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Hi,
You can mill circuit boards using a homemade machine and
a Dremel type tool. I use a Dremel set on number 3. My feed
rate is 6" per minute. I have a picture at:



Of a board milled by my machine.

Any Questions, I will answer here in this conference.


John

At 16:53 01/04/2002 +0000, you wrote:

You can mill circuit boards using a homemade machine and
a Dremel type tool. I use a Dremel set on number 3. My feed
rate is 6" per minute. I have a picture at:



Of a board milled by my machine.

Any Questions, I will answer here in this conference.

...and I see you are still charging $18 for your thin little booklet too.

To potential purchasers of this booklet...as far as I can tell from having paid $18 to read it, it doesn't say anything that isn't already available for free in the archives of this group, or via the various other links that members of this group have posted.

Regards,
Tony

Tony,
You should also say the $18 included shipping and handling
to your country. You left out your shipping but I still shipped.
One year has passed. I have designed several more cheap CNC
machines for hobbiests. Have you finished your book on milling
circuit boards? A year is a long time!

John



--- In Homebrew_PCBs@y..., Tony Jeffree <tony@j...> wrote:

At 16:53 01/04/2002 +0000, you wrote:

You can mill circuit boards using a homemade machine and
a Dremel type tool. I use a Dremel set on number 3. My feed
rate is 6" per minute. I have a picture at:



Of a board milled by my machine.

Any Questions, I will answer here in this conference.

...and I see you are still charging $18 for your thin little

booklet too.

To potential purchasers of this booklet...as far as I can tell from

having

paid $18 to read it, it doesn't say anything that isn't already

available

for free in the archives of this group, or via the various other

links that

members of this group have posted.

Regards,
Tony

Now, let's not all get cranky. No pun intended. Well, OK, pun
intended.

Moderator

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At 17:54 01/04/2002 +0000, you wrote:

Tony,
You should also say the $18 included shipping and handling
to your country. You left out your shipping but I still shipped.

You're right, and my heart bleeds for you. However, even subtracting the shipping, it was an expensive way of buying 15 sheets of paper - and at least if they'd been blank sheets I could have re-used them...

One year has passed. I have designed several more cheap CNC
machines for hobbiests. Have you finished your book on milling
circuit boards?

No, but in the intervening year I have added more *free* articles to my own website, on other topics. Work on other stuff has gotten in the way of paying serious attention to PCB milling, but it is still on the list.

And by the way, for the benefit of other visitors to John's website, before you pay $35 for his plans of a 4th axis constructed out of "Two gears, a floppy drive stepping motor and some PVC" (to quote John' own words), check out:



which describes how to construct a CNC 4th axis that, unlike John's design, is actually usable for light milling of materials harder than soft wax or wood - I have successfully used it to machine items in brass and steel, for example.

A year is a long time!

You're right...and a year on, $18 for sweet FA is still way too much.

Regards,
Tony

Tony,
Learn to read! $20 not $35. My 4th axis "Pooka" can be built
with hand tools. To build your designs a person needs a machine
shop. Lets face it your designs are nothing new. You must own a
bunch of old mags that you steal from. My designs are innovative
and fun! Keep putting up free stuff, because nobody is going
to pay you for something they can buy cheaper. Get a life!

Where is the moderator! My first message and this guy shows
up!


John



--- In Homebrew_PCBs@y..., Tony Jeffree <tony@j...> wrote:

At 17:54 01/04/2002 +0000, you wrote:

Tony,
You should also say the $18 included shipping and handling
to your country. You left out your shipping but I still shipped.

You're right, and my heart bleeds for you. However, even

subtracting the

shipping, it was an expensive way of buying 15 sheets of paper -

and at

least if they'd been blank sheets I could have re-used them...

One year has passed. I have designed several more cheap CNC
machines for hobbiests. Have you finished your book on milling
circuit boards?

