That has to be the best quality homemade PCB I've ever seen, and very quick for holes and everything.

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks! Yes, its taken a few iterations to get here. It is so satisfying when you get to watch the pads reveal through the soldermask.

@beardization

Жыл бұрын

@@Robonza that was my fave bit for sure

@amirajpal6382

Жыл бұрын

It really is. I haven't seen anything close to this good.

I had NO idea this was even an option. My 90w laser should be able to do as well as this. Thank you for sharing the whole process. I will TOTALLY be trying this.

@zorwick

3 ай бұрын

same here

The rain hitting your workshop makes me jealous. Both the fact you have a workshop and the nice relaxing white noise it makes.

@Robonza

Ай бұрын

Great comment. I did have to fix a lot of leaks in the early days haha

Thanks for demonsting that technique, Iike it a lot more than the other CNC options I've seen.

Wow that end result looks legit!

Beautifully done. 👌🤌

That has to be the best quality homemade PCB I've ever seen, and very quick for holes and everything (2)

This is amazing! Very good job. Thanks for sharing. You initiated a new age in the home made pcb!

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks mate, it took a few experiments over the years.

It's all about the process. You produced a great looking product. Nice job with the video and thank you for sharing. Cheers!

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Larry, I wish I had more time to do other videos

Beautiful job!

Thanks thanks Very good Thanks One thousand times thanks

Very creative use of the laser- hats off!

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Leo, I subbed you back mate!

Greatest Homemade PCB. LOVE THIS.

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks! I used it for the first time today in my electric kayaks, It worked good.

That is so damn cool, im genuinly impressed with how you made this

Nice demonstration, thanks!

Excellent ! Thanks for sharing

This is exactly what I'm looking for. I made some PCB by etching but never with laser engraver. The final outcome blow my mind.

@Robonza

2 ай бұрын

Thats awesome

the final result is quite stunning

Awesome!Thank you for sharing.Gotta make one with Cnc!

Many thanks for making this video. It popped up in my feed at random and I watched it out of curiosity. It has just taken me three days to find it again as I want to give this a try. I’ll be saving the video this time…

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Paul, I appreciate the comment.

handy video, so excited to try it with my 80W Laser

Very nice. Thankyou for sharing.

I wonder if a 10W diode laser will be good enough for repeating this (slow is fine) at home over a desktop cnc router. But without doubt this is the best method I have come across to get home made professional grade PCBs. Getting the alignment is gonna be the key, and I think that's where most of the efforts are gonna be. Many thanks for sharing this with the internet!

@thewolfpen4074

Жыл бұрын

I have a 5,5W laser and it removes the paint fine. Wont cut the copper though.

Absolutely beautiful I have to try this

You are superb !! Awesome work 👌 thanks for sharing

Awesome video, nice PCB

Look's AWESOME Thanks for sharing your skills, I'm about to embark on my first try, so THANKS again for your great advise...

Great Job

Smartest Guy .... You Rock .... God Bless You ....

Very impressive.

Very impressive results! Thank you for sharing. Would love to try your method out!

Very perfect

wonderfull made it ........

Amazing... nice job.. thanks

Superbe vidéo, ça donne envie, joli travail, félicitations ! 👍👍👍

Great set of processes ! Wasn't aware paxolin would cut with the laser (I have a 40W Universal) - liked the alignment pins idea too.

@Tuxedo2680

Жыл бұрын

The alignment pins will also allow you to make dual layer PCBs with perfect registration. Registration holes are an industry standard in PCB design and manufacturing.

Good work

Nice work I love it

this video is very instructional and clear, and also funny and natural, Great work, i learn a lot from here, as i have doubt whether to get laser machine or cnc machine

I know not everybody has such laser engraver but you can do the same with a 200$ one. This is a perfect video example how you can make a PCB at home with a laser engraver. I liked the custom spray paint at the end green and clear coat.

@Robonza

5 ай бұрын

This is not a cheap laser. I dont think a low power laser would work

@DominoSixO

5 ай бұрын

@@Robonza i bought one recently with a 3w laser, will design a PCB and give it a try when I get the laser in hand

That's a great method

This is the best thing i've seen this entire year!! Thank you so much for this.... I just bought my first laser machine.. 20W Diode laser, but i'll work myself to getting this type...

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks for such a great comment. I would be keen for you to try ink instead of paint as it will laser better with 20W. Let me know how it goes.

