Homebrew PCBs

Hi Nick,
I am up in Brisbane  and can sympathize with your problem.

Over the last thirty years or so I have drilled thousands upon thousands of 
holes by hand.

Make sure you have decent holes in the pad before you start drilling. I 
usually set the hole size in the PCB design program to 20 thow. This acts 
like a center pop mark and the drill finds its own center.

Use only the tungsten carbide bits as the normal HSS drills go blunt after 
about thirty holes. The tungsten bits are more expensive but last for ages. 
However if you look at them the wrong way they snap.

I use a Desk Mount Magnifier Lamp (Jaycar QM 3525) to look through. If I 
can't use this I wear a head magnifier.

I also have a jet of compressed air blowing on the drill tip to clear the 
swarf away.

Be careful with the Dremell on its drill stand. The Dremell stand I used to 
use was very sloppy and if one used all its travel the last couple of 
millimeters went sideways and broke the drill. I now use a Toyo drill press 
and it works without problems.

David


At 02:52 PM 26/08/2004, you wrote:
>Hello everyone.My name is Nick from Sydney Aust. My first post to
>this group.So this is probably a dumb question to you guys.I have
>managed to etch my first board after a few failures, but I came up
>with a real beauty(I think anyway).I drilled a board last week and i
>nearly went blind tryin to line up the bloody drill to the pads.So
>is there a way i can use a mirror or something to give me a better
>view of tiny drill to tiny pads. I am using a dremell mounted on a
>stand .The drilling is easy but lining up whilst looking through the
>magnifying glass is hard.Any tips would be appreciated.Thanks.
>
>
>
>
>
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David Hopkins (VK4ZF)
Queensland
AUSTRALIA
davhop@...
S 27, 22.294  E153, 11.008