William K. Borsum wrote: > > At 12:15 AM 11/27/99 -0800, you wrote: > >Related question for the group; I will have the capability to plate > >gold onto copper (or nickel or most anything else) pretty soon here; Is > >there an etchant that could be used, that would let me use gold as an > >etch resist? Ferric Chloride will (if hot at least) eat gold, IIRC, > >just curious if this is possible; it's definitely unusual, I know > > There was an ammonium persulfate (???) based etchant that was available in > the hobby market for a while. > Might try that. Nitric and sulfuric acids might work too--bit of a > handling problem though. > > I know a number of board houses that do work for HP use gold as a > resist--and Tin/lead is commonly used as a resist. > Would like to hear what you learn. > > Kelly > > William K. Borsum, P.E. -- OEM Dataloggers and Instrumentation Systems > & San Diego, California, USA Nitric or sulphuric, a problem? The mining folks I talk to always have those on hand, and my dad's a research chemist, WHAT handling problem? (A fume hood can be a good idea...) I could just hand the boards off to him to etch at work HF, now, HCN, or SO2, THOSE can be dangerous... I'll share info, no problem I've wondered about using EDM machining for making PCB's, also, but I have more curiousity than time to do research... It's so slow, I've passed on it. Mark -- I do small package shipping for small businesses, world-wide.