@ironnoriboi

2 жыл бұрын

@@Robonza I use a cheap desktop 5W laser / cnc combination from aliexpress for this, and it works great with regular (black) spraypaint. The laser can't cut the board, but it can remove the paint, the cnc spindle can create the holes and cutout.

Pretty impressive, very good job! Versatile is Universal Laser System.

really clean output

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

Yeah, the opposite of spammy spam haha

ahhhh... so the trick is to flip them over, copper side down... I knew there had to be a way to do this and there was some trick I just hadn't thought of. Thanks!

its amazing !!!

OMG that is an amazing workflow!!! I have laser too but did it completely wrong i see now

that's incredible

به نام خدا با سلام ویدیو جذاب و جالبی بود ممنون

Was watching this again. I can see a rotating vacuum chuck in the future of your spray booth.

Perfect 👏

been seeing a lot more laser cut pcbs lately... must be something trending... This is an amazing job. I might not have to go to JLCPCB all the time any more :p

A nice dip in liquid tin would be the crowning layer but a bottle of it puts you in the poor house haha

This looks like one of the easiest methods for diy PCBs! Don’t have a lazer cutter though

amazing man!

Excellent video and great looking PCB. I’ve a 40W CO2 laser and often thought about making pcb’s with it but now I know it works I’ll give it a go. I also use Arduino Nano’s in many of my projects so thanks for the inspiration to give it a try.

@scolem2681

7 ай бұрын

Hi. How was your experience making pcbs?

Brilliant! Thanks for sharing and by the sound of your accent brilliant Aussie engineering. 👍 I’m a retired electronic engineer having designed, developed and manufactured TV broadcast equipment for 15 years as my last hooray before retiring. So I appreciate your ingenuity and skills. I have used KiCad a number of times in retirement to design PCB for a number of projects and for grandkids some of whom are taking an interest in electronics. I don’t have a laser unit nor the space to locate one so I have used the Chinese PCB manufacturers to fabricate my boards. Frankly I do not know how they can do what they do for the price! Nice to see something being made in Australia (Assuming I have the accent right and your living here in Oz?) Well done again it was fascinating watching your enviable skills....

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

I am in New Zealand and yes I was a broadcast engineer in my younger days too.

Great video! In a couple of years I will be an electrician and I will be hopefully making boards like yours for fun!

@markharrington5826

Жыл бұрын

Im an electrician but I'm going to make printed circuits boards ?? Great video ? Are you ?? Really !! I think you may be in the wrong field myself and may need to become an electrician with an awful lot or electronics backgrounding , service related to component level to start doing this or would have electronics as a hobby of some type I wouldn't follow this presentation thinking that this will work for someone like you because it wont ! Still ought to be interesting !!

NICELY DONE. I am a professional PCB designer with 40 years experience. I would have used Photo Resist and LPI Solder Mask. White paint very creative. I also just started setting up a Laser Engraving system.

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

Nice, I started making pcbs around the same time as you. Todays tech makes everything so easy compared to the old days.

Wow a very impressive result, I just subscribed and waiting for the configuration of the software TO achieve such a neat PCB.

Very good quality, never see a homem made pcb with all that quality. Thanks for share with us, o have a 80w co2 laser and will try this process.

Nice video, keep it up, thank you :)

Looks like I didnt leave a comment. Def the best on KZread. Great Work. Cheers

@Robonza

6 ай бұрын

thanks, I subbed you too

Very smart

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Muchas gracias!

I like it and i need it thanks

Thank you so much for sharing, it's some great techniques, and much faster than drilling all the holes out by hand! Haha.. *sigh*

I love the video

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

I love your comment, thanks!

Fantastico 🇮🇹😀👍

It's were great

perfectly, make speechless

The laser cuts holes surprisingly well, at least for a single-sided board. Less so for a 2-sided board. I’d suggests to ditch the arduino and go for a soldered-on ATmega/tiny MCU. The old mega16/32s and tiny84 series are the old go-to, but I’ve swapped to the tiny1614 series and will be trying the mega4808 series in my own motor driver soon. Sure you’d need a programmer board (which you can also make yourself) but the result is going to be a lot smaller and cheaper. Plus you could arguably get rid of a need for holes altogether. Your setup definitely has a lot of precision yet!

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Good comment. Through hole is so good because I can do a firmware upgrade for dumb dumbs simply by plugging in a new Nano.

