Warning: contains nostalgia.
Was just rummaging around in the under-stairs cupboard and saw my old uv-box. I've got a laminator as well somewhere, which i bought for toner-transfer etching.
All that messing around with sharpies, nasty chemicals, tiny drill bits that snap if you so much as look at them the wrong way, and hours and hours of fun. I even got in to doing etched smd layouts (I think my "gnat's chuff" smd big muff is on here somewhere).
I gave up etching years ago once fab houses became cheap and offered short runs. As a result I now have scores of unused pcbs due to minimum orders of 10 or so. If I don't want to use a fabbed board, i just build point to point on perf.
So... is there anyone out there who still etches boards? Do you use toner transfer or UV? What has made you stick with it?
I try to etch all my own boards, even the double-sided ones. Although I recently threw my hands up in the air and purchased a commercial board for the MFOS delayed modulation module. Couldn't get mine to work, and the commercial board fired up as soon as I finished it.
Mostly, I'm just too lazy to draft my own layouts, or learn yet another piece of software.
I have recently comeback to the hobby so to speak and I etched a board the other day but I don't think I will again for a while ,I'm not young anymore, and standing there drilling a whole lotta holes and etching and printing is not for me anymore.
It's a shame since I dug out all my stuff and I have a lots of parts, some unobtainium,but I think I will buy PCBs when possible,I bought one from GGG and like Mark said ,fired up relatively fast except for a mistake a made wiring the jacks(I'm rusty).
It's a no for me.I think.I also found some boards I etched around 1999 from gyraf forum, huge boards for professional equipment like eqs and compressors and they came out amazing,but I have lost some of my mojo.
Aharon
It's a no for me. I never liked doing it years ago and am happy to not do it now. Since all my projects anymore are my own designs that I offer freely to the DIY community, making the boards is a way to prove out the Gerber files that I create. It also allows me to sell an occasional board for couple bucks or offer a commissioned circuit.
No etching for me.
A professionally done PCB, delivered to my home, costs something like 10 USD. This is so much cheaper than my time that I'm never again etching anything.
Quote from: Ripthorn on May 08, 2023, 04:07:00 PM
It's a no for me. I never liked doing it years ago and am happy to not do it now. Since all my projects anymore are my own designs that I offer freely to the DIY community, making the boards is a way to prove out the Gerber files that I create. It also allows me to sell an occasional board for couple bucks or offer a commissioned circuit.
Well, it also needs saying that your projects are rarely one or two-transistor fuzzes.
I think circuit boards are interesting looking, can be artistic looking, and even "What's that do looking". Building clear acrylic enclosures allows me to see the work I have done. Can be cool looking. The insides of the effect sometimes are made to look as artistic as the outside. But, without a metal box, interference can be a problem. Although I have not witnessed that with my acrylic builds, I suppose if I was in the city or on stage I probably would. So here is the answer to being able to see and enjoy your hard work. Transparent Aluminum.
Aluminum oxynitride. It is Non conductive. Darn
(https://i.postimg.cc/TpSDMt7F/TRANSPARENT-AL.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/TpSDMt7F)
Quote from: Mark Hammer on May 08, 2023, 04:53:41 PM
Quote from: Ripthorn on May 08, 2023, 04:07:00 PM
It's a no for me. I never liked doing it years ago and am happy to not do it now. Since all my projects anymore are my own designs that I offer freely to the DIY community, making the boards is a way to prove out the Gerber files that I create. It also allows me to sell an occasional board for couple bucks or offer a commissioned circuit.
Well, it also needs saying that your projects are rarely one or two-transistor fuzzes.
This is very true. I seen to have an affinity for seeing how much I can cram in a 125B...
Like Ripthorn said, I too only etch if I want to prove a Gerber file before I send it off to one of the many fab houses. That being said, it is very rewarding building it all at home (and it works). Who else has a box full of non-working/non-finished boards. I'm sure everyone. :icon_mrgreen:
It's hard to motivate myself to etch anything anymore when you can get 5 or 10 boards made for for about a $1 a board. But yeah occasionally I will if I need something "right now".
