Printing Circuit Boards at Home

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 16:53:38 GMT

But the quickest easist way is plausibly just drawing on breadboards with electronic graphite pencils.

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 16:51:24 GMT

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 01:39:34 GMT

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RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 23:41:30 GMT

I just got up and running by hand with these basic supplies:

12v adjustable speed Dremel

The Dremel goose neck attachment

Dremel Bits

Proxxon KT70 microcompound xy table

drill press stand*

...i'm going to hand mill a step motor driver board for my unipolar motors.

*(im using the proxxon stand with dremel gooseneck which required a 1/2' hex nut grinded down a little)

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 16:09:23 GMT

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 13:58:27 GMT

The precision leadscrew assemblies came and I'm way happy with them. I should be able to do a good bit (no pun intended) in way of custom boards, once I get it tightly put together.

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 17:36:18 GMT

Just ordered 2 pairs of used leadscrew assemblies ~$10/pair.

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 00:12:25 GMT

Just ordered a new 5 axis controller board for $25 on ebay.

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 02:27:26 GMT

I'm going to experiement with using balsa wood for my first cnc device; since I can make straight cuts with an exacto-knife and metal ruler, I won't need access to a shop. It is somewhat inexpensive, and has an extremely good stregth/weight ratio as well.

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

e14 Contributor — Sun, 30 Jan 2011 05:06:16 GMT

Zad, thank your for your feedback, as I am unfamiliar with many of the more recent pcb manufacturing technologies. This is something I'm going to check into, although what appeals to me most about cnc milling, is that I can use a variety of other non-conducting materials for circuit boards as well. For example, I'm interested in experimenting with sheet glass and diamond bits It seems like that in addition to the aestheic qualities, the thermal properties of glass might improve cooling. The other thing is that by adding a z-axis down the road, I can manufacture other parts as well, which would be extremely usefull, perhaps making cnc a better investment.

RE: Printing Circuit Boards at Home

Zad — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 16:08:46 GMT

First of all, have you considered the alternatives? Desktop CNC millers seem to be the thing to have now, perhaps because they seem easier and less dangerous than photo-etch?

Photo-etch gives a faster product, and produces a better PCB with higher feature resolution. Even accounting for UV box and etch tank, it is a fraction of the cost of a milling machine. Photo-etch does need some (small) skill to calibrate the UV exposure and etch time, and requires that you aren't stupid with chemicals, but I fear in this H&S driven society, people are inherently scared of all chemicals. You don't need to use horrible Ferric Chloride now either, I prefer to use sodium persulphate.

Just a thought anyway!

Mike.