بسیار عالی 👌👌

A great video , thank you for the insight. I found that I used the same type of paint and did exactly what you did but I am finding 2 things. I even tried 4 passes as low power but could not get to the copper colour, still shows a white very feint film , 2 the edges of the tracks looking using my phone on zoom looks like it is bubbled. I have tried the lower the power as much as possible with the same result. I have a 100 W C02. Your engraving looks so perfect. Thank you

@Robonza

9 ай бұрын

Thanks. I spent a lot of time perfecting the machines performance years earlier. I think thats why I get good results. I cut and engraved paper and inspected with a microscope until it was best.

Brilliant. Have you tried it for SMD, and soldered on a hotplate or oven?

This is great. I love the idea that you have used just one hightech tool to do everything. I lets the person starting out invest wisely on a very flexible machine that can do a lot of things AND make PCBs as well that are very presentable. I love your idea of the translucent spray lacquer. I will have to find out if such a custom spray can service exists in Finland, if Not I suppose I could use my vintage JennyCan to hold some paint. A mill can do much but the solder mask and legends will need some other techniques if all you have is a mill.

@markharrington5826

Жыл бұрын

Yes that's the 3/4 of the trouble as thats exactly what they think which is why you do see the economy in the state its in never mind all the other major issues they cause

WOW incredibly good! VERY impressive home-made PCB! I always thought Laser cutters could only be used for wood and styrofoam. BRILLIANT VIDEO! Thank you! Probably takes a LOT of skill and learning to get it working THAT WELL! Did you invent it for yourself or get it from a book or so?

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

Thanks for the nice comment. I saw people doing average pcbs and being a competitive person I wanted to show how well it could be done for single sided pcb's

Шикарно!

Hello! It was very perfect! Congratulations on the type of paint spray you used? You would help him a lot! Thanks Alexander

How much is the laser power used when it was revealing the pads almost at the end of the video?

Great Work! Thank you for sharing. Seems to me like lasers are a better option than CNC milling these days if you want a more professional looking board.

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

Cncs are incredible for some stuff but very noisy and messy.

The best.

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Comentário maravilhoso obrigado

THANKS for your vid! I am starting a large hobby project which requires a fair amount of PCB's. I was going to send them out for FAB, but that makes onesy prototypes nearly impossible[cost]. Here's my catch. I gotta have double-sided, with plated through holes. Can you offer thoughts on that? Thanks

thank you! but what file type did u used?

Are the phenolic boards you cut bakelite? Wondering as that seems to be what I can find, but had heard bakelite doesn't cut well with co2 laser.

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

If its a brown colour it should be good. Everything works for me but fibreglass is much harder (normally light green)

What's the minimum laser wattage do you need to cut the plate? and does it have to be a CO2 laser?

Great video,I have been trying this method on my 40W laser but for some reason, when I try to engrave the paint it still leaves a residue, I don't get a clean copper finish, I've tried several settings from a light engrave 50mm at 5mA to 10mm at 10mA. even tried slightly defocused. it looks like every other line is unengraved paint. do you have any suggestions?

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

It sounds like your laser cutter is not well tuned. I spent time when I got mine getting it nice and precise.. Focus should be as sharp as you can make it. You should run around 100 percent power and 40 percent speed on a 40w for 3 passes. Check you are getting pure black and white when you engrave not speckle etc. Paint a thinner coat if needed.

Cool stuff! I don't see why it wouldn't work on my 5.5mw diode laser either... Just slower and more passes. So long as I can cut thru to the copper, the chemicals can make the rest of the hole... Awesome!

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

Just use ink instead of paint

@Randrew

Жыл бұрын

I found a chart by searching "laser cutting vs wavelength" and it looks like our weaker laser diodes (~450 nm wavelength) might have as good or better chance of cutting the copper itself than Robonza's CO2 laser (~10000 nm wavelength) since copper absorbs much more of our shorter wavelength light. I'm gonna have to test that.

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

@@Randrew I would put the chances at zero. Its not so much the wavelength. Its speed/instantaneous power. e,g, look up femtosecond laser

@Randrew

Жыл бұрын

@@Robonza Thanks. I will definitely study up and test all sorts of things. Those wavelength charts also imply I could cut through FR4 material (epoxy resin and glass fibers), which is yeah, pretty dubious.

Would this work with the K40 as well or is the laser too weak?

There are vids of ppl using lasers to precipate/electroplate copper from solutions. I wonder if this could allow to make vias - basically shine laser into the holes so copper would plate there. There are many ways to make decent PCB 's at home, but making vias is still very challenging.

