How do you make your pcb's?

As the title says, what are the most common methods of creating a pcb? At the moment Im etching any Ive got to do although Ive not got it down to a fine art yet. Any thoughts?

 

Hi,

Having tested a lot of different PCB Materials I personally recommend strongly against using PCB Materials that are hygroscopic and under no circumstances should such be etched in common ironcloride etching solution. If you must, using suitable acids is acceptable as the etching takes little enough time, but even then only for FR4 type boards and be aware of the heath implications (eg. etch with acid only outside, wear heavy duty laboratory gloves and have neutralsing agents handy.

If a circuit is too complex for hardwiring (dead-bug style - BTW, using a heavy copper substrate even complex discrete transistor circuits can be easily hardwired) consider spending the monet to teflon PCB material (double thickness) CNC milled into the PCB pattern and have the tracks direct goldplated, it costs a mint but is the best sonic solution to using PCB's, if you cannot avoid them.

Ciao T

 

I think Thorsten is more or less saying:

Unless you are MANUFACTURING ie repeating the same board, there is no reason for the home constructor to make PCBs.

The good thing about DIY is that you can use simpler circuits, which could need more expensive parts than a manufacturer is prepared to use [a great generalisation of course, but a rule of thumb].

Generally, if its complicated enough to NEED a PCB, then buy it readymade as part of a kit. Anyone who studies electronics gets to make PCBs as part of the learning curve but real PCBs are machine made, cleaned, etched, drilled, plated, soldered, cleaned, etc..
Home made ones often have a shorter lifespan than proper ones because there is no quality control.

Dead bug always works. Tag strips used to be OK, but they are harder to source nowadays.

Google 'dead bug construction' - as Thorsten mentioned, for the logical method of one-off circuit wiring

cheers,

Graham

 

Hi,

Yes, the exemption is for very complex circuits. In those cases you can now get places on-line that will CNC Mill PCB's for you. Here is one place in the UK:

http://www.rak.co.uk/

They can even mill the electrically much superior PTFE PCB Material. So, if you have a project where complexity precludes dead bug wiring (that said, I have dead-bugh wired whole DAC's so, i cannot see too many circuits that cannot be dead-bug wired) and sonic quality really matters, consider milled PTFE PCB's, they are nearly as good sonically as dead bug wiring using a solid copper plate substrate.

Ciao T

 

Cheers Thorsten for the link.

The advantage of PCBs is saving space. They look much more reliable than hand wired because they are neat, but PCBs can hide faults like thin tracks, corrosion, bad soldering etc. especially home-made ones. I'm sure a properly made one, eg the link above, would have no problems.

Here is a tidy dead bug link:

http://www.geofex.com/Article_Folders/deadbug/deadbug.htm

This is not the electrically better version mentioned by Thorsten where you use a complete sheet of copper to attach every ground connection onto [ground plane] but is fine for audio work, I would think..

 

Thanks for the replies, Ive never heard of this method although I have seem the odd example. I'll have to have a good read of this method, certainly seems interesting.

 

Would you recommend sticking the components to the board? If so what would you use, Ive just read one article that details superglue but how would you change components? Or, would you recommend soldering all the earth connections to the board first and building from that, thus meaning that no fixing would be required??

 

Well you could even just blue tack things upside down that you think might be changed. Or drill 2 small holes, one each side, and loop a small cable tie round the component, then cut it if necessary.
TBH, it is so labour intensive making anything [just wait until you're swearing as the drill bit slides over your case as you try putting holes through it..] that when you've finished you will want to sit back for 6 months before you consider changes. You will probably be best knocking up a new board in 1/4 of the time, and correcting everything that wasn't right first time and then comparing 1st vs 2nd..oh and it probably won't work first time anyway!

best of luck

Graham

 

Hi,

I like to use quite thick copper or brass substrate, there you can drill holes for individual transistors to be seated in (or more interetsing pairs of them in thermal coupling), for IC's I wrap them in copperfoil 9self adheasive) and literally solder them down to pretinned sections of the substrate.

Ciao T