Anyone ever used a technique like this? https://youtu.be/drwGvATLNaw Trevor R.H. Clarke, K8TRC

Hi Trevor... Haven't personally used it but I suspect that way back when getting PC boards etched was a major time and expense that it was used. I seem to remember some articles in QST or ham radio magazine that talked about it as a way to make something quickly and cheap. About the only difficulty with the tape method is making connections, but I just skimmed through the video so I might have missed his comments on that. At one time there were allegedly conductive adhesives for the tape but I don't think they worked very well. There were a number of articles way back about using conductive tape to make antennas on glass, for example. Anyway, it is certainly a good way to go, but I'd be careful about the power handling capability. Low Z RF power can generate lots of current, and adding in the skin effect can lead to hot spots. But hey, you don't know until you try it. Tom Holmes, N8ZM -----Original Message----- From: mvus-list <mvus-list-bounces@lists.febo.com> On Behalf Of Trevor Clarke via mvus-list Sent: Thursday, May 14, 2020 3:44 PM To: Midwest VHF/UHF Society Mailing List <mvus-list@lists.febo.com> Cc: Trevor Clarke <retrev@csh.rit.edu> Subject: [mvus-list] Watch "Rapid Prototyping RF Filters with Tape & QUCS" on YouTube Anyone ever used a technique like this? https://youtu.be/drwGvATLNaw Trevor R.H. Clarke, K8TRC _______________________________________________ mvus-list mailing list mvus-list@lists.febo.com http://lists.febo.com/mailman/listinfo/mvus-list_lists.febo.com

He's using copper tape with adhesive already on it and applying to the non-conductive side of a single sided PCB. He fixed minor conductivity issues with solder. I suspect for filter design it's a good starting point, no problem feeding a VNA for noise source for characterization. Probably can handle a few watts as well. The thing I'm not sure about is that you can spin fr4 boards pretty cheaply and quickly but it can still take a couple of weeks and $10s per board for better dielectrics and controlled impedance. Since he's using fr4 board and imprecise cuts I don't think you'd get better performance from this vs. cheap proto boards. I'd be interested to see if he's able to find alumina or other blank boards and if they give better performance. On Thu, May 14, 2020 at 5:41 PM Tom Holmes via mvus-list < mvus-list@lists.febo.com> wrote: > Hi Trevor... > > Haven't personally used it but I suspect that way back when getting PC > boards etched was a major time and expense that it was used. I seem to > remember some articles in QST or ham radio magazine that talked about it as > a way to make something quickly and cheap. About the only difficulty with > the tape method is making connections, but I just skimmed through the video > so I might have missed his comments on that. At one time there were > allegedly conductive adhesives for the tape but I don't think they worked > very well. > > There were a number of articles way back about using conductive tape to > make > antennas on glass, for example. > > Anyway, it is certainly a good way to go, but I'd be careful about the > power > handling capability. Low Z RF power can generate lots of current, and > adding > in the skin effect can lead to hot spots. But hey, you don't know until you > try it. > > Tom Holmes, N8ZM > > -----Original Message----- > From: mvus-list <mvus-list-bounces@lists.febo.com> On Behalf Of Trevor > Clarke via mvus-list > Sent: Thursday, May 14, 2020 3:44 PM > To: Midwest VHF/UHF Society Mailing List <mvus-list@lists.febo.com> > Cc: Trevor Clarke <retrev@csh.rit.edu> > Subject: [mvus-list] Watch "Rapid Prototyping RF Filters with Tape & QUCS" > on YouTube > > Anyone ever used a technique like this? > > https://youtu.be/drwGvATLNaw > > Trevor R.H. Clarke, K8TRC > _______________________________________________ > mvus-list mailing list > mvus-list@lists.febo.com > http://lists.febo.com/mailman/listinfo/mvus-list_lists.febo.com > > > > _______________________________________________ > mvus-list mailing list > mvus-list@lists.febo.com > http://lists.febo.com/mailman/listinfo/mvus-list_lists.febo.com > -- Trevor R.H. Clarke Computer Science House Rochester Institute of Technology retrev@csh.rit.edu http://www.csh.rit.edu/~retrev/