The fastest way to make crisp PCBs at home!

You can make nice, crisp PCBs on any budget MSLA resin printer - here's how!

Products shown in the video:

Read the article to this video here:

Product links are affiliate links - I may earn a commission on qualifying purchases (at no extra cost to you)

[yonggor]

Dry-film photoresist is the solution you need. It comes in thin blue film that you can iron on copper-cladded board (not the solder mask paste). The exposed photoresist turns darker and hardens while unexposed part dissolves in alkaline solution (sodium carbonate). It's much cheaper than presensitized UV PCB, and can be removed & reapplied if something goes wrong during exposure.

[peterschmelcher]

This takes me back 50 years when I was a teenager making pcbs in the bathroom by exposing boards with a sun tanning lamp. In hindsight I had lots of failures mostly because I was spraying the Kodak liquid resist. The resulting coating thickness was not uniform enough requiring different exposure times across the board, basically clean off the resist and try again. As I recall the Kodak literature recommended spinning the board to produce a uniform film thickness. The copper surface also needed to be insanely clean before attempting resist coating. If the resin printer UV light source is columnated consider spin coating before placing the coated board on the printer. This way the flatness of the board will not be a factor.
Cheers-Peter

[ProtonOne]

That result is actually pretty nice.
I've been doing prototype PCBs for our company for a long time, but we cleaned out that pcb-prototype-lab a few years ago. It just was no longer really useful compared to a professionally made PCB with plated vias/holes, multilayer, solder mask, micro detail, reliability and quality, surface finish (ENIG) and all the other benefits. Waiting a week for a pcb is really not an issue, if you plan your project accordingly, and doing proper simulation and reviews of a design to have fewer errors or failures is worth more than trying to crank out 3 hardware-iterations in a week before you get a working design.
I guess this technique here is still useful for some, and probably quite cost effective when you compare it to getting a good resolution 2D printer that can print highly opaque films and an UV lamp for pcb exposure with a vacuum pump.

[ellisgl]

I've seen this done before, but I can see someone making a device that would be two LCDs that would sandwich the board to make 2 layer boards easy to make.

[alexhri]

OMFG.... I've been looking for a way to do this for months and the solution was in front of my face, on my desk this whole time! Thank you so much for

[MakersMuse]

Such a simple concept with awesome results! Most of these machines are capable of displaying their logos during LCD testing so I wonder how you could just get images into it like that vs having to make a negative STL. Would greatly speed up the process, but unlikely to see with chitubox systems :(

[JamesKaoD]

One tip on sodium hydroxide: I would generally suggest sourcing food-grade sodium hydroxide/lye rather than lab grade sodium hydroxide.

Food-grade NaOH is pelletized to minimize dust, because breathing in NaOH is very bad (people can debate the need and efficacy of respirators for acrylate fumes, but no one debates that breathing in lye dust is bad). The larger granule pellets make it relatively safe to handle for kitchen uses, like making pretzels because the bigger pellet size makes it much harder to dissolve if you accidentally touch it (lye isn't caustic until it is mixed with water) and has minimal caustic dust if you handle it gently.

Lab-grade NaOH might come in a different granule sizes which might not be apparent on the labelling and may be potentially more hazardous to handle, especially with respect to eye and breathing protection.

The NaOH shown in the video has large grains like food-grade NaOH. No need to be super scared of this stuff, as it is commonly used in cooking for things like pretzels or noodles. Just exercise some caution.

[BRUXXUS]

First saw this method on Huygens Optics channel and was shocked that this wasn't more common! Such a clever use of MSLA printers!

[dPrintCreator]

In the past, when I was still dealing with single-sided PCBs, this would have been a great technique. I then used sheets of overhead paper and a good laser printer to make transparencies and lay them over my PCB boards so that I could expose them.
Meanwhile, with the current CPUs that we use, even double-sided PCBs are often not good enough anymore, and I use multilayer PCBs. For this, you cannot go with hobby equipment (unfortunately) and you have to go to PCB factories that can usually make a PCB within 2 days.
But for anyone who needs a single-sided print, this is a great solution. Thank you for showing.

[StevenIngram]

I imagine that for prototyping and small scale fabrication, this is kind of a game changer.

[UncleJessy]

Omg this is brilliant!!! So happy someone tried this and that it actually worked

[justinvzu]

I strongly recommend using ground planes on your PCB designs. It's way easier to design a board with a ground plane. It also means you remove less copper, which in turn makes the chemical last longer.

[DigiLab]

This is so underrated. Compared to any other DIY process, this is clean and relatively easy. Just WOW!

[RomanoPRODUCTION]

What a nice accomplishment! Thank you for the tip, now the resin 3D printer sales will increase ❤️

[TechnoidProduction]

I feel like I've just unlocked a new skill! Very smart idea. A lot easier than printing on acetate and using a UV lamp!

[youradvertisehere]

I saw the thumbnail and the title and it hit me... that is brilliant. I always used toner transfer method which isn't very precise and no matter how often you do it, always remains a hit or miss.

[davidfrey]

I was going to go through the process of ordering PCB's for a thing at work that I wanted to play with, but this is much more in line with trying stuff out, perfectly timed video!

[jcdelas]

I made my firsts PCBs 30 years ago drawing them with a sharpee whishing for something better. The time have come. This video is a great out the the box idea that will keep me thinking for some time. GREAT, GREAT, GREAT!!!!

[dack]

This is a great idea! I've done many PCBs with the toner transfer method, but it does struggle a bit on smaller features. One suggestion - when using a small etch batch, you get a faster and better etch by removing less copper. Just use flood fills on most/all of the board. You can also make your fill a ground plane, which can help simplify routing and improve signal integrity or thermal performance in some cases as well.

[Aletsch]

Had an idea about doing this with my original Anycubic resin printer some years back and never quite got round to testing it. Thanks for putting the hard work in, and getting this out there :) Its evidently way easier & more reliable than the pain of Toner transfer from laser printed gloss paper ;)