Hi guys,
today I’m playing with the CNC module and after some test on a piece of wood I’ve done my first PCB!
I’ve used the Snapmaker V bit and I had to goes down 0.2mm because I think my copper plate it’s not really accurate on all the surface so with just 0.1mm not all the engraving was made (any idea or any good copper plate to buy?).
After the engrave I’ve made the holes with a precision drill bit (0.7mm) and at the end I’ve gutted the PCB with the 1.5mm flat end mil bit.
This is my first PCB and I think it’s a great result, isn’t it?
For sure I have to work little bit on some dimension etc… but the way it’s good.
Any comment and/or suggestion will be appreciated.
Definitely looks nice. Would love to try myself too. (but still some other priorities first)
It does look like the edges are a bit rough and you will need to quickly go over it with some sanding paper. Not really a big deal.
I did purchase some tiny flat end mills (a box from ali) with bits ranging from 0.1mm to 1mm because it did want to try that. As with the v-bit the paths get bigger as you go deeper. I’ll let you know how that goes when I get to it I’m pretty sure the 0.1mm bit will break before it’s even mounted (it’s so tiny! ), but I’m hoping a 0.5 and up should work.
But if I can reach the quality you’re achieving, I’ll be more than happy!
I had a go at it with a flat end mill and am satisfied with the end result. (You can hardly call it a pcb, but therefor also a good small test project (size of the part is 20mm x 15mm)
The one in the middle was my first attempt with a 1mm flat end mill. it looks like the feed speed set by flatcam isn’t really honored, or something is a bit wrong with it. Either way, it went too fast and the bit broke (yay).
Second try was on the bottom right: In this case the traces went fine and I just wanted to go for it with a .5mm bit. Went really well and when I loaded the second file to cut it out, the work origin shifted for some reason. And I was too late to stop it so the traces were damaged already. Don’t understand why, will have to have a better look at the gcode files as to what caused it. maybe it was just an error on my side that I didn’t only adjust the z-height for the new bit but also the origin. But I think it’s something with the gcode generated by flatcam that throws the snapmaker off.
Third one worked well and appeared to be a succes.(yay). In this case I did copy the cnc code for the traces and the cutout in one file and ran it as a single job.
Did the last ones with a .04mm stepdown (yes, really that small) .4mm stepdown broke the 1mm bit, but in that job I didn’t notice the speed was way too high as well. I did reduce the speed for the jobs with the smaller bit.
Oh, and flatcam isn’t the most intuitive piece of software for a first time user. The files it produces are not fully compatible with the snapmaker. Doing a run boundary does crash the machine every time.
What software did you use to generate the cnc gcode for the PCB?
Flatcam doesn’t have the most user friendly interface, but it does work. What didn’t work was “run boundary” on the generated files. And I had some problems getting the feed speeds right.
So I would suggest to run your file in the air the first time.
), but I’m hoping a 0.5 and up should work.