I do eatch my boards, even I had to study some chemestry to. Here in Venezuela is not easy to get products for eaching (or they are too expensive).
First I have to look for rust metal parts and then mix with a cleanner product, wait a few days until the metal disappear and then use this solution with peroxide and sulfuric acid.
Once the board is in the plate I put the peroxide 10% to rust the cooper and then put the solution with a small part of acid. It needs to be on movement all the time so the solution could "eat" the cooper once it is rusted.
...yes, is not easy but... ...what can I do?.. ...I live in Venezuela.
Time ago Erik Vincent (from DIYGUITARPEDALS) sent to me a very nice boards (4), I keep one untouched just because it looks very very nice and I don´t think I can get one of those in here.
Percy
I haven't since I got a CNC machine. I just mill the PCBs now. I used to etch a LOT of boards back in the day! I still have my UV exposure frame though "just in case". :icon_wink:
Not anymore, but did a ton of boards.
Must say that I did not mind the etching (toner transfer) it was the drilling of holes that I bloody hated, and I did buy the nice pillar drill from Proxxon for it.
Quote from: percyhornickel on May 10, 2023, 09:29:34 PM
I do eatch my boards, even I had to study some chemestry to. Here in Venezuela is not easy to get products for eaching (or they are too expensive).
First I have to look for rust metal parts and then mix with a cleanner product, wait a few days until the metal disappear and then use this solution with peroxide and sulfuric acid.
Once the board is in the plate I put the peroxide 10% to rust the cooper and then put the solution with a small part of acid. It needs to be on movement all the time so the solution could "eat" the cooper once it is rusted.
...yes, is not easy but... ...what can I do?.. ...I live in Venezuela.
Ferrous sulfate is just as good for etching as chloride.
Electrochemical etching with salt is one of the most accessible methods. (cost near zero)
Is it really so difficult to find popular etching reagents in your country? HNO3, FeCl3, CuSO4+NaCl
I've done some home-etched PCBs that had me questioning my sanity, for sure. Sometimes I feel that I hadn't quite recovered. Though, there was something quite therapeutic about it. After getting familiar with a few big PCB manufacturers I'd say I'd probably never etch a board again. My current situation of finance and patience outreach the tribulations of etching and toner transfers by miles.
For years I did magazine paper or glossy photo paper toner transfers and etched in 50/50 muriatic acid & hydrogen peroxide.
I also did a thread about home made tinning solution that's deep in the forum somewhere. Wouldn't mind revisiting that one eventually. Mostly to replate edge-card connectors.
Oh yeah, I have some of my old transfer files in my signature. For the overly ambitious.
It was fun until it wasn't :icon_lol:
Quote from: Kevin Mitchell on May 24, 2023, 04:26:59 PM
I've done some home-etched PCBs that had me questioning my sanity, for sure. Though, there was something quite therapeutic about it.
For years I did magazine paper or glossy photo paper toner transfers and etched in 50/50 muriatic acid & hydrogen peroxide.
It was fun until it wasn't :icon_lol:
For a 1-10 pc box-sized PSB with not-so-thin tracks, it can still be quite fun.
Diluted HNO3 and FeCL3 are quite meditative and well controlled.
But eventually for of amounts of PSBs — the homebrew method is a pain in the ass. ;D
Quote from: Dormammu on May 24, 2023, 04:12:43 PM
Quote from: percyhornickel on May 10, 2023, 09:29:34 PM
I do eatch my boards, even I had to study some chemestry to. Here in Venezuela is not easy to get products for eaching (or they are too expensive).
First I have to look for rust metal parts and then mix with a cleanner product, wait a few days until the metal disappear and then use this solution with peroxide and sulfuric acid.
Once the board is in the plate I put the peroxide 10% to rust the cooper and then put the solution with a small part of acid. It needs to be on movement all the time so the solution could "eat" the cooper once it is rusted.
...yes, is not easy but... ...what can I do?.. ...I live in Venezuela.
