Circuit Board Drill Templates

[rgsparber]

Occasionally I etch my own circuit board and then drill it to accommodate through hole components. Components with rigidly positioned pins demand fairly accurate hole placement. This is not so easy when free hand drilling, especially when the drill bit is 0.03 inches in diameter.

My solution is to build a series of templates to guide my drilling. They are made from pre-drilled circuit board material so I just cut them out, solder in two alignment pins, and mark the holes.

If you are interested, please see

http://rick.sparber.org/SRCBT.pdf

Your comments are welcome. All of us are smarter than any one of us.

Thanks,

Rick

[DIYer]

Thanks Rick! We've added your Circuit Board Drilling Template to our Electronics category, as well as to your builder page: Rick's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:

Circuit Board Drilling Template by Rick Sparber

tags: PCB, drilling

[FEM2008]

That is a simple and excellent idea. I have etched many a PCB and I know exactly what you mean about drilling holes. it's also quicker than trying to do it on a mill.

[desbromilow]

do you etch the "centre punch mark" to aid in drilling? I don't do this enough to claim much knowledge, but I do know they taught us at uni to use pads with a .5mm hole in the centre for the reason of helping to align the drill.

[FEM2008]

do you etch the "centre punch mark" to aid in drilling? I don't do this enough to claim much knowledge, but I do know they taught us at uni to use pads with a .5mm hole in the centre for the reason of helping to align the drill.

For homemade PCBs, I've always done the layout with an etched hole in the center of the pads. It does indeed help with drill alignment. But, very small drill bits flex and wonder sometimes, especially if I'm not being careful. If there a lot of holes to drill, I tend to get sloppy towards the end. It is good enough for most components though, even IC pins. But as you noted, sometimes more accuracy is needed.

It's probably been 3 years now, but the last board I did, I, sent to a fab house in China, and for just a few dollars, I got 5-blank pcbs complete with silkscreen. The quality was excellent, and best of all, I did not have to deal with the etching solution. The only complaint was it took a couple of weeks. For $20 more, I could've had the PCBs in in about 4-days, but that was double the cost of the PCBs themselves.

[rgsparber]

That is a simple and excellent idea. I have etched many a PCB and I know exactly what you mean about drilling holes. it's also quicker than trying to do it on a mill.

Here is the idea generalized:

Rick

[rgsparber]

do you etch the "centre punch mark" to aid in drilling? I don't do this enough to claim much knowledge, but I do know they taught us at uni to use pads with a .5mm hole in the centre for the reason of helping to align the drill.

Yes, I do etch a "centre punch mark" but with the system shown above in the video, I only need them at two points as long as all holes are on 0.1-inch centers.

Rick

[rgsparber]

For homemade PCBs, I've always done the layout with an etched hole in the center of the pads. It does indeed help with drill alignment. But, very small drill bits flex and wonder sometimes, especially if I'm not being careful. If there a lot of holes to drill, I tend to get sloppy towards the end. It is good enough for most components though, even IC pins. But as you noted, sometimes more accuracy is needed.

It's probably been 3 years now, but the last board I did, I, sent to a fab house in China, and for just a few dollars, I got 5-blank pcbs complete with silkscreen. The quality was excellent, and best of all, I did not have to deal with the etching solution. The only complaint was it took a couple of weeks. For $20 more, I could've had the PCBs in in about 4-days, but that was double the cost of the PCBs themselves.

I didn't provide any context. These boards are etched by my students so they can understand the process. They also solder in all components and end up with a flight data recorder which is used during the rest of the year.

Given the technique demonstrated in the video, they can etch a board and drill it in a few hours. During post-mortems of the class, this lab is listed as the most fun. Well, except for one guy that was only interested in software and theory.

Rick

[tonyfoale]

In the early 1980s I needed to etch a few PCBs and I made simple dedicated drilling guides in aluminium. I would drill the holes first and then use the holes as a guide for hand drawing the traces with a resist pen. Now for simple boards I just use Vero board as a drilling guide but I now do more complex boards by milling.

Click images for full size


Sometimes I still drill first but not always.

If I am not in a hurray I now get them made professionally because they are so cheap and on another quality level. Rapid shipping puts the cost too high, which is the reason that I only do this if time is not a factor, but it usually is.