It sounds like I need to talk to folks in the tool shop? and find out the capabilities of things. Jewelry folks still rely on a lot of hand tools or want is basically a motorized version of them.
I need to go hit the scrap yards for more copper sheet, soon.
I used the PCB mill last week as basically a motorized hand tool using the jog to cut out some boards after etching. Much better result than shears or a handsaw and easy to do.
Care to demo for a group of us some night? I will bring some stock and a set of Gerbers.
I was hoping to have someone do the same thing. I just used the manual jog and didn’t import files. I tried to do that before but had issues with file types. Didn’t spend any time trouble shooting since I was in a hurry so it might be a trivial issue.
Agreed with ChadB, the PCB mill has tooling meant to cut thin copper (1-2oz per ft^2) and also shallowly into the underlying fiberglass substrate.
Your project sounds like a great application for the Emco, however. I think copper can be “gummy” like aluminum, so some research is warranted.
Will there be another demo any time in the near future?
It’s out of commission since someone stripped it of parts. It’ll be a while before it’s up and running again.
That’s the sort of thing that makes me think the Facebook “emotion” thing isn’t a terrible idea… I need a 
button. Are we still down the parts?
We have had some donated parts but they are mismatched. 3-D printing just donated a printer that we can use parts from. I think it was @wandrson’s reprap?
Yeh, it was a reprap I built so I could learn how to keep the Printrbot Metal Simple functioning for more then a week at a time…
It had four matched steppers, which should also match two of the three steppers I donated to the pcb mill rebuild. As I recall it had a standard reprap controller board as well. Don’t know if that is useful for the pcb mill build though. The power supply was a standard chinese 12V, 10-20?A switching unit.
The last time I glanced over at it (about a week or so ago…), it was still a skeleton of its former self…
I’m not sure what the current plans for it are. It’s kept in the Electronics Room now, under their domain, so I’ve moved this thread to the Electronics category to make it easier to find for others who may be looking for an update on it as well.
Edit: I type too slow on this phone… Answers came in as I was trying to type this out. 
I’m still up for donating some money to get this fixed, as well as a kinda build day for it.
Did our fancy video system catch the offense? Why hasn’t the guilty party been brought to justice?
We were unable to see well in the corner where the bone picking occurred.
We can see you now! 
There were issues w/ camera. And of coarse we found out when we needed it. Problems have been fixed and second camera is on Brooks to do list…Thanks Brooks!
You can use Marlin for PCB milling, and even use auto-Z leveling to make sure the PCB is milling properly.
Honestly, photo-resist etching is the way to go. Great quality and some really good results down to .008" trace/space. The trick is to do a one-sided board, SMT on one side, thru-hole on the other, and jumpers where needed. Works like a champ, and a lot less work (IMO).
I like the concept, but this brings up all kinds of questions like:
*Where do we get the material for doing this photo resist etching?
*What sort of light (photo) do we need?
*What chemicals?
*What masks?
*How do we print the mask onto our board?
*Can we purchase prepregs and cores and make a multilayered board?
*etc??
If you are willing to help me figure out a good solution path from gerber to board for the space, I will make video about the process and set up to do some of this up there…
(Sorry that I didn’t see your reply earlier; you might have replied to the thread and not my post.)
This site is an absolutely great resource about photo etching PCBs:
http://www.electricstuff.co.uk/pcbs.html
For a more straightforward tutorial, Ladyada’s site is hardto beat:
http://www.ladyada.net/library/pcb/inhouseetch.html
I’d recommend a single-sided board design to start with, and working up from there.
Putting together a quick demonstration isn’t out of the question. It just boils down to time – right now I’m writing this while sitting in LHR’s departure lounge waiting to get back to the US. It’s been a busy year of business travel so far, but June should be calmer.
These are excellent resources! Thank you for sharing!
Of course, things always come down to a matter of cost, and the value of a developer’s time amortized on an hourly basis. So if the cost of equipment and time is less than you can find a board house to do the work, then obviously its worth consideration.
I have had the experience in the past of having the manufacturing service create schematic, layout, and stuff a set of quantity 10 boards each having 50 or so components. I paid some $6k for this service, which was nice because I only spent a couple of hours advising as to what components and headers I wanted on the design, and of course reviewed schematics, layout, and ohmed out the resulting boards. They came out flawless. MJS designs in phoenix az was the shop. The lady with the hair is the one who helped me, and i think it was her fathers business. http://www.mjsdesigns.com/contact.html
MJS is quite excellent for prototypes, and embraces the challenges for first revision stuff. Of course, once things are all worked out there, you may as well do your volume run right there. It will cost less. So it makes since that they ‘loss lead’ and do first article stuff. First articles become volume products sometimes.