming device?

> For the last few years, my ICD-1 (now ICD-2) and I
> have been the "production programmer" for all the
> PIC's that we use.  But the numbers are increasing
> and we have a need to let the production techs
> program their own stock.  I have hesitated handing
. this sort of thing over because the procedures
> involving the ICD-2 and MPLAB can get quite involved--
> MPLAB is a development environment.   I also
> suspect that an ICD-2 programming run does not exactly
> yield a production-quality part.

> What I'm looking for is something that will take a HEX
> file--and any other necessry info and not change it
> (MPLAB likes to turn Debug mode back on and other
> antics) and program the device via ICSP (In-circuit
> serial programming).   Ideally it would
> be upgradeable as Microchip invents new parts.  Maybe
> Microchip makes what we need.

> It doesn't have to be zero cost, either.  It does
> have to be reliable and simple.

> Barry

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