Try it on small scale and see if it works. I wonder where all the iron
ions go ? Iron goes in and none comes out !. My guess is you end up
with lots of ferrous chloride sludge.
I think the best regeneratable etchant is the cupric chloride type,
the one that consumes cheap hydrochloric acid. I tried on a small
scale and its very fast. At 50C with bubble agitation it can etch 36
um copper clad (1 oz/ft²) in under 2 minutes.
Have a large tank (> 10 liters) so you don't have to go through he
laborious regeneration procedure very often. You need to titrate the
HCl with a burette and indicator, standard lab glassware and fairly
cheap to setup. Also the tank should be fairly well closed when in
storage so HCl gas doesn't evaporate over many months or years.
Adam
Steve Greenfield wrote:
> Someone on the Seattle Robotic list said he recharges his FeCl.
> Here's what he said:
>
> ∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗
> I have not thrown out FeCl in 12 years. I keep recharging the same
> batch. I apply a voltage to a set of nails in the FeCl. One
> terminal corrodes away (putting the Fe back), the other terminal
> plates out copper (ugly mix of Iron and copper so you wouldn't use
> it for anything else, but it takes the copper out of the solution).
>
>
> I don't know what the voltage is that I use, I suppose it is
> somewhere between 1 and 5 volts. I use a variable 12V supply and a
> current meter. About a dozen nails wired together and spread out,
> I run the voltage up until I have about 4 amps flowing. I leave
> that on for half a day to charge up a 2 gallon stock.
> ∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗∗
>
> Anyone else doing this?
>
> Steve Greenfield
>
> =====
> Steve Greenfield // Digital photography, scanning,
> Polymorph Digital Photography // retouching, and photomorphing
> 253/318-2473 voice // to your specs.
> polymorph@... //
> http://www.polyphoto.com/ // Based in Tacoma, WA, USA
>
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