How to etch a PCB using blue press and peel film from Jaycar Electronics.

[Andy40]

Thanks Doc. I wish I read this before I drilled mine. I did look at the Jaycar clear film but its expensive, I think $35 for 5 sheets? but I haven't had great transfers with magazine paper, maybe i should try it. Also what program do you use to draw out the PCB?, there wasn't one with the greenbean pedal and I'll have to draw one out.

[DrNomis_44]

Thanks Doc. I wish I read this before I drilled mine. I did look at the Jaycar clear film but its expensive, I think $35 for 5 sheets? but I haven't had great transfers with magazine paper, maybe i should try it. Also what program do you use to draw out the PCB?, there wasn't one with the greenbean pedal and I'll have to draw one out.

One program that I can think of off the top of my head is a bit of software called DIY Layout Creator, it's open source software so it's free, if you register yourself as a member at Freestompboxes.org, you can download it from one of the forum threads, I think if you just google DIY Layout creator you should be able to download it that way, there is a bit of a learning curve with it though, but the good thing about it is that you can do Veroboard layouts with it as well, I'll see if I can find a download link.


Here we go, here's a link to a website where you can download DIY Layout Creator:

https://github.com/bancika/diy-layout-creator


Yep, the press and peel film is a bit expensive but you do actually get about 5 sheets of it per envelope if my memory serves me right, most of the project pdf files that Madbean has on his website should have a page with the PCB artwork on it, to be honest, it's been some time since I last etched a proper PCB so I mostly use Veroboard to build my pedals, I should get back into etching PCBs.


Here's another download link for DIY Layout Creator:

https://github.com/bancika/diy-layout-creator/releases


You might also need to download this file if you're installing DIY Layout Creator in Windows 10:

https://www.java.com/en/download/win10.jsp



Update:


I downloaded the DIY Layout Creator windows executable file from the second link, plus the Java Runtime environment file and installed both on my laptop computer which is running the 64 Bit version of Windows 10 Creator's Update, and I can confirm that the DIY Layout creator software seems to run fine so far with no issues, I don't know whether it'll run fine on the latest Mac OS X though, can't see why it shouldn't since it's supposed to run on any platform that supports Java.