My way to professional prototype at home.

[flodins]

Hi,

Just want to show my way of making a professional looking PCBs at home. This is faster and cheaper for small quantities than any manufacturer and satisfaction is priceless .

Hope you like it (:



Here is a design video:




And here production:




I have just developed through hole copper plating and tin plating so I will post more videos later.

[KTP]

I have never seen anyone do a solder mask at home...very neat and very nice job.

[Psi]

I wish my hacksaw moved that quick.

[IanB]

Mesmerizing!

I didn't catch from the video how you got each side of the board to line up?

[flodins]

as in the intro there are missing parts, because I did not want to wait while copying full SD card, but stay tuned for more videos on my channel

after exposure one layer i drill three 0.4mm holes in vias far from each other so placing a second mask is easy, misalignment is less than 0.1mm

with through hole copper plating, drilling is first step so there will be no problem to align photomasks,

[saturation]

Great job!

[digsys]

Awesome training video, great work.

[ChrisKiwi]

The finished  result looks great! but what materials, chemicals, etc are you using? or have you got that information somewhere else? like on a blog or something?

[free_electron]

Pretty slick , but a few comments

Safety:
1) fix the damn laminator so you don't have to mess woth the cover take the little board off the cover mount it on the machine and put some isolation over the exposed electrical comtacts
2) uv lightbox . Bare wires plugging into an iec connector... Seriously ? Why no proper powerplug ? And why is that live mains carrying pcb not in a plastic box ?
3) one gloved hand, one bare hand. The bare hand is touching chemicals more than the gloved hand in the video....

Thru hole metallisation. That's just sticking a bunch of wires in holes.. I thought somebody finally had cracked the home rout to copper plating without all the chemicals.... A bit disappointed

Now, as far as in dustrial process.. You are pretty close , but also far off.
The principles are there but there are a few important differences.

Dry film negative photomask , check. Works waaaay better than positive photomask.
Lamination, check
Exposure,  nobody uses photplots anymore. They are expensive, wear out, get damaged. Its LDI or now even Maskless imaging which can create incredibly fine patterns. LDI: a laser writes the pattern to the board. Same principle of a laser printer. Board moves horizontal while a laser scans the rasterized image vertically. Maskless imager: a DLP chip ( like used in video projectors ) is used to deflect a UV powersource. can write halftones to create perfect circles.

Developing. Check
Etching check
Cleanup check

Soldermask. Dry film.. Not used anymore. Too fragile. Too much waste. Liquid photomask or printed photomask ( silkscreen) : liquid photomask : spray on , expose uv , wash off.

But, for home usage the film way is the only solution.

Soldermask.. Dynamask ?  Developer is sodium carbonate.
You could even do a text layer. There's got to be white dryfilm out there...

All in all a pretty good video. But bad example for safety !

[KTP]

All in all a pretty good video. But bad example for safety !

I didn't realize all the saftey violations when I first watched the video....good point.

I used to hand make/etch boards about 15 years ago, but now you can just send your gerbers to one of many companies and get back high quality silk screened boards in about a week or so.

On the RGB matrix board I did recently, I ordered 10 boards about 9 inches by 8 inches each with silk screen and over 1000 holes (lots of thermal vias and such) for $220 total including shipping.  They actually ended up sending me 12 boards, VERY high quality, TSSOP24 package pads were perfect, air knife finishing.  I would still be drilling the via holes in the first board with a pile of 0.018 broken drill bits on the floor.

But for a video on what you can do at home, I thought it was very interesting.  I rank it along with that guy who hand built a vacuum tube at home...very impressive, but a similar transistor from digikey with better specs is $0.20

[flodins]

Pretty slick , but a few comments

Safety:
1) fix the damn laminator so you don't have to mess woth the cover take the little board off the cover mount it on the machine and put some isolation over the exposed electrical comtacts
2) uv lightbox . Bare wires plugging into an iec connector... Seriously ? Why no proper powerplug ? And why is that live mains carrying pcb not in a plastic box ?
3) one gloved hand, one bare hand. The bare hand is touching chemicals more than the gloved hand in the video....

