[Lab] PCB Etching with the Laser Cutter

[Jason Arnold]

I hope this doesn't lead the discussion away from Dave's awesome work, but
Rick's comment on the trials of soldering fine pitch components on homemade
PCBs without soldermask got me thinking: why solder at all?

One thing that could make prototyping homebrew single-sided PCBs with SMT
components a breeze is 3M's z-axis tape. You'd just etch the board as per
Dave's how-to, put this magic tape between your PCB traces and components
and BAM!

3M has an elaborate product page here
<http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/en_US/Electronics_NA/Electronics/Products/Product_Catalog/%7E/3M-Electrically-Conductive-Adhesive-Transfer-Tape-9703?N=4294406280+5153906&Nr=AND%28hrcy_id%3A5CP6S9HG9Rgs_LXDB394ZN3_N2RL3FHWVK_GPD0K8BC31gv%29&rt=d>
but this product page from Adafruit <https://www.adafruit.com/product/1656>
has a great description on how it works.

This stuff's obviously not the right tool for the job on this project, but
for other projects that are lower power and not exposed to temperature
swings or UV, I think the tape holds a lot of promise... no pun intended.

*Jason*

2014-11-16 15:32 GMT-05:00 Darcy Whyte <darcy at inventorartist.com>:

> Yeah, Dave's board is pretty seggsy...
>
> Really makes me want to try milling one...
>
> I think the whole point of doing a board by hand is to save time on
> project duration so probably just use larger components...
>
> I've got a few things in the queue so as soon as I come up with a circuit
> to make I'm going to try...
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Darcy Whyte
>
> Art+ inventorArtist.com <http://inventorartist.com/> | Aviation
> rubber-power.com
> Contact: darcy at inventorArtist.com | 613-563-3634 by appointment (no text)
>
>
> On Sun, Nov 16, 2014 at 1:39 PM, Richard Sloan <rsloan at themindfactory.com>
> wrote:
>
>> If you are not a pro solder-er then SMT is a bitch without solder mask!
>> even SO8 SO16 type packages which are the most friendly you will repeatedly
>> bridge, it can be done, lots of solder wick!
>>
>> Simple drilling out Daves board with a hand drill is not that hard, been
>> there, done it :-)
>>
>> Daves board, which I saw last night, is very nice!
>>
>> R.
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Nov 15, 2014 at 6:59 PM, greg atcheson <greg.atcheson at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Consider surface mount, it's easier than you think and there is no
>>> drilling!
>>> On Nov 15, 2014 5:35 PM, "Darcy Whyte" <darcy at siteware.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> wow, that was fast! I'm still mulling over what circuit to make for my
>>>> first pcb project. :)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Darcy Whyte
>>>>
>>>> Software Since '88 siteware.com | Contact: darcy at siteware.com |
>>>> 613-563-3634 by appointment
>>>>
>>>> Canada N 45° 25'03.1" W 75° 42'21.4"
>>>> Art+ inventorArtist.com <http://inventorartist.com/> | Aviation
>>>> rubber-power.com
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Sat, Nov 15, 2014 at 4:11 PM, Dave Hunt <dave at huntgang.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> I etched my very first PCB today, and I used the laser to do it!  I
>>>>> thought it worked out rather well other than I have to manually drill the
>>>>> holes now.
>>>>>
>>>>> I put up a post on my blog illustrating the process I followed and I
>>>>> thought I would share it in case others are interested.
>>>>>
>>>>> Dave
>>>>>
>>>>> http://blog.huntgang.com/2014/11/15/laser-cutter-pcb-etching-tutorial/
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> Lab mailing list
>>>>> 1. subscribe http://artengine.ca/mailman/listinfo/lab
>>>>> 2. then email Lab at artengine.ca to send your message to the list
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Lab mailing list
>>>> 1. subscribe http://artengine.ca/mailman/listinfo/lab
>>>> 2. then email Lab at artengine.ca to send your message to the list
>>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Lab mailing list
>>> 1. subscribe http://artengine.ca/mailman/listinfo/lab
>>> 2. then email Lab at artengine.ca to send your message to the list
>>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Lab mailing list
>> 1. subscribe http://artengine.ca/mailman/listinfo/lab
>> 2. then email Lab at artengine.ca to send your message to the list
>>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Lab mailing list
> 1. subscribe http://artengine.ca/mailman/listinfo/lab
> 2. then email Lab at artengine.ca to send your message to the list
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://artengine.ca/pipermail/lab/attachments/20141116/81281e78/attachment.html>