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$13 4'' Hot Laminator

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Black PCB with Green Foil Silkscreen

Harbor Freight shipped via USPS on 5th so it should be here in about a week.

I have been working with painting the topside of SS PCBs and adding a toner silkscreen like image. The acrylic clear coat I was using to protect the toner caused it to run. I tested some conformal coating on the toner. I sprayed it on a PCB pattern that I had printed wrong side up. It did not run so I gave it a few more passes. After the coating dried I placed the pulsar paper in water and the coating with the toner came off in a neat but somewhat fragile clear sheet.

Using the conformal coating I made a very sharp white PCB with black toner lettering under conformal coating. But I screwed it up with a flux remover that reacted with the coating and toner. I could have used soap and water so that is not a problem.

I was thinking it would be neat to make black PCBs with green foil lettering. The problem is that after you paint the board you can not apply the foil because it sticks to the paint. The answer may be to add the top artwork as a decal. I think it would be cheaper to buy the bits form pulsar rather then use a bunch of conformal coating. But it was fun, the pulsar paper is amazing stuff.
 
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So are there any reports yet on this laminator from harbor freight? If it works I'd like to purchase one and some real pulsar paper. I've been doing the photo quality printer paper and iron thing and as a newbie it is very frustrating spending hours trying to make a board.

Thanks guys
Malcolm
 
The Harbor Freight order I sent was for the laminator and a brake sheer. The brake came 3 days ago but the laminator has yet to arrive. I will post when it shows up.

You should be very happy if you use the Pulsar paper with a laminator. You can order the paper from Mouser or DigiKey. Mouser also has the green and white foil.
 
The laminator came. I only had a few minutes to play it. Or fix spelling/grammer etc ...

This is what I know so far.

The feed rate is about half that of my GBH laminator.

It takes it about 5 minutes for the ready light to come on.
Seems to get hotter with time after that. So wait about 5 or 10
after it says ready. My other laminator is this way too.

Both .014 SS and .022 DS boards feed without problem.
The two together .036 worked.
Pulsar paper between the two boards .043 went through.

I will try it when I make a pair of board tonight.

If you have anything you want me to try let me know.
 
Sounds like it works. I've never used a laminator so sorry for dump question but do you just place pulsar paper on copper side of board and feed in? Copper side up or down? This may seem obvious once I actually see one.

Glad to hear it's working as I've been looking for an alternative solution to the printer paper and iron. This sounds really nice and easy with good results.

Thanks
Malcolm
 
Valid questions are not dumb.
The Jury is still out but I think it will work. I will know in a few hours.

The toner goes between the paper and the copper. I run the board through twice flipping it after the first run. It seems to help keep the thin paper cut boards from warping. There is enough heat (at least on my good laminator) that it works both ways.
 
Success with .014" SS stock.

Looks like it works, at least with the thin stock. Ran this board through 4 times moving it from side to side. There is some danger of the toner spreading if you run it too many times but it looks OK. I laminated the Pulsar green foil to the toner to see if the foil would lift any toner, it did not.

It is a credit card sized SS board on the .014 inch stock. It is medium dense Eagle board with many .01 inch traces, 35% restring, and 15mil spacing. I never like taking pictures of copper but here it is. The image is sharper the it looks here. The small text is quite clear. See attachment.

I also tried a board on the DS .022 in stock. It did not work but it may have because I did a poor job of cleaning the badly oxidized board. Or it could be that there just was not enough heat. I will try again tomorrow.

On the up side I like this machine feeds/handles small boards. With my larger units I have to coax them into the machine with chop sticks.

On the down side it makes a clicking noise every now and then. Not sure what that is about or if it is a problem. Could be a thermostat? I am not sure if it can generate enough heat to heat the thicker board. The board moves quite slow and much of the heat is lost between passes.

More when I know it.
 

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Nice board but it reall isn't a good idea to route traces inbetween DIL pins as it can create problems when soldering and you might have a very fine track between them that you can't see.
 
Don't SMD parts like processors heave even tighter spacing ?