I dont care, I know what is inside and I will newer get shock or bad from chemicals. This is NOT a tutorial only ilustrative video. If someone want to play with such mess and will stick hand into... so one idiot less. My instalation is quite trial and I know what I am doing.

Thru hole metallisation. That's just sticking a bunch of wires in holes.. I thought somebody finally had cracked the home rout to copper plating without all the chemicals.... A bit disappointed

Please read my first post not only watch videos. I have developed true through hole copper plating and tin plating after recording this viedo so I will post more videos later.

Now, as far as in dustrial process.. You are pretty close , but also far off.
The principles are there but there are a few important differences.

Dry film negative photomask , check. Works waaaay better than positive photomask.
Lamination, check
Exposure,  nobody uses photplots anymore. They are expensive, wear out, get damaged. Its LDI or now even Maskless imaging which can create incredibly fine patterns. LDI: a laser writes the pattern to the board. Same principle of a laser printer. Board moves horizontal while a laser scans the rasterized image vertically. Maskless imager: a DLP chip ( like used in video projectors ) is used to deflect a UV powersource. can write halftones to create perfect circles.

Developing. Check
Etching check
Cleanup check

Soldermask. Dry film.. Not used anymore. Too fragile. Too much waste. Liquid photomask or printed photomask ( silkscreen) : liquid photomask : spray on , expose uv , wash off.

But, for home usage the film way is the only solution.

Soldermask.. Dynamask ?  Developer is sodium carbonate.
You could even do a text layer. There's got to be white dryfilm out there...

All in all a pretty good video. But bad example for safety !

I can do silk screen too.

On the RGB matrix board I did recently, I ordered 10 boards about 9 inches by 8 inches each with silk screen and over 1000 holes (lots of thermal vias and such) for $220 total including shipping. 

$220 is acctualy 1/3 of my monthly salary, so for only one board like on video I will do it by my self, especially if it is not extremely complicated otherwise the PCB company is the only way

[Jimmy]

flodins

Well done man the boards look great keep up the good work. I looking forward to your upcoming vids and maybe a tutorial in the future.

On safety you should be as safe as practical the safety is not for you it is for the boffins that visit your lab.

[Monkeh]

Pretty slick , but a few comments

Safety:
1) fix the damn laminator so you don't have to mess woth the cover take the little board off the cover mount it on the machine and put some isolation over the exposed electrical comtacts
2) uv lightbox . Bare wires plugging into an iec connector... Seriously ? Why no proper powerplug ? And why is that live mains carrying pcb not in a plastic box ?
3) one gloved hand, one bare hand. The bare hand is touching chemicals more than the gloved hand in the video....

I dont care, I know what is inside and I will newer get shock or bad from chemicals. This is NOT a tutorial only ilustrative video. If someone want to play with such mess and will stick hand into... so one idiot less. My instalation is quite trial and I know what I am doing.

And that's the sort of attitude which leads to mistakes being made and injuries. For pete's sake, spend five minutes tidying it up.

Little bodge jobs are fine for testing, but if you're going to actually use it, finish it properly.

[CHexclaim]

A really nice job, congrats!

I agree that there are many issues in the video to rant about, but for me, the bottom line is that this is impressive and done with pride.

Charlie.

[flodins]

Pretty slick , but a few comments

Safety:
1) fix the damn laminator so you don't have to mess woth the cover take the little board off the cover mount it on the machine and put some isolation over the exposed electrical comtacts
2) uv lightbox . Bare wires plugging into an iec connector... Seriously ? Why no proper powerplug ? And why is that live mains carrying pcb not in a plastic box ?
3) one gloved hand, one bare hand. The bare hand is touching chemicals more than the gloved hand in the video....

I dont care, I know what is inside and I will newer get shock or bad from chemicals. This is NOT a tutorial only ilustrative video. If someone want to play with such mess and will stick hand into... so one idiot less. My instalation is quite trial and I know what I am doing.

And that's the sort of attitude which leads to mistakes being made and injuries. For pete's sake, spend five minutes tidying it up.

Little bodge jobs are fine for testing, but if you're going to actually use it, finish it properly.

I will fix everything for next video (:

[sorin]

Please read my first post not only watch videos. I have developed true through hole copper plating and tin plating after recording this viedo so I will post more videos later.

