Hello everybody! I haven't been able to source a product that should be out there. It is a perforated prototyping circuit board that would have a solid, undivided copper clad as a surface for etching your own traces without the need to drill holes. There has to be these things on the market, right?

If you know a product or search words, please let me know.

Thanks!

 

I do not think there is such a board on the market. A copper clad board, pre-drilled? You har perf-board, strip boards, photo resist boards, and regular copper clad boards. The two first are pre drilled, but they do not have a solid copper surface.

 

I have not seen such a thing either. However, you can buy resist either as a liquid or dry film that you laminate onto a clean PCB to make your own boards. I would suggest using a dry film type such as this: file:///D:/eProject/PCB_making/Photoresists/Dry%20Film%20Resist%20-%20Negative%20MGChemical.htm

For more information, search on DuPont resists.

John

 

Typically, it's the etching rather than the drilling process that presents the challenges for most people so why would anyone use the type of board you propose? Can you give an example of its application?

Any pcb manufacturer or anyone with a small CNC machine could produce such boards relatively inexpensively.

 

Never seen anything like it. I can only suggest buying a copper clad board, drilling all the holes and then etching your own design but then you may as well just do a proper job and drill all the holes after you've etched the board.

 

I find the exact drilling (components with many feet - have to be right pitch) to be the nastiest thing since my CNC is still on the way. I would (obviously) just etch the traces using UV curable lacquer and acid, and then solder the components on. Does it really sound so weird to you Maybe I should start to produce these boards...

 

Does it really sound so weird to you Maybe I should start to produce these boards...

Yes, it sounds unusual and completely unnecessary to me. I don't think there is much of a market for what you suggest.

Consider the diameter of the holes in the typical perf board (0.038" ref: DigiKey) and the width of traces in now-typical PCB's -- I typically use 24 mil for homemade, unless I need narrower to go between pads; some people try for much smaller. Thus, routing would have the added excitement of dodging pre-existing holes on a pitch of 0.1 inch (typically).

If you follow standard practices for homemade UV-sensitized PCB's, you can make a small (e.g., 0.3 mm) etched area in each pad. The tool for that in Eagle is "drill-aid". With that area etched,you have an excellent center punch for drilling. You only need to be close, and a hand-held board will move slightly to self center. Of course, when your CNC arrives, centering a drill is less important.

John

 

I think, in reality, you would find the process of drawing the tracks and maintaining clearances extremely difficult as a large proportion of the boards surface would be holes. Stripboard has the advantage of providing correctly spaced holes and tracks.

I used a model-makers pillar drill with a tungsten bit for drilling PCBs and never had a problem with accuracy.

 

All right, I didn't think of the drill aid bringing the aid for centering the drill for hand drilling. That pretty much solves the thing. I have never etched a board myself, only used those basic perfboards with stripes or dots.