PCB Mill training

Electronics
#21

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 thereā€¦

#22

(Sorry that I didnā€™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, Ladyadaā€™s site is hardto beat:

http://www.ladyada.net/library/pcb/inhouseetch.html

Iā€™d recommend a single-sided board design to start with, and working up from there.

Putting together a quick demonstration isnā€™t out of the question. It just boils down to time ā€“ right now Iā€™m writing this while sitting in LHRā€™s departure lounge waiting to get back to the US. Itā€™s been a busy year of business travel so far, but June should be calmer.

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#23

These are excellent resources! Thank you for sharing!

Of course, things always come down to a matter of cost, and the value of a developerā€™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 ā€˜loss leadā€™ and do first article stuff. First articles become volume products sometimes.

#24

Usually it is a matter of time for me: My projects arenā€™t usually profit-generating, and I tend to work on them late into the evenings (midnight-2am). Being able to shoot and etch a quick board in an hour is super nice. :slight_smile:

#25

you are clearly much quicker than I. It takes me at least an hour to even form the notion in my mind that I may need to make a board. Ill remember your expedience should I encounter a situation where a majority of my slow cranial neurons happen to conclude that a PCB development is in orderā€¦:wink:

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