The Shop > Electronics & IC Programing
Making a home brew printed circuit board
Chuck in E. TN:
I've finally got a working programmer, I hope. Now I find I need to make an adapter board to mount the PIC on and connect the adapter to the programmer. I went the same rout as with the controller board. I had Office Depot print some coppies of the art on a laser printer. Then I used the hot clothes iron transfer method. Problem is, the artwork has such thin conductor pathes, my transfer is not working too well.
My question, can I touch up the pathes that need repair with a sharpie? Will that work? Or do I need to get the art redrawn with bigger traces?
Thanks again to all that have assisted me in this project.
Chuck
dakengineermeister:
Better to use a PCB etch resist pen. (search on etch resist pen, lots of places cary 'em.) The ink that these pens put out carries a liquid latex rubber that can dry very fine. They make 1/16-in tips which are quite fat and tend to blot out and 1/64-in tips with a steel reinforcing barrel around the tip that hold shape quite well. ~25yrs ago I used these a whole lot. I even went so far as to build a small 3-axis stepper motor controlled plotter to use these pens to draw directly onto the copper without using photo resist.
To answer your question, yes, you can use a sharpie but it does react with the etch resist a bit and you'll get weak etch resist where you touch it up. This can lead to traces that are partially etched though but still conduct for extremely low currents (higer impedance). It'll work in a pinch for slow digital stuff.
-Kenneth
ibuildstuff4u:
I made this board up for an amp project last month. I take my paper to Kinkos and have them print it for me. I have them crank up the toner for me which seems to help provide more toner to transfer to the circuit board. I also bought a non contact temp gun so I can test my iron which helped me find a good setting to use.
As for the drilling, right now I'm using a Dremal tool with a 90* head on it. The bits I'm using are really tiny diamond balls which seem to be working good, but I plan to buy better bits in the future.
I don't buy the special etching acid any more and simply brew my own. It works better and is cheaper. I buy Muriatic acid from the local hardware store for $5.00 a half gallon. Then I add hydrogen peroxide to the mix and it's ready to go. If the etching slows down add more hydrogen peroxide and it will pick back up again.
Good luck!
Dale P.
John Rudd:
Dale,
Nice job on the boards...
What are the o/p devices? transistors or mosfets?
Care to share the schematic?
John
ibuildstuff4u:
The amp is not my design, I found the plans on this web site.
https://sites.google.com/site/quasisdiyaudiosite/nmos-series/nmos200-1
I'm building the TO247 version
The next amp I want to build is the Destroyer DX Blame MK III. I got some really nice 5 oz copper boards to use for this build. It takes hours to etch the 5 oz copper! The only trouble is I don't really need a 300 watt amp, I just want to build it!
Do you have any pictures of your rotary table? I would be interested in seeing it as well as the circuit. I have some spare steppers and drives and would love to hook one up to my rotary table.
Dale P.
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