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  1. #61
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    Cheers ynneb, I just hope it works now...lol

    Russell.



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    Quote Originally Posted by scratch_6057 View Post
    As for the PTHs,
    While “cleaning” my shop today I came across a bottle of
    GC Electronics ‘Nickel Print’. I’m wondering if this stuff
    can be soldered to ? ? ? It’s generally used to repair traces.
    If I recall, $8.00 - $10.00 for 2 oz bottle.
    FYI: I got around to trying this stuff out today,
    DON'T BOTHER. Placed some on a piece of RadioShack
    proto board and baked it @ 200 for 20 min to make
    sure it was cured. Resistance test two holes, same
    (top) side of board 0.40" distance = 5.7 Ohms. It will not
    take solder, even after being baked it melts under the
    soldering iron.

    This stuff MIGHT be good for emergancy trace repair
    ( if you can glop enough on and not cause a short )
    but call yourself LUCKY if it works.

    This stuff and PTH? Forget I ever mentioned it, PLEASE

    Mike_L

    When I was younger I thought I knew EVERYTHING,
    NOW, the older I get the more I find out I don’t know!


  3. #63
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    lol, thanks for doing the testing Mike, now I will get busy forgetting...heh

    Today I bought an extra magenta cartridge, some ferric chloride, some aluminium persulfate, a toaster oven second hand - 5 bucks!!! Just gotta draw up a small circuit or test pattern and try it all out, I will post results.

    Russell.



  4. #64
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    Hey C88Mod, did you have to change anything on your printer to get the magenta to work in the black ink slot ?
    Mine won't allow it to run with it in there

    Also the black ink is empty, I'm not particularly worried as it is no good for etching purposes, just seems strange, I have used it for the test prints, but hardly enough to run it dry, I am thinking it might have something to do with the head cleaning station, maybe it is too high and the little sponges hitting when they shouldn't and "sucking" the ink out of it via capillary action.

    Any suggestions welcome...

    Russell.



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    Quote Originally Posted by miljnor View Post
    thats a tiny pcb!

    did you use a hacked printer to make it?
    Yep, set the C88+ printer res to 2880x1440/best/inkjet paper with yellow
    and etched with floating the board upside down in (i like hot) ferric chloride.
    (you can see the etching process through the board this way.)

    I will take apart the printer to clean out the rollers, and maybe document
    my mods with pics and post them here.



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    Quote Originally Posted by epineh View Post
    Hey C88Mod, did you have to change anything on your printer to get the magenta to work in the black ink slot ?
    Mine won't allow it to run with it in there

    Also the black ink is empty, I'm not particularly worried as it is no good for etching purposes, just seems strange, I have used it for the test prints, but hardly enough to run it dry, I am thinking it might have something to do with the head cleaning station, maybe it is too high and the little sponges hitting when they shouldn't and "sucking" the ink out of it via capillary action.

    Any suggestions welcome...

    Russell.
    Huh?
    Have not touched the ink carts since i bought the printer.
    I don't switch carts around, i just use color exchange pcb.ps in gimp.
    (i use linux tools, kicad, gimp, for pcb printing.)
    I guess you could take cart out and shake it to see if it is truly empty...
    What does it weigh compared to a new one?

    And i raised my printhead ~0.065 just by shimming the front of it. (pics will follow soon.)



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    epineh
    How does your printer print at all with an empty cart?
    my C88 will not print anything until all carts are happy and have ink.

    black barely works in ferric but is mostly intact and has some under etching, compared to persulfates or hci+h202 that just strips off the ink, this one was done in durabrite black, cured and floated upside down in ferric chloride. (thats enough of the small pics

    (epson durabrite yellow barely hangs on in persulfates, and esp the nasty hci+h202 mix.)

    For black, the trick is to not agitate the warm ferric etchant, just let it alone and do its thing.
    havent tryed cupric yet, as i can get 16oz of ferric at RS (276-1535) for $4.29.

    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Hacking A Printer To Directly Print PCB's-p1010002-jpg  


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    Default What's wrong with toner transfer?

    The boards were done with laser printing onto Epson glossy INKJET paper, then transferred with a heated badge laminator.

    I have not tried it with ink, but that might work too.

    There's more photos on my site...

    Regards,

    Barry

    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Hacking A Printer To Directly Print PCB's-done-jpg  
    my projects:
    http://www.barryfish.com


  9. #69
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    Toner transfer can't get as fine a transfer, and in my experience isn't as consistent as just printing on the board would be.

    besides Toner transfer method is well covered in other posts, so there is no reason to go into it here.

    Not to mention the cool factor of a pcb printer!

    thanks
    Michael T.
    "If you don't stand for something, chances are, you'll fall for anything!"


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    Thumbs up

    Keep up the good work on this. I am currently converting my Epson
    CX 3500 printer scanner to do exactly this and have been following
    this thread and the massmind site very closely. Have not tried etching
    yet but have printed test PCB, this Morning.

    To use an empty cart, just reset it , with a chip reseter , the printer reads
    the chip as full after being reset. As for Running out of ink , pull the cart
    and shake it , Bet it still has plenty just need to reset it For some reason
    these Epsons are not very accurate at calculating the amount of ink they
    use.

    Kym



  11. #71
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    Default Ok, I'll give in...

    Michael,

    I'd love to see a direct print method work but doubt that you will get good resist action without modifying the ink to withstand spray etching.

    Without etching fast, your boards will suffer from undercutting (etching under the resist)

    As a starting point, you might try adding a fraction of a gram of chelating agent to the ink to bond the ink together. Something like a dichromate (ammonium dchromate, potassium dichromate might work)

    If you can get the ratio to print without kicking you would just expose the inked boards to UV or heat to get the ink to bind up. Once set it should take dynamite to get it off the board.