Ferrous sulfate is just as good for etching as chloride.
Electrochemical etching with salt is one of the most accessible methods. (cost near zero)
Is it really so difficult to find popular etching reagents in your country? HNO3, FeCl3, CuSO4+NaCl
Yep, is a hard thing to find chemicals in here, maybe is possible to find one or two but very very expensive so.. ...I had to deal with it and read some nights to find a solution for me. Even ferric clorite is hard to find too, I heven`t seem a small bottle since like ten years . :icon_neutral:
I don't etch PCBs anymore, but I'm using my leftover etching materials for something else:
(https://i.postimg.cc/kVhVkPjj/image.png) (https://postimg.cc/kVhVkPjj)
That and irreversibly staining some sinks.
Quote from: percyhornickel on May 25, 2023, 07:41:07 AM
Yep, is a hard thing to find chemicals in here, maybe is possible to find one or two but very very expensive so.. ...I had to deal with it and read some nights to find a solution for me. Even ferric clorite is hard to find too, I heven`t seem a small bottle since like ten years . :icon_neutral:
What about electrochemical etching?
I have tried a few times with no luck!!
Quote from: percyhornickel on May 25, 2023, 09:49:33 AM
I have tried a few times with no luck!!
What went wrong ?
Quote from: Dormammu on May 25, 2023, 11:16:29 AM
Quote from: percyhornickel on May 25, 2023, 09:49:33 AM
I have tried a few times with no luck!!
What went wrong ?
Don´t know, borders of the tonner/papper lifted over the pcb even with low voltage I remember.
Quote from: Kevin Mitchell on May 24, 2023, 04:26:59 PM
I've done some home-etched PCBs that had me questioning my sanity, for sure. Sometimes I feel that I hadn't quite recovered. Though, there was something quite therapeutic about it. After getting familiar with a few big PCB manufacturers I'd say I'd probably never etch a board again. My current situation of finance and patience outreach the tribulations of etching and toner transfers by miles.
For years I did magazine paper or glossy photo paper toner transfers and etched in 50/50 muriatic acid & hydrogen peroxide.
I also did a thread about home made tinning solution that's deep in the forum somewhere. Wouldn't mind revisiting that one eventually. Mostly to replate edge-card connectors.
Oh yeah, I have some of my old transfer files in my signature. For the overly ambitious.
It was fun until it wasn't :icon_lol:
Forty years ago, my etching technique was as follows:
1) Photocopy the layout in the magazine article and tape it to a piece of copper-clad board.
2) Go over it with my spring-loaded centre punch and pop a dimple in the middle of every pad.
3) Remove the photocopy and use a water-resistant fine marker to draw the pads on, or possibly use rub-on transfers to place nicely circular pads on.
4) Play connect the dots with the marker pens. One technique I adopted was to have 2 colours in addition to black. I'd draw the traces connecting the dots in one colour (e.g., green), then go over those traces in another colour (usually red), and finally over them again in black. Using the different colour marker pens allowed me to know which ones I had gone over and reinforced, and which ones I hadn't. Preferred pin was the Staedtler Lumocolor.
I probably didn't keep my damn "finger-juice" off the boards then as much as I have learned to do since. I also discovered carbide drill bits. Forty years back I had only conventional drill bits. Fortunately, grad school offered me access to decent workshops whose drill presses had much better chucks than I have now. The resulting boards weren't pretty, but they worked OK.
I'm still waiting for the folks who came up with toner transfer to receive their Nobel prize.
Quote from: percyhornickel on May 25, 2023, 01:53:36 PM
Don´t know, borders of the tonner/papper lifted over the pcb even with low voltage I remember.
It is more important not to exceed the current so as not to overheat the solution.
And tracks drawn in the old school style are less prone to flaking.
Im sure everybody can get peroxide and vinegar. Mix equal parts and add a small amount of salt and away you go!
Quote from: tonyharker on May 25, 2023, 02:59:38 PM
Im sure everybody can get peroxide and vinegar. Mix equal parts and add a small amount of salt and away you go!
