Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: Homebrew PCBs

Hi,

There was talk a few days ago about using a vacuum pump when applying Press-N-Peel to a circuit board. Vac Pumps are expensive and Vacuum Cleaners don't pull enough vacuum.

I have been in the refrigeration business for more years than I care to remember and one of the jobs I do is remove all the air from a fridge system before it can be gassed up. I now have a very good vacuum pump but when I started I used an old fridge motor. These will pull 30" of vacuum with no trouble, the larger the motor the quicker it will do it. I could do 30" on a 6' fridge/freezer in about 15 minutes with a small motor from an under the counter domestic fridge, so a small bag with a circuit board inside would only take a few minutes. There is no problem in leaving the pump running longer because they are oil filled and even when too hot to touch cause no damage.

A little tip is to empty the oil out and measure the contents before you use it for the first time. Then periodically, I used mine all day every day and only checked the oil level once a month. Any light oil will do the job.

Regards,

Terry


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