    Dichromates like most other chemicals are frowned upon in todays world (due to toxicity) (but used everyday anyway). A source might be a silk screen guy - dichromates are used as a photo sensitizer for emulsions. Add a pinch to elmers glue and you make a photo emulsion.

    Hope this helps and good luck on your method.

    Barry

    my projects:
    http://www.barryfish.com


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    Hi Barry.
    You beat me to the punch about dichromates. When we were screen printing (many years ago) that was our standard method.
    In fact I used dichromate /gelatine to produce photoimages on wood/stone/whatever in the days when life was full of time to experiment !

    One thing I will add here, though, as you raised the point about speed of etching.
    I found a very simple method which when I was etching 1 mm bas-reliefs in brass and copper, might have a wider application here, and that was to add in the idea of electrolysis to the mix.
    I was using dichromate photo resists, and all I did was to add another electrode (another copper plate if memory serves) and connect 1.5 volt battery across it and the copper plate.
    The etching rate went up suprisingly - minutes of etching became seconds.
    It might be worth checking out. I was using 10% battery acid as an electrolyte, but later diluted that down to about 1%.
    Regards
    John

    PS I also wondered about adding dichromate/gelatin to the ink.

    It's like doing jigsaw puzzles in the dark.
    Enjoy today's problems, for tomorrow's may be worse.


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    Quote Originally Posted by Barry_ward View Post
    I'd love to see a direct print method work but doubt that you will get good resist action without modifying the ink to withstand spray etching.
    Barry
    This is one of the photo's I saw on the Yahoo group, was one of the reasons I went this way, the quality seems fine to me, any smaller and I'm gonna need a microscope inserted into my head...

    I don't know if I am allowed to show it here, cannot remember which user it was to ask permission so look while you can!!!

    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Hacking A Printer To Directly Print PCB's-pcb-etched-jpg  


  14. #74
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    Default Holy Crap Batman !

    That's fantastic.
    It's nice that he printed the secret method right on the board.

    A few things seem certain to me.
    He spent some time perfecting the method.
    I'll bet he had virgin FeCl3
    I'll bet that he sprayed it onto the board. Once you spray your ferric, you won't go back to any other method. There is something magic about a warm thin spray running over the board. The copper dissappears before your eyes (and you can see the surface of the board while it's etching)

    Because I can get 8 mil lines with the transfer method, and I'm set up to do it, I'll probably stick with it for now, but when I get the time I may work on the inkjet. It's definitely way cool.

    Thanks for posting the photo.
    Now I'm waiting for the plate-thrus.....

    Barry

    my projects:
    http://www.barryfish.com


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    Default A common thread to good results

    As I reflect on what makes the beginning of good results, there is always heat involved.

    I preheat my transfer boards too. I think that it drives off moisture and oils that hurt high resolution.

    my $0.02 USD worth..

    my projects:
    http://www.barryfish.com


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    Quote Originally Posted by Barry_ward View Post
    Now I'm waiting for the plate-thrus.....

    Barry
    Lol you and me both, though one step at a time. I am waiting on a chip resetter and I am back in business...

    I am with you on the heat, makes sense to warm it up to help get rid of moisture etc, and as you mentioned it will take some time to perfect, but the results look worth it.

    Russell.



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    Barry, this direct inkjet printing of not only echant resist, but also solder mask and "silkscreen" is not something we are hopeing for: IT WORKS!

    And not 8 mil, people using direct inkjet resist printing are RELIABLY doing 3 mil and double sided, in LESS time than it takes to do toner transfer. How is it faster? Well, there is no time required to run it through the laminator or hold it under the iron, and then it doesn't require any time to remove the paper. You pre-heat the board for a minute, load it in to the printer, push print, and heat it for a few minutes to cure. Done. Etch. Then back through the printer for solder mask / silkscreen.

    We are well past hope and on to perfecting the method.

    The ONLY downside is that you have to hack the printer. And I think we may find there are CD printers that will be found to work without modification other than loading the right inks.



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    Quote Originally Posted by kowell View Post
    Keep up the good work on this. I am currently converting my Epson
    CX 3500 printer scanner to do exactly this and have been following
    this thread and the massmind site very closely. Have not tried etching
    yet but have printed test PCB, this Morning.

    To use an empty cart, just reset it , with a chip reseter , the printer reads
    the chip as full after being reset. As for Running out of ink , pull the cart
    and shake it , Bet it still has plenty just need to reset it For some reason
    these Epsons are not very accurate at calculating the amount of ink they
    use.

    Kym
    Feel free to post pic's on this thread Kym, the more info on this stuff the better IMHO.
    Just wondering, once the chips are reset do they need to be reset ever again?
    Or do they need resetting every fill/drain cycle ?

    Cheers.

    Russell.



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    Quote Originally Posted by C88mod View Post
    epineh
    How does your printer print at all with an empty cart?
    my C88 will not print anything until all carts are happy and have ink.
    It doesn't, mine has a hissy fit once out of ink.

    Before I forget, has anybody got any suggestions on making the printer use magenta only ink ? My ideas so far are to either fill the black cartridge with magenta ink and reset it, or to open the artwork in photoshop and change it to pure magenta then print, similiar to your method C88mod.



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    They need to be reset when the printer say they are empty but mine
    say they are empty when about half full. You can print with just black
    and have empty color carts just as long as they have been reset to make
    the printer think they are full.

    My epson carts tell the printer what color it is, but i have some calidad
    carts that do not ,so use one of these and refill with any color or take the
    chip out and put it in the epson carts , the chips are not connected to
    the ink at all, just sit on the cart . Just refilling the epson with a different
    color may work. NO PICS YET?

    Kym



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