[/quote
Maybe the venezuelan vinegar is mixed with too much water ;) ...I tried this way to with luck, Maybe I could try Electrochemical once again sometime.
I liked the Mark`s old school technique, I just take a photocopy on normal paper (with high quality to get more tonner in the tracks) and put on the pcb with tape, carefully heating and pray like 3 hours hoping the tracks don`t lift.
This way worked fine most of the times.
"Normal" paper (that is, NOT shiny) will not work very well, or at all, as a toner-transfer method. The toner has to want to stick to the copper MORE than the shiny coating on the paper wants to stick to the paper. If there is no shiny surface to the paper/sheet, then the toner will "like" where it is, and not want to come off.
Quote from: Mark Hammer on May 26, 2023, 01:55:23 PM
"Normal" paper (that is, NOT shiny) will not work very well, or at all, as a toner-transfer method. The toner has to want to stick to the copper MORE than the shiny coating on the paper wants to stick to the paper. If there is no shiny surface to the paper/sheet, then the toner will "like" where it is, and not want to come off.
Ok Mark, next time I will try with another kind of paper for sure (magazine or glossy paper), I always clean my pcb surfaces with sand paper and alcohol before putting any paper on it.
I made most of my projects with this method: 3207 mod zombie chorus, some rats, pulsar, TS, Dist +, DB Delay, Rebote Delay, DOD compressor, Orange Squeezer, OD-1, FF Ge, FF Si, Tone Bender, Big Muff, LP JTM, Purple Plexi, Plexi Drive, OCD, etc...
All of them always had little tracks problems, it is time to find a best way for transer..
PH
I'm waiting for someone to do a board with a 3-D printer. Either print the conductors or print the resist on a copper-clad board. No need for the third dimension, so it should print pretty rapidly, like a minute per square inch. Certainly not a production technique but for a one-off, this could be good.
Quote from: percyhornickel on May 26, 2023, 11:10:48 PM
Ok Mark, next time I will try with another kind of paper for sure (magazine or glossy paper), I always clean my pcb surfaces with sand paper and alcohol before putting any paper on it.
I made most of my projects with this method: 3207 mod zombie chorus, some rats, pulsar, TS, Dist +, DB Delay, Rebote Delay, DOD compressor, Orange Squeezer, OD-1, FF Ge, FF Si, Tone Bender, Big Muff, LP JTM, Purple Plexi, Plexi Drive, OCD, etc...
All of them always had little tracks problems, it is time to find a best way for transer..
PH
Although Press-and-Peel blue works best, it is expensive. In recent years, I have switched to some yellow sheets I have bought from several sources, at about 1/5 the price, if not less. They are A4 size, unlike the 8.5 x 11" that PnP blue comes in, so one has to be mindful of lining it up right. But it works very well, and has 95% of the precision that PnP does.
I rate transfer paper based on the spacing required. For a 2 transistor fuzz with space between pads, photo paper - even the cheapest kind -is sufficient. Glossy magazine paper is also probably okay, but whatever is printed on it may make it hard to tell if the toner pattern has been completely transfered. If there are ICs with 1 or 2 traces running between the two rows of IC pins, then I use the yellow sheets. If there are ANY pads for surface-mount components, nothing less than PnP will do.
Ok I found here in Venezuela the yellow pcb transfer sheets here (kind of expensive too / $3 each), I think I will ask to my sister if there´s a chance to send me a few ones from U.S.A. next time she sends a box with "supplys" (she does it 2 or three times at year) so I´ve could try this method, for the kind of circuits I build this is more than enough I guess.
I was thinking to build something like the Ibanez CP-9 compressor (tonepad´s layout) which has traces running between the IC pins, I hope it gets easyer this way than the normal or glossy papper way.
PH
nope, not boards, i despised the drilling and dust , i only etch my enclosures now....
if i desperately need something quick i use stripboard still..but even that's rare these days..
