While waiting for my 3D printer I'm thinking I'll do some research into making a laser plotter to cure UV paint to form solder mask and silk screen layers on PCBs and maybe also expose a photosensitive film for PCB manufacture.
I've read up a bit already and there seems to be people doing this, but some of the details are lacking.
I keep coming back to Hacking the PHR-803T | Diyouware.com which use a blue-ray pickup sled complete with the autofocus circutry, and it has a really short focal distance.
Their solution has 150mW 405nm laser available, and this is more than sufficient for the photosensitive films used in PCBs. This guy use a 25mW laser pointer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=va0taOtdYPQ And I suspect its also sufficient for the UV paint as a few minutes in sunlight cures the paint.
So are there better (i.e. easier or cheaper) solutions than the PHR-803T pickup sled to make a focusable dot with a very short focal length? A few millimeters?
Ideal solution would be able to adjust dot size from 1.0mm down to 0.2 or maybe 0.1mm. If a fixed dot size is the only economical solution, then anything below 0.3mm will work for now. I can make PCBs on a mill, so maybe laser only need to handle UV paint for silk screen and solder mask.
And if ending up with a 150mW or less, 405nm laser, OD3 goggles should be sufficient?
If there are similar topics here, please point me in that direction, I've tried browsing all the results I could find for 'UV curing'.
I've read up a bit already and there seems to be people doing this, but some of the details are lacking.
I keep coming back to Hacking the PHR-803T | Diyouware.com which use a blue-ray pickup sled complete with the autofocus circutry, and it has a really short focal distance.
Their solution has 150mW 405nm laser available, and this is more than sufficient for the photosensitive films used in PCBs. This guy use a 25mW laser pointer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=va0taOtdYPQ And I suspect its also sufficient for the UV paint as a few minutes in sunlight cures the paint.
So are there better (i.e. easier or cheaper) solutions than the PHR-803T pickup sled to make a focusable dot with a very short focal length? A few millimeters?
Ideal solution would be able to adjust dot size from 1.0mm down to 0.2 or maybe 0.1mm. If a fixed dot size is the only economical solution, then anything below 0.3mm will work for now. I can make PCBs on a mill, so maybe laser only need to handle UV paint for silk screen and solder mask.
And if ending up with a 150mW or less, 405nm laser, OD3 goggles should be sufficient?
If there are similar topics here, please point me in that direction, I've tried browsing all the results I could find for 'UV curing'.