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

Hello folks,
I am currently in the process of gathering parts for a CNC servo driven
XY plotter, which
is going to be my university project also for my final year. I would
like to isolation route PCBs.
I am aware that EDM is a currently successful method, but I am wondering
about laser
vaporisation. I have read about laser machining, which focuses the laser
beam to a focal
point where it heats up the metal (copper in the case of a PCB) so fast
it vaporises, thus
eroding the material away. Has anyone thought about this, tried it,
heard about it being done
or even think it's feasible for a PCB by the home hobbyist? I found that
you can pick up a
20W CO2 laser from eBay USA quite cheaply.
I figure the benefits of laser are the fact you can also drill all your
holes, cutout the shape of
the board, cut out irregular hole shapes (like D-sub support pins) and
even engraving.
Another benefit I see for laser is the fact you have no grounding, which
makes EDM difficult
with vectors. This would mean you can isolate the traces without regards
for whether you are
still completing the circuit.

Anyone have any ideas or want to talk about this, it'd be great!!

-Mikey