DIY Etchant Tank

[96ecss]

I found this site tonight while searching for Ferric Chloride. http://www.embeddedtronics.com/etchant.html

Anybody try anything like this yet?

Dave

[ambulancevoice]

my local electronics store sells them, i dont have one but according to there catalogue, its easier to etch with, uses less etchant a and its easier to remove the pcb

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

I have the commercial version of one (though I did add a fish tank heater & air pump).
A plus is you can put a lamp behind it & see exactly when the etch starts to go through the copper!

[96ecss]

my local electronics store sells them, i dont have one but according to there catalogue, its easier to etch with, uses less etchant a and its easier to remove the pcb

I'm jealous of anybody with a local electronics store. The only local electronics store I have here in New Jersey is Radio Shack. 

I have the commercial version of one (though I did add a fish tank heater & air pump).
A plus is you can put a lamp behind it & see exactly when the etch starts to go through the copper!

This seems like a pretty good idea. It has to be better than just using small plastic box I got from Small Bear. I like Mark M's idea (at least I think it's Mark M's idea) of using a glass jar and suspending the pcb from the top with fishing line. That way all the used etchant falls to the bottom. If I can find a big enough jar, I'll try a heater or at least an air pump for it.

Dave

[Minion]

What I use is a Big Zip Lock Baggie, it allows the Piece to be etched in a small ammount of etchant and if you agitate it good it greatly increases the Speed of the Etch......

I also don"t use Ferric chloride either....I Find it is too expensive so I use Muriotic acid with Hydrogen peroxide which cost me about $10 for over 16 Literes and it etches really fast.....

[boyersdad]

You've gotta be kidding! I live in a small city (65,000+) in a small province in Canada, and we have two! And then Radio Shafts (now called "The Source by Circuit City") all over the place.

[Minion]

You've gotta be kidding! I live in a small city (65,000+) in a small province in Canada, and we have two! And then Radio Shafts (now called "The Source by Circuit City") all over the place.

I also live in a small town in Canada (15,000 +) and the Radio Shacks here don"t even sell electric components...I have to drive about 70km to find a Real electronics store but there prices are over Two Thousand percent higher than online......

[widdly]

You've gotta be kidding! I live in a small city (65,000+) in a small province in Canada, and we have two! And then Radio Shafts (now called "The Source by Circuit City") all over the place.

I also live in a small town in Canada (15,000 +) and the Radio Shacks here don"t even sell electric components...I have to drive about 70km to find a Real electronics store but there prices are over Two Thousand percent higher than online......

We've got a whole shopping mall just for electronic components shops here in Singapore.  It's bliss!

[Barcode80]

What I use is a Big Zip Lock Baggie, it allows the Piece to be etched in a small ammount of etchant and if you agitate it good it greatly increases the Speed of the Etch......

I also don"t use Ferric chloride either....I Find it is too expensive so I use Muriotic acid with Hydrogen peroxide which cost me about $10 for over 16 Literes and it etches really fast.....

i know we've talked about this, but i can't seem to find a solid answer. where do i find muriatic acid and is the hydrogen peroxide just the off-the-shelf stuff at pharmacies?

[Minion]

Yes you can get the Muriotic acid in Hardware stores for about $6 a Gallon and use regular 3% Hydrogen Peroxide and Mix one part acid with 2 parts Peroxide and etch away....


Cheers

[dmk]

i use plastic tray thingys i get from my local chinese take away.
not before consuming the noodley goodness before i might add.

[soulsonic]

I also live in a small town in Canada (15,000 +) and the Radio Shacks here don"t even sell electric components...I have to drive about 70km to find a Real electronics store but there prices are over Two Thousand percent higher than online......

We've got a whole shopping mall just for electronic components shops here in Singapore.  It's bliss!

You guys are so lucky in Asia! I read an article written by a man from Hong Kong about an amplifier he built. He said he just walked down to the local market and bought all the parts he needed. In Kokomo, we have local sales offices for most of the major component manufacturers; Vishay, ST, International Rectifier, etc... but no regular stores. The sales offices are for the corporate accounts they have with Delphi Electronics (we are home to their world headquarters), so they're not interested in selling a handful of parts to a hobbyist. There used to be a small shop you could get some components from, but they went out of business. Now all we have is Rat Shack, and all they're good for is mobile phones.

[R.G.]

Those tanks have always attracted me, but I was never able to get a hand-made plexiglass one not to leak and there aren't any commercial tanks that skinny.

I came up with a scheme for a non-leaking plexi tank, never built it though.
1. Go to a plastics supply place or order a square foot of 1" thick plexiglass. Yes, it exists. You ... might ... be able to buy several thicknesses of thinner stuff (e.g. two 1/2" thick, or four 1/4" thick) and then laminate them with plexiglass solvent glue. But I didn't try that as the point of the exercise is to not have to use plexi solvent glue. Also buy two panels of one square foot 1/4" plexiglass.
2. Cut a "U" out of the 1" thick stuff. Leave a 1" margin around and bandsaw the middle away.
3. Cut and fit neoprene gasket on both sides of the 1" thick U.
4. Align the U, two neoprene gaskets and two 1/4" thick outside panels; drill holes every 3". Insert 10-24 hardware and bolt the sandwich together.
5. drill and tap 1/4"-20 holes in the bottom of the U to mount the tank on a duck-foot to get it to stand upright.

I think this gets you a thin tank with no solvent or other glued joints to leak.

It's always been easier to me to just rock it in a pyrex tray, so I never built the tank.

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

Cheaper still (for an upright transparent tank) might be glass & that sealant stuff.
As for peroxide, sometimes it is cheaper from a hairdressing supply shop.
Note that peroxide comes in many different strengths.

[Jaicen_solo]

I'm of the opinion that with enough silicone rubber sealant, you can make anything wateretight, even the Titanic
That said, I get it free, so I guess I can afford to be extravagant with it!

I've been planning to build something very similar to this using some tupperware containers from Asda, but they aren't as thin as this, which is something i'd not thought about. What are you doing in terms of suspending the PCB? The model I'm working from used a mesh basket, would that work?

[96ecss]

You've gotta be kidding! I live in a small city (65,000+) in a small province in Canada, and we have two! And then Radio Shafts (now called "The Source by Circuit City") all over the place.

I wish I was kidding. I checked phone books, the internet and asked everybody I know if they knew of a local electronics store. There was one about 40 minutes from my house, but when I went to find it, it was out of business.

Dave

[markm]

Here's my etching tank.
Simple, practical and works quite well!



The PCBs are hung in the jar by fishing line, taped to the side of the jar.
Note the iron next to the jar to provide a bit of heat.



In the above pic, note the plastic paint brush in the jar's cap which is used to brush off the pcb a few times to speed the process.
Nothing fancy but, it works!! 

[96ecss]

I just took a jar of pickles from the fridge. I'll be washing it out and making my ethcant tank today. I like the idea of an air pump to agitate the etchant. I think I have an old air pump from a live well I used to keep my fishing bait in. If I can find it out in my garage, I'll give it a try.

Dave

[markm]

Ya know,
If you just jiggle the fishing line every once in awhile, you don't even need an air pump!
The jar makes clean-up a breeze too.
Just screw the cap on! 

[96ecss]

Ya know,
If you just jiggle the fishing line every once in awhile, you don't even need an air pump!
The jar makes clean-up a breeze too.
Just screw the cap on! 

Well, jiggling a fishing line will be a whole lot easier than trying to find that air pump!

I like the idea of screwing the cap back on the jar too. 

Since all the copper sinks to the bottom of the jar, you don't have to dispose of the etchant very ofter right? How often do you have to dispose of it?

Dave