There’s an old joke about the physics student tasked with finding the height of a building using a barometer. She dropped the barometer from the roof and timed how long it took to hit the ground. Maybe that was a similar inspiration to [Moe_fpv_team’s] response to the challenge: use a 3D printer to create a PC board. The answer in that case? Print a CNC mill.
[Moe] had some leftover 3D printer parts. A $40 ER11 spindle gets control from the 3D printer software as a fan. The X, Y, and Z axis is pretty standard. The machine can’t mill metal, but it does handy on plywood and fiber board and should be sufficient to mill out a PCB from some copper clad board.
It would probably be possible to beef up the design by using rods larger than 8mm. Of course, you could just attach a spindle or even a rotary tool to a 3D printer, but the fact that the machine uses leadscrews on all axes should make it better at forcing its way through the material even if it is a little slower.
If you need a tutorial on how the process works, we’ve got you covered. If your setup isn’t robust enough to cut through copper, maybe you can just cut through the resist and etch.
3D Print a PCB the Hard Way
Source: HackADay
