Squink - the personal electronic circuit factory

[MagicSmoker]

A colleague just sent me a link to [yet another] ambitious attempt to rapidly prototype pc boards at home:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/botfactory/squink-the-personal-electronic-circuit-factory

It's basically a desktop cnc that applies conductive ink to whatever flexible or rigid board substrates. Concept seems sound, but as per usual, the devil is in the details.

[Dongulus]

From their FAQ,

What is the minimum line width/spacing?
The accuracy of the inkjet printing process allows for lines as thin as 10mils, as well as a 10mil spacing.

They don't seem to report a practical limit to the trace width and spacing. My guess is that they would have more trouble placing the conductive glue precisely and consistently than with printing the traces.

For $3k, this just doesn't seem justifiable. Chemical etching copper clad is hard to beat for rapid prototyping; it may not take as little as 30 mins like Squink does for the entire assembly, but it's still much quicker than getting a PCB manufactured. An etched PCB is much more robust and also offers the ability to do double-sided PCBs, which doesn't seem doable with Squink. Squink just feels far too limited to be useful.

[kony]

Nah.
Not worth it, if I can get proper film matrices in under 1 hour made for peanuts (look up for DTP studio nearby) and etch it myself in another 15 minutes (if not desperate for having solder masks, otherwise another 30 minutes for doing that).
Not a single problem with 10/10 mil double sided PCBs this way (and even finer resolution at the cost of using alkaline etch bath - but I don't want something outgassing ammonia in my shop).
The biggest hassle is drilling.

I doubt there are any time savings using this conductive-ink method in any board more complex than few components - mostly due to epoxy dispensing, not even to mention robustness of prototype.
Also - what about traces resistance ?

Edit: wrong conversion of units in trace/space specs.

[jaxbird]

Looks like a fun toy, but at $3K it's much too expensive! I don't see it as usable beyond toy level.

You can get a CNC for less than 1/4 that amount, that will do better than 5 mill resolution and allow you to make usable proto boards in a short time for peanuts.

Just need a material that is less hazardous to machine than FR4, but with approximately the same performance.

Or someone invent a machine that will produce multilayer boards with proper through hole plating in a short time with a reasonable cost.

[a.malin]

... with proper through hole plating in a short time with a reasonable cost.

I haven't even managed to find a way of doing that yet. (And no, via rivets do not count!)

So it seems like this dream machine is a long ways away. Also, it's funny how they're trying to word things to make it seem as those printing the boards on paper is a good thing, because then they're flexible!

[poorchava]

Making a board is 40 minutes tops printing photomask on drafting paper, enchancing in paint thinner vapours. Using dry film which very cheap nowadays and HCl+peroxide for etching is really fast. Plus I can get 8/8 mils resolution and a pcb to which you can actually solder stuff.

I'm gonna be convinced that this makes any sense when I see this machine reliably producing 0.5mm QFP144 fanned-out footprints.

[miguelvp]

Didn't Dave do a video about this recently? IIRC the main limitation is the minimum spacing/pitch for SMD parts. At least they have a working prototype.

That was these guys:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cartesianco/the-ex1-rapid-3d-printing-of-circuit-boards

Last comment was on December I wonder if they delivered on time since no one is commenting about where their printers are and the last update on June 17th implies that shipping is immediate.

Edit:
Also these guys shipped their kits it seems:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1597902824/agic-print-printing-circuit-boards-with-home-print

[kingofkya]

... with proper through hole plating in a short time with a reasonable cost.

I haven't even managed to find a way of doing that yet. (And no, via rivets do not count!)

So it seems like this dream machine is a long ways away. Also, it's funny how they're trying to word things to make it seem as those printing the boards on paper is a good thing, because then they're flexible!

Hum, you got me thinking those conductive epoxy or whatever could make good vias on CNC boards. Do one side of the board (with holes drilled) apply some epoxy like you would a solder paste then mill that side.

[EEVblog]

I agree, the price makes this a complete non-starter.

[EEVblog]

Making a board is 40 minutes tops printing photomask on drafting paper, enchancing in paint thinner vapours. Using dry film which very cheap nowadays and HCl+peroxide for etching is really fast. Plus I can get 8/8 mils resolution and a pcb to which you can actually solder stuff.

I easily got 8/8 on my laser printer photoresist boards back in the day. 6/6 was possible.

[firewalker]

Just make a waterproof ink printer to print on standard copper boards! Why bother with conductive ink... 

Alexander.