I found some stuff that may help out those of you who wish to make a green PCB without doing the whole UV process. I found a product at tower hobbies that is called a latex paint mask, extra fine applicator brushes, and testo'rs candy green paint. I also found a dry decal kit from decal pro. Here is the process:
1. Etch your board.
2. Use applicator brushes and dip into latex mask and apply to the pads you will be soldering eventually. (More coats are better)
3. Let Dry completely
4. Paint using the Testor's Candy green (Translucent) paint.
5. Let dry completely!
Pictures coming soon!
If you want a silk screen use Decal Pro method. I haven't tried his stuff yet but looks awesome!
Hi Frank, Just something to save yourself a bunch of time and hassle. With all the lacquers i've tried, including the Testors you mention, you can paint right over the naked pads and traces with it and when it comes time to solder your hot iron will vaporize the lacquer upon contact with the pad... solder away just like as if the lacquer wasn't there.
Take care
dave
Quote from: davent on July 19, 2013, 07:19:44 PM
Hi Frank, Just something to save yourself a bunch of time and hassle. With all the lacquers i've tried, including the Testors you mention, you can paint right over the naked pads and traces with it and when it comes time to solder your hot iron will vaporize the lacquer upon contact with the pad... solder away just like as if the lacquer wasn't there.
Take care
dave
Isn't that potentially toxic? ???
Quote from: GGBB on July 19, 2013, 07:32:07 PM
Quote from: davent on July 19, 2013, 07:19:44 PM
Hi Frank, Just something to save yourself a bunch of time and hassle. With all the lacquers i've tried, including the Testors you mention, you can paint right over the naked pads and traces with it and when it comes time to solder your hot iron will vaporize the lacquer upon contact with the pad... solder away just like as if the lacquer wasn't there.
Take care
dave
Isn't that potentially toxic? ???
It's ok, I think he's from Hamilton.
http://www.watterott.com/en/Bungard-Green-Coat
I used to snort testers model glue... explains a lot! :icon_mrgreen:
Quote from: Frank White on July 19, 2013, 11:02:53 PM
Not if you are doing double sided PCB's you will not be able to have the solder get sucked up to the top of the board to make the solder connection on the top side. Hence the reason for my method
and what was your method?
How do you plan to get the solder to flow through to the other pad without a barrel? I missed that trick?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=jg9fDm-uUlg
Quote from: rousejeremy on July 19, 2013, 07:33:56 PM
Quote from: GGBB on July 19, 2013, 07:32:07 PM
Quote from: davent on July 19, 2013, 07:19:44 PM
Hi Frank, Just something to save yourself a bunch of time and hassle. With all the lacquers i've tried, including the Testors you mention, you can paint right over the naked pads and traces with it and when it comes time to solder your hot iron will vaporize the lacquer upon contact with the pad... solder away just like as if the lacquer wasn't there.
Take care
dave
Isn't that potentially toxic? ???
It's ok, I think he's from Hamilton.
Watch out... prevailing winds are from the SW and what's nearby to the NE... on no... Jeremy you need to come on over to the dark side, join the exodus of Torontonians snatching up our cheap real estate, join the vibrant artistic community, it's a cheap place to live and only 45min from the centre of the universe, come breathe our toxic soup, everyplace has it's trade-offs. It's not quite the armpit it use to be, seems most of the heavy industry has been bought up and shut down or moved by former out-of-country competitors, times are a changing, now if we would just do something with the city politicians.
GGBB- Toxicity of the lacquer, good question, i have no idea but there was this tumour... If you're spraying the stuff you need to be taking precautions, two stage respirator and ventilation. When soldering, how much and what is being liberated back into the air, what's being done to remove the normal flux fumes of soldering, should there be concern, i don't know.
dave
Quote from: Frank White on July 19, 2013, 11:02:53 PM
Not if you are doing double sided PCB's you will not be able to have the solder get sucked up to the top of the board to make the solder connection on the top side. Hence the reason for my method
That requires thru plated holes. Solder mask does not provide that functionality.
Quote from: defaced on July 20, 2013, 11:52:00 AM
Quote from: Frank White on July 19, 2013, 11:02:53 PM
Not if you are doing double sided PCB's you will not be able to have the solder get sucked up to the top of the board to make the solder connection on the top side. Hence the reason for my method
That requires thru plated holes. Solder mask does not provide that functionality.
There are DIY methods of making plated-thru holes.
But from I remember, it does require a bit of work.
Okay....
I have a comment and a question.
First the comment.
There are entirely too many Canadians on this site! ;D
Now the question:
At Frank:
Why do you want to spend time, effort, and money "Making PCB's look real?"
Is there a reason? Commercial enterprise perhaps? If so, I have some suggestions from a business owner's perspective.
Quote from: armdnrdy on July 20, 2013, 07:12:51 PM
Okay....
I have a comment and a question.
First the comment.
There are entirely too many Canadians on this site! ;D
Yes there are a lot of us. You could petition to become the eleventh province. California is full of Canadian actors and musicians.
Quote from: amptramp on July 20, 2013, 07:43:08 PM
You could petition to become the eleventh province.
If California became a province then Prime Minister Harper could say "this one goes to eleven"
Quote from: amptramp on July 20, 2013, 07:43:08 PM
California is full of Canadian actors and musicians.