Quote from: deadastronaut on May 28, 2023, 06:02:40 AM
nope, not boards, i despised the drilling and dust , i only etch my enclosures now....
if i desperately need something quick i use stripboard still..but even that's rare these days..
I have seen your etched enclosures in your site before, a really nice work!
Long time ago when I was a kid.
Etched one that needed no batteries.
(https://i.postimg.cc/zLBRnKnR/download.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/zLBRnKnR)
-
Only if I want to quickly try a circuit for which a layout already exists, or for situations where a special footprint is needed (e.g. impromptu adapter boards).
I recently tried spray painting the PCB black, then using a laser to remove it and it worked flawlessly. Far better than my old toner transfer methods.
(https://i.postimg.cc/9RwhQCqt/PXL-20230209-174808009-1.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/9RwhQCqt)
(https://i.postimg.cc/bdbPXYPq/PXL-20230209-180011498-MP-1.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/bdbPXYPq)
Were any "thin lines of copper" left behind because of the resolution of the raster used to remove material.?
Quote from: Phend on May 31, 2023, 05:31:02 PM
Were any "thin lines of copper" left behind because of the resolution of the raster used to remove material.?
At 300 lines per inch (LPI) it worked great, and it completely obliterated the paint.
I spray painted a few boards and tried out different speeds and power settings to find the optimum, but I don't recall if I experimented with LPI values and 300 was the best, or if I simply didn't try others.
How many watts ?
It's a 50W CO2 (@ 20%, 60mm/s). I just saw in my notes I ran it a bit out of focus, too, which probably contributes to avoiding any thin lines.
That said, I bet any laser, even a weak diode, can get through paint with enough patience.
I can etch thru the paint, not sure about the copper.
Found this stuff, not sure what it is, or where I got it. (ca7fr)
My laser is 40w and cuts 10mm acrylic in one pass.
(https://i.postimg.cc/zbLh0XP8/IMG-8105.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/zbLh0XP8)
Reading back to my earlier post
Quote from: Phend on June 01, 2023, 01:17:15 PM
I can etch thru the paint, not sure about the copper.
Found this stuff, not sure what it is, or where I got it. (ca7fr)
My laser is 40w and cuts 10mm acrylic in one pass.
Checking back on my earlier post, I think I may not have been clear. The paint is just an etching resist. I still use HCL and hydrogen peroxide to etch the board.
Copper is way too reflective for a CO2 beam to remove it.
Thank you for the clarification.
500w might do it though !
Hello everyone – 1st time post
I still old school etch, I like to keep my pcb looking a bit vintage
1/ Design in DIYLC.
2/ Capture trace only with snipping tool
3/ Print onto proper wax transfer paper using laser printer
4/ Cut out and apply to cleaned one sided PCB board
5/ Fix with a hot iron
6/ Peel off – touch up any pinholes with a black sharpie
7/ Etch in Aluminium Sulphate – takes around 4 hrs but no sink residue problems
8/ Drill holes with small cheap ebay hand drill
9/ Remove ink with acetone
10/ Re-polish copper with 600grit, clean again with acetone.
11/ Apply tin coating with Tin/Urea salts.
12/ done
(https://i.postimg.cc/DJBp6wB1/IMG-20230201-1305302.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/DJBp6wB1)
Hi.
I suffered from "Brother laser ink and magazine paper may not work".
Switching to toner transfer paper fixed things. The "put your name on a coffee cup" type. Print, slide the decal on, dry in oven, peel off plastic backing, bake toner on.
I've found:
Don't dry the decal too much. You might not get the backing film off. 3 minutes at 70 C (recommended for my paper is 10 minutes at 110 C).
No need to do the final bake at 180 C for 10 minutes. 150 C at 5 minutes is plenty.
Tracks need to be at least 0.02 inch wide (about 0.5 mm).
Ammonium persulphate 1:8 at 70 C etches in about 5 minutes if kept hot.
5g of persulphate is ample for 50mm x 25mm of board (2" x 1").
I'm way too impatient and make way too many design errors to send pcbs off for manufacturing.