Pcb laminator

[dr pepper]

I just procured this off the scrap truck,

I remember seeing something on the net about making boards using a laminator, transferring laser toner onto a copper clad board.
This is an A5 laminator for business cards I think, I got it for the switches knobs & temp control board, but now I'm thinking of seeing if I can bash it into a board laminator.
I photo etch boards sometimes but I've never tried this way, has anyone else tried this, any pointers?

 

[JimB]

I tried toner transfer and was disappointed with the results.

Using my laser printer (Brother DCP-1612W) I could never get a dense enough print on to the transfer paper.
It looked OK to the eye, but when heat transferred to the copper clad board it was obvious that there were "tin bits" in the toner film on the copper.
As a result, when etching, the wanted copper areas had a mottled appearance and thin tracks could have no continuity.

I abandoned my efforts with toner transfer and have adopted milling machine techniques, where I have had some good results. I still need to develop my skill with the milling, but I am getting there.

From reading on the interwebs and a discussion with someone I met who knew a bit about it, it seems that a good printer to use for the toner transfer technique is the old HP LaserJet series.

JimB

 

[dr pepper]

Hmm interesting.
I dont have a laser printer, I'd be using a big fancy photocopier/printer thing here at work, it prints exceptionally good images.
Still might suffer from the same problem though.
Could you tell if you printed on paper, or would I have to actually try a board to find out.

 

[JimB]

Could you tell if you printed on paper, or would I have to actually try a board to find out.

From memory, because it is some time since I tried this, looking at the print on to paper I could tell that the print was not as dense as some which I have seen in the past from printers at work, which were mostly HP laserjets.

I'd be using a big fancy photocopier/printer thing here at work,

Give it a go and see what happens.
I have been retired for a couple of years now, so I don't have access to big chunky printers and copiers any more.

JimB

 

[dr pepper]

Ok might see if I can get a piece of thin board & see what happens before any modifying.