28 Jun
2012
28 Jun
'12
3:46 p.m.
On 28 Jun 2012 at 19:43, Tony Duell wrote:
Yes, there are home etching kits, but making edge
conenctor patters is
not trivial. Layign them out and etchign them is, but if you leave
them as bae copper they will oxidise fast and you'll get poor
connections. Tinnign them helps, but the best thign to do is
gold-plate them and that's not somethign you can sensibly do at home
(the chemicals involved are very toxic -- cyanides, for example). Not
all PCB manufacturers can do gold plating either.
It wasn't my intention to use edge connectors on the project, but
rather double-row headers. My reasoning was that header-equipped
cables are easy to obtain, are more secure in their attachment
(particularly if the receptacle has locking "ears") and are less
costly to fab than a gold (alloy, if we're talking a good job)
plated male edge connector, which also requires special PCB tooling.
--Chuck