Homebrew PCBs

On Mon, 13 Jun 2016 15:18:04 +0000, you wrote:

>My problem isn't getting the toner to transfer well, it's etching. Lots of pinholes. The toner is too porous. I've tried the lighter fluid method of fixing the toner but no workie. The foil method will probably work if I can get the stuff hot enough to transfer. I am using original HP toner. Any thoughts ?

I use a GBC laminator and green foil.  The unmodified GBC laminator
does not have a temperature adjustment, and I use it on thinner (0.020
thick) boards.  Thicker boards will need more heat possibly.  When
using another laminator, I use the foil setting, which is the hottest
one.

I run the boards through twice.  The foil should be completely
transparent when removed (and I let it cool completely) over the parts
where it should have transferred.

Every once and a while it really screws up, don't quite know why.  May
be insufficient heat.

Not sure that people who use irons get a decent transfer, perhaps on
smaller boards.  I've done boards almost 4 * 6 with laminators and
toner transfer.  I can get generally less than 5 errors (pits) in a
board, but I do have to look at each board carefully for transfer
errors.

Harvey

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>Doug Forbes
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>________________________________
>From: Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com [Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com]
>Sent: Sunday, June 12, 2016 5:41 PM
>To: Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com
>Subject: RE: [Homebrew_PCBs] First attempt at toner transfer
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>Well, I tried the cold transfer method and\ufffd yeah.. no dice at all.  Probably my mixture wasn\ufffdt working right.
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>Anyway, for sport, I went back to the process I had tried before.  My PCB patterns are bigger than what\ufffds out there on youtube, and I had been printing them on separate pieces of paper.  This time, I printed them together on one piece of magazine paper from Hotrod Magazine (love that magazine).  Then I cleaned the board, let the iron get hotter than the blue blazes of h\ufffdll.. and then went for it.  Spent a good 10 minutes really working the iron \ufffd first back and forth nice and slow like a laminator, then faster, on the theory it would keep the paper hot all the way around.  I looked really closely and could kind of see where the toner was coming off the paper a little bit, and really worked the front end of the iron down on spots I thought were suspect.  Then I dunked the whole thing in a tub of cold water and let it sit for 2 minutes.  Anyway, voila!  The result:
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>http://s1381.photobucket.com/user/unclefalter/media/20160612_172825_zpstl1dzy7q.jpg.html
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>So that disproves that my compatible toner won\ufffdt work.. at least for the ironing process.  Don\ufffdt know if we\ufffdll have a problem when we etch?  But yeah.. it looks really good, I think.  I kind of figured the problem was \ufffdoperator error\ufffd here since 80%+ was coming off on my previous tries.
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>Now that I sort of have a procedure that works I think I\ufffdll keep at it and get my other patterns done.  Lots of Hotrods lying around. :)
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>Brad
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