About BOM Squad
Table of Contents
Welcome to BOM Squad, the free search and inventory tool created for and by DIY audio hardware enthusiasts! BOM Squad converts static component lists into interactive shopping lists cross-referenced against a database of common components from Tayda, Mouser, and other retailers. Once you’ve sourced your components, BOM Squad helps you manage your personal inventory of components. And because your shopping list knows what’s in your inventory, BOM Squad eliminates redundant orders and helps you repurpose extra components for future builds.
Say goodbye to the headache of managing complex spreadsheets and double checking them against PDFs and supplier websites! BOM Squad eliminates this tedious manual work.
BOM Squad’s community features crowdsource information about components. Want to know how a certain diode sounds in a fuzz distortion circuit? Need to find an alternative to a component that’s been discontinued? Each component is reviewed in relation to a particular build. No more searching through forum archives. BOM Squad preserve this community wisdom in a single place that’s purpose built for the DIY community.
How You Can Help
BOM Squad is open source and the code is freely availible on GitHub, but web hosting isn’t cheap. Please support the project on Ko-fi for $3 or $10 per month and help keep us free and online. And to thank you for your support, Ko-fi subscribers get to choose which features and projects we add next! Besides your support on Ko-Fi, please report bugs with the built in "Report a Bug" button on certain screens or by opening a new GitHub issue. Please report content and data inaccuracies with this form.
Values
Over 95% of audio hardware manufacturers are either sole proprietors or small businesses. We want to give back by building a platform that supports grassroots artists, whether they be consumers, hobbyists, or manufacturers, by making access to knowledge and components easier for everyone.
We’re committed to keeping BOM Squad free to use forever. To that end, we’ve chosen to experiment with crowdfunding instead.Our platform thrives on transparency. Explore our codebase on GitHuband contribute directly to our codebase. We welcome experienced engineers and new contributors alike. BOM Squad is a great place to dip your toe into contributing to an open-source codebase!
We’re building a fully-featured tool that is intended to scale. Although our initial aim has been to support the DIY Eurorack community, we aim to expand over time to support DIY guitar pedals, video synthesizers, and creative electronics for use cases beyond the performing arts too.
How it works
Project List
From thehomepage, select a project you want to build. You can add projects to your personal list of previously-built project or add it to an aspirational list of projects you plan to build.
Project Page
Each project page contains details about the project, including a links to the manufacturer’s page where the item (PCB, front panel, kit, etc.) can be purchased, the manufacturer’s original bill of materials (BOM), build instructions (if any) and other relevant links.
A key feature of each product page is the interactive BOM. The manufacturer’s original BOM has been converted into a nested table. BOM items (the build requirements) are listed as rows in the top-level table. Clicking on any row in the table reveals a nested table of components which fulfill that BOM item. (Note that if a project exists in several versions, with different PCBs and BOMs, each version is listed as tabs along the top of the table.)
The interactive BOM for the Triple Sloth module by Nonlinearcircuits, showing different versions of the PCB.
The nested table underneath each rows reveals a list of components which fulfill a particular BOM item. Each component displays a few key attributes, including price and a supplier ID number which links to the supplier website. There’s also a community review, which represents how well a component works for a particular BOM list item in a particular build. Community reviews do not represent the quality of components apart from their use in particular projects.
Component that fulfill the 10uF item from a BOM.
Signed-in users can add components to their inventory or to a “shopping list” of components they intend to acquire for a particular project. You may add components to your inventory/shopping list or edit the quantity in the inventory/shopping list directly. If you’re adding a component to your inventory, you can also specify the location where you store the component.
If you're adding a component to your inventory, you can specify storage location. Locations are specified as a comma-separated list representing a nested structure. For example, you could specify a drawer number which itself contains a box number. This would be the location where you could find the component in the "real world."
As a signed-in user, if your inventory contains sufficient components to fulfill a particular item in a BOM, a folder icon is displayed in the interactive BOM. The BOM row will be light yellow.
If your shopping list contains sufficient components to fulfill a particular item in a BOM, a cart icon is displayed in the interactive BOM. The BOM row will also be light yellow. If both your inventory and shopping list both contain sufficient components to fulfill a particular item in a BOM, both items will be displayed and the row will be a darker shade of yellow.
It's easy to verify that a particular project is possible with the components you posses or intend to acquire. Use the shopping list in the user account page to verify that you are purchasing sufficient components for each BOM list item.
The interactive BOM uses yellow highlights and icons to indicate if your inventory or shopping list meets an item's requirements. Darker yellow means both sources meet the requirements.
Inventory
BOM Squad is more than a list of projects and BOM lists. As a user, your inventory simplifies the process of organizing and managing components for DIY audio hardware projects. It allows you to track all components needed for projects. For efficient storage, the inventory includes location management, allowing you to assign each component to specific storage areas—shelves, boxes, or bins—making retrieval quick and easy, even for complex setups.
Inventory component locations are stored as a nested tree structure, representing arbitrary containers and their contents.
The Inventory feature in BOM Squad offers users the ability to manage and export their current stock of components with ease. Users can download their entire inventory as a CSV file, facilitating easy data backup, sharing, and external processing. Each component’s storage location is formatted as a string using “->” characters to denote hierarchical storage paths.
Inventory Versioning
Managing your component stock accurately is crucial, and BOM Squad’s Inventory Version History feature makes it simple to track changes over time. Every adjustment to your inventory—whether it’s adding new components, modifying quantities, or removing items—is logged in the version history. The detailed logs include timestamps and descriptions of each change, ensuring full transparency and control over your inventory records. With this versioning capability, users can confidently manage their inventory, knowing that even unexpected or mistaken edits can be identified and rectified promptly.
The Inventory Version History pages access with the "Version History" button on the top-right of the user's Inventory page.
Locations Diagram
Locations are not only a useful feature of items in your inventory, BOM Squad also includes an experimental feature to visualize the inventory as a whole, represented as a tree structure. The Locations Diagram page offers an interactive, network-style visualization of the nested storage locations for your components.
Hover over the nodes at the ends of the “branches” to view the specific components stored in each location. The size of each node reflects the frequency with which that location appears in your inventory data, while the thickness of the lines connecting nodes indicates how frequently these linkages occur in the data. Higher-level nodes in the structure are labeled with larger fonts, and the color gradient cools progressively from the top of the tree to the bottom, helping to emphasize the hierarchy within your storage system.
Locations Diagram showing a network graph of component storage locations in the user inventory.
Soldering Mode
Soldering Mode in BOM Squad is a special view of the user inventory designed for DIY enthusiasts working in low-light environments or actually at a workbench. This feature includes a dark theme that reduces eye strain, making it easier to focus on your workbench during late-night soldering or assembly sessions. The interface is optimized for readability, allowing you to update inventory quantities and locations seamlessly while you work.
Soldering Mode opens a separate view of your inventory optimized for readability, useful when working on a build late at night or at a workbench.
Shopping List
The user Shopping List in BOM Squad acts as a powerful "meta shopping list," replacing the need for complex spreadsheets to manage parts orders across multiple DIY projects. Instead of manually tracking quantities and comparing overlaps in a spreadsheet, the Shopping List consolidates your needs across builds into a single, streamlined view.
A standout features is the “Add All to Inventory” button, which allows you to move the entire shopping list into your inventory with a single click once you’ve received your orders. You can also add each component to the inventory individually, offering flexibility if you only want to update specific items.
In either case, the "Add to Inventory" modal box cross-references your components against your inventory and suggests your storage locations based on the current contents of your inventory.