No, but in the intervening year I have added more *free* articles

to my own

website, on other topics. Work on other stuff has gotten in the way

of

paying serious attention to PCB milling, but it is still on the

list.

And by the way, for the benefit of other visitors to John's

website, before

you pay $35 for his plans of a 4th axis constructed out of "Two

gears, a

floppy drive stepping motor and some PVC" (to quote John' own

words), check

out:



which describes how to construct a CNC 4th axis that, unlike John's

design,

is actually usable for light milling of materials harder than soft

wax or

wood - I have successfully used it to machine items in brass and

steel, for

example.

A year is a long time!

You're right...and a year on, $18 for sweet FA is still way too

much.

Regards,
Tony

John, let comments like his roll off your back like water off a
duck. Don't return insult for insult, either of you.

I like John's principles- use good-enough parts so you don't spend
a fortune. Not everyone -needs- to machine steel, me for instance.
I'm also one of those people who does not have a machine shop,
who's current milling machine is a drill press and clamps and who's
lathe is currently just a wood lathe.

Steve, the moderator

--- crankorgan <john@...> wrote:
-snip-

--- In Homebrew_PCBs@y..., Tony Jeffree <tony@j...> wrote:

-snip-

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Steve -

It is unfortunate that this has ended up as a slanging match, and I apologize for my part in that.

My intention, when I saw what looked like a pretty blatant piece of product marketing on John's part (pointing the members of this eGroup at his web page offering his booklet for sale), was to point out that the product might not live up to expectations as to value-for-money (as it most definitely had not, in my case).

I believe that if you put stuff up for sale, you'd better be prepared to defend how much you charge for it.

Regards,
Tony

My concern was that it was becoming personal.

Tony, your website looks like you are pretty advanced. Is it
possible that John's paper is aimed more at the beginner? Reviews
are most definitely on topic but keep in mind that a reasoned
explanation is a lot more useful than a slam.

Posting your On Topic website, commercial or not is allowed here
but only if you stay around to answer questions. John is obviously
staying to take part, as are you.

I was sent a 5.25 inch disk, Commodore formatted, that contains a
Basic program for a Commodore PET computer. It is for milling and
drilling PCBs. That is his machine in the Files section. I have a
C128 in the basement that I'm going to try and read it with. I'm
not going to set up a PET, don't have one, but I'm looking forward
to picking over the code and seeing how he did it.

Otherwise I'm thinking of tearing apart an HP pen plotter. Use the
electronics with beefed up stepper drivers and drive a homebuilt
engraver. Then I could just use a vector drawing program like
CorelDraw, Illustrator, etc. to drive it with HPGL driver.

Has anyone here bought and maybe built one of John Nachbaur's
plans?

Steve Greenfield

--- Tony Jeffree <tony@...> wrote:

Steve -

It is unfortunate that this has ended up as a slanging match, and
I
apologize for my part in that.

My intention, when I saw what looked like a pretty blatant piece
of product
marketing on John's part (pointing the members of this eGroup at
his web
page offering his booklet for sale), was to point out that the
product
might not live up to expectations as to value-for-money (as it
most
definitely had not, in my case).

I believe that if you put stuff up for sale, you'd better be
prepared to
defend how much you charge for it.

Regards,
Tony



At 13:20 01/04/2002 -0800, you wrote:

John, let comments like his roll off your back like water off a
duck. Don't return insult for insult, either of you.

I like John's principles- use good-enough parts so you don't

spend

a fortune. Not everyone -needs- to machine steel, me for

instance.

I'm also one of those people who does not have a machine shop,
who's current milling machine is a drill press and clamps and

who's

lathe is currently just a wood lathe.

Steve, the moderator

--- crankorgan <john@...> wrote:
-snip-

--- In Homebrew_PCBs@y..., Tony Jeffree <tony@j...> wrote:

-snip-

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Steve,
Don't take the plotter apart until you look at:




Also, hooking up a Dremel or other tool to a Plotter
has a drawback. Pen-up and pen-down signals are too fast. If
you use a dashpot to slow the solenoid, the X Y will start moving
before the Dremel is down all the way. A plotter can make really
nice boards. It is possible to gut a plotter and drive it using
GCode files. Then using the Z axis movement you can get the timing
right.

