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

For drilling I use a small hand held DC motor fitted with a pin chuck.  A foot switch is used to activate the motor and when the switch is released it shorts the motor winding so the motor stops very fast. I have drilled a lot of holes with the thing over the past 40 years.  It's no good for carbide bits they are too brittle, just use the standard HSS bits.  Keep as small wet stone handy and just touch up the drill once in a while when it gets dull. I would think one of those small diamond flat files would work well.

 It helps to set the artwork up so the pads have an etched center to locate the drill to the center of the pad.  If you set this up correctly you can leave the motor running between holes and things go faster.  But you don't have to do it this way,  with the motor stopped you can center the bit on the pad and press it down a little to keep it from walking when you press the foot switch.

There is a photo  of it in the photos secton under the album Craigs photos.  Don't use it much anymore as I just order my PCB's on line.

Craig