What post???
Can you explain what materials did you used??

[Stephen Hill]

This is faster and cheaper for small quantities than any manufacturer

Can you estimate the cost of producing a single prototype board?

The reason I ask is that I don't believe doing PCBs at home is now cheaper than getting a small batch from somewhere like Seeedstudio.

For example, Seeedstudio can do 10 of 100mmx100mm double sided boards for ~$25.

[flodins]

For this board is less than $2 and it took about 1h. Show me pcb house where I can order ONE board 100x100 mm for less than $10 including shipping and delivery in 24h.

[Stephen Hill]

I assume you are excluding the cost of equipment and chemicals? A breakdown of your costs would be nice to see...

Sorry for being skeptical, but I just don't believe that the cost of buying all the materials, chemicals, equipment is cheaper than getting a company to make them.

[KTP]

For this board is less than $2 and it took about 1h. Show me pcb house where I can order ONE board 100x100 mm for less than $10 including shipping and delivery in 24h.

The advantage to your method is that it is great for one offs with fast turnaround.  To get a single PCB made with next day delivery would cost several hundred dollars.  It was actually quite funny for my RGB board.  A single pc with 2 day turnaround was $250, but I could get 10 pc for $180 plus shipping with a 2 week turn (although they arrived in 8 days).

There are places where you can get your board tossed in with other people's boards on a panel and probably get under that $10 figure, but we are talking many days wait.

I think there is definately a good use for your methods and I like your video...looking foward to seeing you fix up some of the saftey issues though.

[flodins]

I assume you are excluding the cost of equipment and chemicals? A breakdown of your costs would be nice to see...

Sorry for being skeptical, but I just don't believe that the cost of buying all the materials, chemicals, equipment is cheaper than getting a company to make them.

Including chemicals.
I will describe later how to use househeld stuff instead propper pure chemicals as I have.

Equipment? hmm...

Everyone have toothbrush, some cup, stick,  and a halogen lamp(you don't need proper UV lamp for this) so there is no reason for including this in the cost.

I like doing it by my self and even if I needed to invest, this is better solution for me.

[slateraptor]

Very impressive.

[george graves]

I really wish you had given more details on the chemicals and materials.  Rats.

It looks great - but it's much more of "look at my magic", then it is helpful.  But I do think it looks nice!

[free_electron]

his chemicals are not that special

He's using dry-film etch-resist and soldermask. Dynamask or Dupont or one of many brands. sold on ebay as Positive Dry-film laminate. Developer is Sodiumcarbonate or potassium carbonate.

Precleaning the board is important. :
- scrub copper clean using pumic or scotch brite pad.
- Pre-etch in 5% hydrochloric acid to remove all oxidation.
- dry
- apply dry-film photomask ( peel backing material off )
- laminate in hot laminator
- expose to photomask
- peel of top foil
- develop in sodium carbonate

-etch . with what ever. sodium persulfate , ammonium persulfate , feCl of your homebrey hydrochloric aci+h2o2. the photomask is designed for sodium persulfate as that is the industrial etchant used.

- wash board in water
- strip etch resist using sodium hydroxide ( positive photo developer ) or a real stripper.

- dry board
- apply dry filme solder mask : peel of backing , put on copper , laminate
- expose to photomask
- peel off top protective foil
- develop in sodium carbonate

- drill holes.

if you want to put on a text layer : repeat step with different color of dynamask material. you culd even use photomaks as soldermask. that stuff is pretty thick and doesn't melt easy. it's a polymer. it hardens under UV light.

nothing secret in the chemicals nor the process.

get on ebay and search for 'dry film photoresist' and 'dry film developer'

Dow chemicals Dynamask : http://www.octamex.de/shop/?page=shop/flypage&product_id=31&category_id=5848924494118370762daa6f026e22f7&
Dupont Vacrel is another one
http://www.frezycnc.eu/pcb-processing-manual/photoresist-and-soldermask/lamination/pouch-lamination/laminating-dry-films-with-the-modulam/
http://www.megauk.com/dry_film_laminators.php
http://www.mgchemicals.com/products/prototype.html

[george graves]

Very helpful.  Thanks.