John

Good point about speed of pen-up and -down. Oops, you're
Kleinbauer. I know a Nachbauer who makes Theremins, hence my
mistake.

I did try a Staedler 313 (Red) pen, just discovered I already had
one. I was etching some boards I'd made with a vinyl cutter and so
I drew onto a bare area with the Staedler 313 and some permanent
pens, the kind they sell at Radio Shack remarked as "Etch Resist".
IE, laundry marking pens.

My acid (Ammonium Persulfate(sp?)) was weak so it took a long time
to etch. The laundry marking pen started out with a few breaks, and
ended up pretty bad. The Staedler 313 was nearly perfect. That was
just me drawing it, I'd expect better from a plotter moving the pen
at a more constant speed.

The vinyl cutter? I drew it in CorelDraw and cut it out of vinyl
sign plastic and stuck it to the board. I didn't do nice traces, it
was done as large areas of copper isolated by thin etched strips.
This was at the limits of small size of the cutter and the vinyl.

Steve Greenfield

--- crankorgan <john@...> wrote:

Steve,
Don't take the plotter apart until you look at:




Also, hooking up a Dremel or other tool to a Plotter
has a drawback. Pen-up and pen-down signals are too fast. If
you use a dashpot to slow the solenoid, the X Y will start moving
before the Dremel is down all the way. A plotter can make really
nice boards. It is possible to gut a plotter and drive it using
GCode files. Then using the Z axis movement you can get the
timing
right.

John

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Hi Steve,
When you use a plotter to draw on the copper
you have to be able to slow the plotter down. If you
don't the ink will not flow fast enough. Over the years
I have made PCBoards with every method. Mechanical Etching
has lots of pitfalls too. My latest one to show up is runout
of the Dremel. For over a year I milled at 16,000 RPMs. Then
I made a stiffer machine. I set the speed of the Dremel faster
and I increased my feedrate to 8" per minute. I got several
boards milled with no problem. Then everything went bad. In
the end I found that you should set the Dremel at 16,000 RPMs
with a feedrate of 6" per minute. With a bit in the Dremel turn
it on and look at the tip of the bit. When you increase the Dremel
past number 3 you will see the tip of the bit grow. This is
caused by centrifugal force and a worn bearing. My Dremel has
many hours on it! The tip of Mechanical Etching bits grows twice
as large above 16,000 RPMs. I am going to buy a new Dremel and
check it out. Mine has paid for itself several times over and
its time for a new one.


Nachbauer

Steve,
An other thing about using a plotter. If you use
PLT files, you will end up with pads and traces but
they won't be connected. When a plotter draws pads it
makes a circle for each pad. Then it puts in the
connecting lines. If you replace the pen
with a motor tool you can end up with pads that are not
connected to the traces. Have you noticed how your
plotter draws?

John

Good point. I'm used to using CorelDraw and a vinyl cutter so it
draws it differently, I guess. I make sure and join all objects
that touch so the path is only around the outside of an area. I
would imagine that if I try and use something like Eagle that way,
I'll have to figure it out again.

I can do simple PCBs without much trouble in CorelDraw, but
anything more complex or any changes are a big hassle.

Steve

--- crankorgan <john@...> wrote:

Steve,
An other thing about using a plotter. If you use
PLT files, you will end up with pads and traces but
they won't be connected. When a plotter draws pads it
makes a circle for each pad. Then it puts in the
connecting lines. If you replace the pen
with a motor tool you can end up with pads that are not
connected to the traces. Have you noticed how your
plotter draws?

John


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Steve,
You can use Corel. I use Turbocad. Make sure that you draw
the trace all the way around and make it overlap onto itself a
short distance. This eliminates unwanted little shorts.

John