No matter what we do to keep them out! ;D
Quote from: amptramp on July 20, 2013, 07:43:08 PM
Quote from: armdnrdy on July 20, 2013, 07:12:51 PM
Okay....
I have a comment and a question.
First the comment.
There are entirely too many Canadians on this site! ;D
Yes there are a lot of us. You could petition to become the eleventh province. California is full of Canadian actors and musicians.
I was always under the impression that there were Canadians in California then in Canada.
Frank - if you can - I'd love to see pics.
I use a solder-mask laminate. I think I worked it out at about £0.03 per square inch. That includes chemical developing as well.
I also use "Immerse Tin", a solution that you chuck your freshly etched and washed board into for 15 minutes or so, that deposits a few microns of tin onto the copper. Shiny :D That works out just over 1/2 a penny per square inch @ 30% copper remaining and under 2p per sq in for isolation routing (almost 100% copper remaining).
Yes, it takes a bit of time to do, but so does painting pads with latex, waiting for it to dry, then painting it green and waiting for that to dry. If I'm doing a run of boards, then I end up with a bit of a production line thing going on, so time per board is dramatically reduced. If you're already equipped for UV photo-resist, then this is a no-brainer if you want to "make it look real". It's really easy to do... just takes a bit longer than doing nothing, and it's a lot more interesting than watching paint dry :D
Now, if someone would only design a similar method of putting the silkscreen onto the component side that didn't involve... a silkscreen and that ended up opaque bright yellow or white, I'd be a happy bunny.
Quote from: CodeMonk on July 20, 2013, 06:39:14 PM
Quote from: defaced on July 20, 2013, 11:52:00 AM
Quote from: Frank White on July 19, 2013, 11:02:53 PM
Not if you are doing double sided PCB's you will not be able to have the solder get sucked up to the top of the board to make the solder connection on the top side. Hence the reason for my method
That requires thru plated holes. Solder mask does not provide that functionality.
There are DIY methods of making plated-thru holes.
But from I remember, it does require a bit of work.
Yes and yes. My understanding of the process is that the baths require daily maintenance and are an environmental health and safety issue if not handled properly. That falls under the "above my pay grade" category for me. You also have to drill before you etch, and must do UV films for the etching resist (the tenting from the resist protects the freshly thru-plated holes). Sounds like a process best left to an automated system with CNC level controls.
Quote from: R O Tiree on July 22, 2013, 07:48:24 PM
Now, if someone would only design a similar method of putting the silkscreen onto the component side that didn't involve... a silkscreen and that ended up opaque bright yellow or white, I'd be a happy bunny.
There are some UV curable products on eBay that say they do this. I think I have some (as well as some of the solder mask paints), but haven't experimented with them yet. I'd like to get my dry film UV resist process dialed in first.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1pc-PCB-UV-Curing-Paint-Ink-For-Character-Labels-White-100g-/180917167954?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a1f80e752 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/1pc-PCB-UV-Curing-Paint-Ink-For-Character-Labels-White-100g-/180917167954?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a1f80e752)
Ooh - interesting, defaced - thanks. Now... I wonder if that would flow through something like a Rotring nib... maybe hook that onto a CNC machine which could draw the characters and outlines... expose, cure, job done? Otherwise we're back to silkscreening again.
I was thinking about a laminate, though - stick it on the PCB, expose, develop, wash, cure. It's hugely wasteful, though, but might be good for short runs or prototypes?
Testors Transparent Candy Green
(http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc305/davent/IMG_1173-1.jpg) (http://s216.photobucket.com/user/davent/media/IMG_1173-1.jpg.html)
Pretty simple hack... Tops, any colour you want but the legending has to black
(http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc305/davent/IMG_4513.jpg) (http://s216.photobucket.com/user/davent/media/IMG_4513.jpg.html)
(http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc305/davent/IMG_4659.jpg) (http://s216.photobucket.com/user/davent/media/IMG_4659.jpg.html)
What did you use for the top? How? etc. :)
I've done that with the standard laser printer thermal transfer, but its not really durable.
I believe he used an acrylic gel medium, I forgot the name of the stuff he used I wanted to say Gac but I cant remember. I have something basically the same called Liquitex Gloss gel medium.
It's a clear acrylic medium you can apply to a surface and then lay a print on regular paper over the top squeeze out any air bubbles , let it dry, apply water and rub off paper the toner stays with the acrylic.
There's a few videos on youtube of a lady dying boards with dye and markers , John Lyons paints his boards really nice, same with a few other people. I've painted a few And have printed out some sticker paper for the top to make a component side. I like the black blue and red copper clad I picked up recently. They look great when their tinned with mg chems liquid tin.
Here's the pcb dying vids just in case anyone was interested , I have done the marker bit myself a few times and its not bad.
^Yes Jim has the details. Paint the pcbwith acrylic paint, add a Toner Transfer using acrylic medium. I use GAC200 from Golden but there are a lots of other acrylic mediums out there as well as other brands. Just take your "toner" art glue it down to the board with the medium, let it dry, re-wet the paper and rub the paper off. Usually takes a few dry/rewet/rub cycles to remove all the paper. Protect it with a few shots of lacquer, done. Functional, cheap, supplies i already use for other things, non-toxic. As you are working blind, the tricky part is registering the art transfer to the board so everything lines up with the etch on the other side of the PCB.