PCB making

[Electronics4you]

I have made a double sided PCB, but I don't know how to make the plating. I can't find any manuals or equipment on the Internet to do it. Is it possible to do it at home, or should a just use a mechanical via (I don't like that idea)?

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

I have made a double sided PCB, but I don't know how to make the plating. I can't find any manuals or equipment on the Internet to do it. Is it possible to do it at home, or should a just use a mechanical via (I don't like that idea)?

Just solder a piece of wire through the hole, you can even buy special little 'pins' to push through and solder.

 

[evandude]

I have never really seen a hobbyist-friendly method for doing plated vias. I have pretty much resigned myself to the fact that if I ever need anything that fancy, I'll just get boards made professionally.

From what I gather, it involves applying special conductive ink to the board to fill in the holes, baking it to cure the ink, and then electro-plating copper onto the whole board. I don't expect that the ink is very cheap, I hear it's VERY messy, and I don't expect electro-plating to be an extremely cheap or home-friendly process either. Definitely something more suited to a large-batch production system, as it would be done professionally, than for small-run hobbyist projects.

 

[philba]

non-PTH design rules

making plated through holes is not impossible but probably beyond the vast majority of hobbyists. here's one procedure (in two parts):
https://www.thinktink.com/stack/volumes/volvi/condink.htm


If you designed your pcb presuming through holes, you may have problems, especially in locations where you can't solder components on both sides. You could overdrill the hole and slip a very thin piece of wire and solder it to both sides before you insert the TH component. Not a great way to do it and you run the risk of ruining the annular ring but it beats having to redesign.

for vias, use a piece of wire and solder both sides.

in general, when I design a DS home brew PCB I use what I call "non-Plated Through Hole design rules". Basically, be aware of which side of a through-hole pin you can solder. avoid running traces to the non-solderable side. Vias should never be hidden (i.e. underneath components) as you may need to access them later. Use the DS exposed pins to pass a trace from one side of the board to the other.

 

[Electronics4you]

The problem with wires is that the components themselves have to be soldered on both sides to make the connection to the board. I use the Ultiboard PCB software, which automatically create the doublesides traces.

 

[evandude]

I use the Ultiboard PCB software, which automatically create the doublesides traces.

Well, does it allow you to manually edit them? Eagle has an autorouter, which I occasionally use, but even when I do that I still manually edit and move a few (or a lot of) traces until I am satisfied... especially if I end up with thru-holes underneath components.

 

[philba]

well, not completely. You just need to solder where a connection needs to be made. That's what non-PTH design rules are about. From your comment, you appeear to be using autorouting. I gave up autorouting long ago so it's no big deal for me to arrange the traces for non-PTH design rules. You could probably do selective hand routing.

another approach that works is to route single sided and when the autorouter gives up, hand route the remaining traces on the component side, keeping in mind non-PTH DRs.

edit: damn evan, you are always 2 mintues ahead of me!

 

[evandude]

edit: damn evan, you are always 2 mintues ahead of me!

can you tell I'm bored at work?

 

[jpanhalt]

Check out: **broken link removed**

They sell tiny rivets and tools to flare them. If you are handy and have access to a lathe, you can make the tools yourself. It's just a steel rod with a conical end to start the flare. You can add a shoulder to finish the flare or just press it down with a flat-ended rod. The #115-7366 is probably the size you need for adding a through-hole wire. I have also done as others suggest above with good results. John

 

[Oznog]

Check out: **broken link removed**

They sell tiny rivets and tools to flare them.

Can that make throughholes you can put an SMD component on top of though? Those don't have much, if any, clearance underneath them.

 

[jpanhalt]

I would not try to put an 805 form resisitor or cap or SOT23 transistor over them. A 1206 form may fit, but I have not tried that either. An SOIC should fit over the flat (machined side) of the head with no problems. It is very close to being flush with the copper traces. The "shop-formed" head is a little higher, which I put on the non-component side of the board. That head might cause problems if you tried to put an SMD that was flush to the board over it; although, I suspect you could still get the pins of the device to solder to the traces. John