I last made PC boards in the 80's. When I started again a year ago I had some problems with hidden shorts. Since then I switched to SP etchant, a temp controlled solder station, liquid flux, and .015 solder. I do not know if any or all of these contribute. But it is working well. The Pulsar paper could be part of what make it work.

Correction: In my last post I said spacing was 15 mils but it is actualy 10 in the tight spots. Most everything else but the connectors is at least 20 mils.
 
How much time ........

3v0 said:
{snip}
It takes it about 5 minutes for the ready light to come on.
Seems to get hotter with time after that. So wait about 5 or 10
after it says ready. My other laminator is this way too.
{snip}

Using an old steam iron, cost $1.00 at a junk store, and using Press-N-Peel I can get a PCB ready for the etch in less than five minutes.
Steps:
1. plug in the iron (it heats up in about a minute)
2. clean the copper surface, don't forget to burnish the edges first.
3. dry and place on several pages newspaper underneath the PCB; for insulation.
4. position Press-N-Peel with a piece of clean copy paper on top. It keeps it in place and makes the iron glide easier.
5. iron for three minutes.
6. place under cold running water and peel when cool, about three seconds.

Total time less than five minutes. By the way I have a laminator sitting here and have never used it for anything but its intended purpose.

The five minutes is probably the time it takes to remove the magazine paper, when not using Press-N-Peel! And that is from a small PCB!

Then we have posters constantly griping about the cost of Press-N-Peel but go out and spend $ 20.00 (including shipping on a laminator), doesn't make sense to me.

To me time is money, you only have so much of either.
 
Many people do not have a lot of luck with using a clothes iron. With a good laminator (the jury is still out on this one) it works every time. A transfer with the laminator takes a few seconds. It is less then fair to count the warm up time.

I agree with you regarding people not wanting to pay for P&P or Pulsar transfer sheets.
 
What is the problem?

3v0 said:
Many people do not have a lot of luck with using a clothes iron. With a good laminator (the jury is still out on this one) it works every time. A transfer with the laminator takes a few seconds. It is less then fair to count the warm up time.

I agree with you regarding people not wanting to pay for P&P or Pulsar transfer sheets.

When a procedure works for for most but not for you, then it is time to sit down and analyze what you are doing wrong.
It is no different than any other engineering task.
Edit:
If it is not fair to count warm up time, then is it fair to say that with a "good laminator it work every time". And how much does a "good laminator" cost?
And is it fair to say: "A transfer with the laminator takes a few seconds", when in fact my commercial grade one has a feed rate of about four seconds per inch. And how often do you have to send it through the second time (as some posters claim), how do you determine when to do that?
 
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I didn't have much luck using the iron. Perhaps I didn't struggle with it enough to find the magic moment where I had the right heat setting, just the right amount of pressure, for just the right amount of time. The laminator takes away the guess work, and the many trials and errors. Using the iron might be a skill like soldering, once you learn to do it correctly, it's no big deal.

For those facing the decission of buying a clothes iron (I didn't own one), or buy the $13 laminator... I would go for the laminator, I bought a 4" model for around $20 (on sale, surplus). I have a clothes iron, that sits around barely used, but might need to do a larger board sometime.
 
Man! All that because I said many people do not have a lot of luck using a clothes iron? Would it help if I changed many to some?

I purchased the inexpensive laminator because I will be teaching high school sophomores to make boards. I do not like the idea of dragging the good one around. I did not want a hot clothes iron in class, or attempt to teach each kid how to use it correctly.

I have no problem with what you choose to do to make boards.

I like making boards. I like making them my way.
Eagle layout - CNC drill - Pulsar Paper - Laminator - SP etch

Some of these things make the process easier, some produce better results, some do both. Each and every one of us is free to pick and choose.

You talked about fast. Look at the Pulsar site. They go from the printer to a finished but undrilled board in 15 minutes. It would be faster if they did not silver plate the traces, ~silkscreen, and paint the board green.

**broken link removed**


If it is not fair to count warm up time, then is it fair to say that with a "good laminator it work every time".
It may be a slight overstatement, but much less so than saying a clothes iron work every time. Even if you get a good result with the clothes iron you have to stand there and press down on a hot iron for three minutes. Did you press hard enough? Was the iron too hot or too cold?

