Electronics > Beginners
PCB Drilling
Domagoj T:
--- Quote from: Old Printer on April 30, 2019, 06:08:58 pm ---I didn't get the impression the OP was using carbide bits, but I could be wrong. I wanted to offer a possible solution for his current tooling. Sharping a bit that small by hand is not a trivial task, but with a fine wheel and a bit of practice, far from impossible..
--- End quote ---
HSS bits are entirely unsuitable for the task, as witnessed by OP. Even if his sharpening skills were top notch and he had the equipment to properly sharpen such small bits, it would still be of no use. The reduction in the hole size does not come from the dulling of the cutting edge, but from the bit being abraded on its sides, reducing the diameter. You would need to grind off all the affected length before sharpening, only to get another 5-10 usable holes before having to go through the whole process all over again.
Carbide is the only reasonable way to drill PCBs. Luckily the carbide bits of quality suitable for hobby use are so cheap that the cost of buying them should not be of concern.
In hobby use, they last forever (or until you break them, whichever comes first).
I can post some pictures/videos of the little drill I use (on Thursday when I get back to work) if anybody is interested. The setup is fairly cheap, but quite effective for PCB drilling (not much else).
Gyro:
You can still get carbide drill bit sets for little money, eg: https://www.amazon.co.uk/KKmoon-Tungsten-Carbide-Engraving-Circuit/dp/B074DW29RR/
Old Printer:
--- Quote from: Domagoj T on April 30, 2019, 06:34:33 pm ---
--- Quote from: Old Printer on April 30, 2019, 06:08:58 pm ---I didn't get the impression the OP was using carbide bits, but I could be wrong. I wanted to offer a possible solution for his current tooling. Sharping a bit that small by hand is not a trivial task, but with a fine wheel and a bit of practice, far from impossible..
--- End quote ---
HSS bits are entirely unsuitable for the task, as witnessed by OP. Even if his sharpening skills were top notch and he had the equipment to properly sharpen such small bits, it would still be of no use. The reduction in the hole size does not come from the dulling of the cutting edge, but from the bit being abraded on its sides, reducing the diameter. You would need to grind off all the affected length before sharpening, only to get another 5-10 usable holes before having to go through the whole process all over again.
Carbide is the only reasonable way to drill PCBs. Luckily the carbide bits of quality suitable for hobby use are so cheap that the cost of buying them should not be of concern.
In hobby use, they last forever (or until you break them, whichever comes first).
I can post some pictures/videos of the little drill I use (on Thursday when I get back to work) if anybody is interested. The setup is fairly cheap, but quite effective for PCB drilling (not much else).
--- End quote ---
That would be appreciated, I don't have a setup for doing thicker boards. I have done some thumbnail sized boards of .2mm material for a micro model airplane project and "drilled" them with a Co2 laser, but it does not work well on anything much thicker.
CatalinaWOW:
I have now set up a CNC board mill which handles this nicely. But a hack for manual drilling that aided me a lot was 3D printing a drill guide. Your mileage may vary but it improved my accuracy and dropped drill breakage significantly.
My theory in trying this was that the relatively soft filament printing material would be not be as hard on the drill bit with initial offset errors and that the spindle runout could be gently reduced. I don't know if either of the theories was valid, but it worked.
Domagoj T:
As promised, this is a video of the upgrade I made for the drill press.
The old version had a motor with significant runout. Additionally it was too slow for effective drilling with small diameter bits. The new motor is much faster, has much lower runout and is quieter.
The L bracket is still something that needs to be addressed as it is not as stiff as I'd like it to be.
The base contains the power supply for the motor, lights (both above the table and below, and the air pump.
It uses a small Proxxon drill press stand as the basis for the setup, the rest is custom made.
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