How do you handle heat build-up with the PCB? I tried this and, while it burned of the solder mask, the copper/substrate got so hot that the pads separated from the substrate.

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

This just means your laser is not working well. e.g. out of focus. Mine does not get hot at all. You must be running slow to get that heat.

@stevepreskitt283

5 ай бұрын

I know this is a late reply, but I think he was using FR2 in the video, which is a LOT easier to cut than the FR4 you see more commonly. If you try using FR4, a lot of times the resin in it will char pretty badly, and the fiberglass can hold a lot of heat which can destroy the adhesive holding the copper down in adjacent areas. FR2 just burns away without a lot of residual heat. I've had difficulty trying to cleanly take just the copper off of an FR4 board with a fiber laser because of the heat retention issues.

Great video. I love what you have come up with. Could you explain the lacquer mix you use for solder max and how you got it in a spray can? Thank you.

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

I just went to a paint shop and they did it for me. I think it was 20 percent green and 80 percent clear lacquer

@rickmccaskill7888

2 жыл бұрын

@@Robonza do you think standard Rust-Oleum 352721 Automotive Premium Custom Lacquer Spray would work as well? Thank you.

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Sure, it would work fine. I only made the translucent green to make it look cool. It does not "function" any better.

@daffygrey

Жыл бұрын

@@Robonza I'm impressed with the look of the green solder mask, but does it truly function as a solder mask i.e. prevent solder bridging between pads in close proximity?

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

@@daffygrey Its nowhere near as good as a real solder mask but can you solder really nice like me haha?

Very nice result. It would be nice to get away from any chemical baths, I think that should be a real benifit of using laser. I wonder if you can reduce the steps if you use soldermask tape (no paint required) directly onto the pcb and cut away the copper (and the soldermask on the pads) you don't need. Is this an option or just a stupid idea?

@thelabby9998

7 ай бұрын

It’s similar to do it with cnc router so maybe with enough power…

How much power you user when the laser makes the etching mask and the solder pads? On how many wats is the laser set up?

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

Its 60 watts and I use all of it

What kind of resolution does this have? For instance could it to 0.4mm pitch SMD ICs?

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

1.27mm is possible but tight

I use Altium, what output files do I use to operate the machine? Altium does output Gerber (GRBL) files. I prefer using Ammonium Per-sulphate as my etchant as it does not stain.

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Altium is a nice program but severely overpriced. I output pdf files in my example which worked well

@davidbwn

2 жыл бұрын

@@Robonza Unfortunately it’s downfall. Due to licensing of the various functions such as the proprietary programming softwares and FPGA and CPLD developers. Which I have never used.

Hello....Can you explain in detail how the layers work in Corel Draw?

I have not been able to export/plot a file from kicad to cut the holes, can you explain how you managed this? thanks

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

I simply export a PDF and import that into the laser software

@kalamgish

2 жыл бұрын

@@Robonza Could I ask what version of Kicad you are using? If I go to the board layout then File>Export I do not see a pdf option, I can get the layer data from the SVG export after a bit of a struggle but no hole information/layer.

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Try pressing the print button .I use Cutepdf writer as a printer

Damn dude, they came out absolutely beautifully! How far do you think I'd get trying this with a 3W laser etcher? 😅

@Robonza

Жыл бұрын

about 1 micron haha. Sorry I cant give you an optimistic answer

That's awesome! What is your laser module power output? Could you share some tips about the laser power output percentage and also the speed please?

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

Its a 60 watt Universal and you can see the settings at 3:45

@JB-20

2 жыл бұрын

@@Robonza Thanks for a quick response. Just wondering if it was running at full power during engraving, I can't see clearly the settings on the video so I raised my question. I am new to this method and wanted to learn some techniques. I've never seen such very wonderful result like yours here in YT. Not just beautiful as it looks but also very precise. Love it!

@JB-20

2 жыл бұрын

@@Robonza I review the video many times and it's really helpful. Have made few PCBs out of my 5500mW laser engraver with almost the same looks as you did. I made mine with a manual cut and drill though. Thanks a lot!

@Robonza

2 жыл бұрын

@@JB-20 well done, its not easy

Very good. But there are several nuances. The paint must be heat-resistant and not be destroyed by soldering. The paint must also be resistant to solvents. It would be interesting to look at the board after soldering and de-fluxing.