And how much does a "good laminator" cost ?
If this one turned out to be a good laminator it would be $13. I have not worked with it enough to say. But if you already have one then the cost is what? If cost is an issue married men can give one to their wife as a gift. :):D:eek: ouch :(...
 
Rolf said:
When a procedure works for for most but not for you, then it is time to sit down and analyze what you are doing wrong.
It is no different than any other engineering task.
Edit:
If it is not fair to count warm up time, then is it fair to say that with a "good laminator it work every time". And how much does a "good laminator" cost?
And is it fair to say: "A transfer with the laminator takes a few seconds", when in fact my commercial grade one has a feed rate of about four seconds per inch. And how often do you have to send it through the second time (as some posters claim), how do you determine when to do that?

Well, I new here so, go easy on me...

I've been using the Pulsar toner transfer method for about two years now.

I make my boards a little out of sequence from most people as, I have a table top mill that I use to drill the holes.

I use an HP1200 laser printer to put the toner pattern on the decal paper. The paper is cut to the appropriate size and then registered to the holes and the paper is taped down using Avery file labels.

I run the registered PCB/artwork thru the laminatior twice - faithfully.

I have had 100% success with the laminator and Pulsar toner method.

Carl W. Livingston
Cincinnati, Ohio
 
When they say that a board only takes 15 minutes they've conveniently forgotten drilling the holes which can take hours unless you've got a CNC machine.

Also, I don't see the point in silver plating unless you're using it at VHF or the green coating unless it's going to be exposed to oxidising agents or left for ages before it's soldered.
 
To some degree how you view the Pulsar process depends on where you are coming from. You needs. The following is about how it works for me.

I used to coat the traces with solder to prevent oxidization prior to assembly. Now I am using an acrylic conformal coating.

I started using Tinnit on the boards I make for my students to solder. That ensures they have a good surface to solder on even if the project spans a weekend or vacation. The boards I make for myself I do not plate.

The silver plate, white foil, and transparent green paint work together to create a board that looks good enough to pass for a production quality board. It is not, but it sure looks good.

Yes the Pulsar site does ignore drilling time. A CNC is nice. For class work I need to make 4 boards for the students, one for me and a spare. Using the paper-cut PCB stock I can stack the boards and drill them all at once. Doing each step on all the boards then moving to the next saves time.

I have been playing with painting the top side of the board white and then adding a toner parts placement guide (silkscreen) over it. To keep the toner in place I use a layer of clear acrylic conformal coating. It works but I am still fine tuning the process.
 
HarveyH42 said:
I didn't have much luck using the iron. Perhaps I didn't struggle with it enough to find the magic moment where I had the right heat setting, just the right amount of pressure, for just the right amount of time.

I cant agree more!

Without a laminator, much blood, sweat and tears must have been spilt, before a consistent result has been achieved!

I suppose if you're a highly skilled individual such as Rolf, you may only need a clothes iron. For the rest of us, a one time purchase of a laminator may be the way to go.

I treat any tool that I buy as an investment. IMO paying a few quid for something that saves time and effort is a few quid well spent;)

Also, a laminator only needs to bought once, and it requires no consumables (appart from the board;))
 
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There may be hope for the little laminator.

I needed to do a small DS board that was 1 x 1.2 inches.
It was a simple layour with a 16 pin dip, 7 resistors, and 7 LEDs.
Small boards are difficult to feed through the larger laminator so I gave it another try.

This time I let the laminator warm up for at least a half hour. Should have timed it. I used 4 passes.

Why did it work? I suspect the longer warmup. I did not attempt to apply the green foil. Do not know if that would have worked.

They are still on sale. 4'' HOT LAMINATOR
 
I get my PCB material from Digi-Key. Sometimes they have some PCB material for 2 to 3 dollars for a single sided blank board's a 4"x6" board. Most times, it's about $.50 for the same dimensions.

You can sometimes find good deals at Amateur Radio (HAM) swap-meets.
 
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