Evil Mad Scientist Labs famously scaled up the 555 timer, splitting it into discrete parts. Can it be scaled back down to DIP-8 size, but keeping the discrete parts?
Albert van Dalen created a wager to shrinkify EMSL's discrete 741 op-amp. Additional info on hackaday.io. My approach to that challenge is here. It seemed only natural to extend it to EMSL's 555 kit, also!
The discrete 555 IC has 6 more transistors than the discrete 741 IC, so I didn't even try for a one-sided component layout. I had to use 4 layers, as well. The BJTs are in the SOT-883L package (1.0mm by 0.6mm, a wee bit wider than an 0402 component). There are probably some more space savings to be gained by finding a cleverer part arrangement and by switching from KiCad's 0201 footprint to a more compact 0201 footprint.
TODO: Re-check design, order boards and parts if I'm feeling brave, order stencil if I'm not feeling that brave, figure out how a nifty demo.
