About 10 years ago OSH Stencils started out selling stencils made of
kapton. The kapton came on rolls and there was curvature in the stencils
such that 80% of the hassle of applying paste was holding the stencil
down as flat as possible. For fine pitch parts it was a serious PITA. I
was told kapton was used because it would cut cleanly. After Matt
(owner) had shipped a zillion kapton stencils he could afford a serious
laser cutter to offer stainless steel. For me this was a cause for major
celebration. The time with the kapton was when stainless steel stencils
from other sources were expensive. Now they are cheap, as you noted
John. A lot of the stencils I get from Matt are $10. A hobbyist might
flinch at this cost, but IMO it's a small price to pay for the ability
to actually assemble a board vs imagining that one can do it by manually
putting paste to board. One can't actually manually put paste to board
reliably for small parts. :-) Again, my focus is on small pitch parts as
these have become a fact of life and avoiding them imposes a very heavy
constraint on design. I'm preparing to make a flexible board for a
sensor that has 10 pads around it's sides underneath and is 1.8x2.0mm
overall. That takes a good stencil. :-)
A plastic that is dead flat to begin with and that doesn't go bonkers
with a laser (i.e. that can be cut cleanly without the edges swelling)
would IMO make for a cottage industry for somebody because they could
beat the stainless steel prices and perhaps offer comparable quality
results. But I'd have to see such a plastic stencil under my microscope
to be convinced that it can actually compete with stainless steel. My
'scope has a very good camera and I'd be happy to take pictures to share
with the group so we could see what the apertures look like close up.
("Aperture" is the 50 cent term for the mostly square corner holes in a
stencil.)
Pete
On 6/4/23 08:09, John Wettroth via TriEmbed wrote:
I've played with this with standard transparency film and a little 40w Chinese
laser- takes a bit of tuning to get it all correct but works. Stencils are
really cheap when you order a board if you remember.
Regards,
John M. Wettroth
E: j...@mindspring.com
M: (919) 349-9875
H: (984) 329-5420
-----Original Message-----
From: TriEmbed <triembed-boun...@triembed.org> On Behalf Of Pete soper via
TriEmbed
Sent: Saturday, June 3, 2023 1:51 PM
To: Triangle Embedded Interest Group <triembed@triembed.org>
Subject: [TriEmbed] a full custom biz card that runs Linux
He made his solder stencil with a laser cutter and the BOM runs around $3.
https://www.thirtythreeforty.net/posts/2019/12/my-business-card-runs-linux/
_______________________________________________
Triangle, NC Embedded Interest Group mailing list
To post message: TriEmbed@triembed.org
List info: http://mail.triembed.org/mailman/listinfo/triembed_triembed.org
TriEmbed web site: https://TriEmbed.org
To unsubscribe, click link and send a blank message:
mailto:unsubscribe-triem...@bitser.net?subject=unsubscribe
Searchable email archive available at
https://www.mail-archive.com/triembed@triembed.org/
_______________________________________________
Triangle, NC Embedded Interest Group mailing list
To post message: TriEmbed@triembed.org
List info: http://mail.triembed.org/mailman/listinfo/triembed_triembed.org
TriEmbed web site: https://TriEmbed.org
To unsubscribe, click link and send a blank message:
mailto:unsubscribe-triem...@bitser.net?subject=unsubscribe
Searchable email archive available at
https://www.mail-archive.com/triembed@triembed.org/
_______________________________________________
Triangle, NC Embedded Interest Group mailing list
To post message: TriEmbed@triembed.org
List info: http://mail.triembed.org/mailman/listinfo/triembed_triembed.org
TriEmbed web site: https://TriEmbed.org
To unsubscribe, click link and send a blank message:
mailto:unsubscribe-triem...@bitser.net?subject=unsubscribe
Searchable email archive available at
https://www.mail-archive.com/triembed@triembed.org/
