Hey John,
Thank you for the kind words. A router is still the path for me but I think
you've come up with an excellent idea for people who want to use plotters
for resist work.
Just as a little follow-up:
A light pressure scribe line produced an isolation area .006" wide. At this
width it's very important to make sure etchant doesn't leave behind any
tiny hair width bridges across the isolation. Brushing the surface with a
soft brush during etching to make sure all these small areas "wet" worked
well and eliminated the hair size bridges.
A slightly heavier scribe, or going over the same area lightly twice with
the point, produced an isolation area .011" wide. No bridges across the
isolation lines were found.
Again, this was etching with sodium persulfate at 120 degrees F.and using
Dykem Steel Blue layout fluid as a resist.
Denny
At 07:24 PM 04/06/2002 -0000, you wrote:
>Denny,
> Great job! When the idea hit me I was working on a 4 axis
>4 wire controller board. I try to be innovative. Like I said in
>my first message. I am here to help out! I goofed by sending
>people to a picture of an etched board I did. The problem was
>I used the location of a page on my website instead of the
>picture. I only wanted people to know I really mill circuit
>boards for a living using a Dremel. I also use cheap 1/4-20 threaded
>rod for all my machines. In the right hands Scratch and Etch will
>be lots of fun! A cheap plotter and some isolation software.
>
> Good work Denny!
>
> John
>
>
>
>--- In Homebrew_PCBs@y..., milwiron@t... wrote:
>>
>> Hello Steve, John and All,
>> I had to run a sample of a redesigned board Saturday morning so I
>tried a
>> simple Scratch and Etch test of John's idea.
>> Here are some fast notes:
>> I coated a small piece of 1 oz. single sided board stock with Dykem
>metal
>> layout fluid. (I did clean the board first with 320 wet or dry and
>a quick
>> wipe with lacquer thinner. Scribing lines through layout fluid
>coating
>> produces very clean marks with no chipping
>> A metal-scriber's weight alone is not quite enough to get a line
>down to
>> the copper, a little extra weight was needed. A light spring
>loading on the
>> plotter would probably be fine.
>> I also scribed some thicker lines with a 1/16" inch wide tool I had
>laying
>> on my bench.
>> The board was etched in Sodium Persulfate at 120 degrees F.
>> The Dykem layout fluid had no problem as a resist, in fact I'll
>probably
>> fill a pen and start using it to repair bad resist areas on proto
>boards.
>> Bottom line: The resulting etched scribe lines came out beautifully
>and the
>> Dykem cleans off easily with Scotch Brite or some light wet or dry
>sanding.
>> My only minor concern is the narrowness of the isolations produced
>by a
>> pointed scriber and soldering using a set of eyes that ain't what
>they were
>> 10 years ago.
>> Denny
>>
>>
>>
>> >> Very interesting idea.
>> >> You could use layout fluid for metal working. Most are a lacquer
>> >> type base
>> >> and scratch very cleanly since that's exactly what they're
>> >> designed for.
>> >> Dykem is one manufacturer, it's available in a couple of colors,
>> >> spray or
>> >> brush.
>> >> Denny
>> >
>> >Great idea. Anyone here have some and some etchant and want to try
>> >it and report back here? Nothing fancy, just coat a scrap of board
>> >and then scratch the surface with the scratching device held at 90
>> >degrees with only its own weight holding it down.
>> >
>> >Steve Greenfield
>> >
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