How to DIY teflon/silver PCB???

[Prune]

Can anyone point me to some info on how to make DIY teflon/silver PCBs? I couldn't find anything during my Googling.

[mgreene]

I've got some sample pieces of teflon high freq board and it is too pliable for a tube circuit. Look at the Loth-X Silbatone here: http://www.enjoythemusic.com/magazin.../silbatone.htm . It looks like they are just using a raw teflon sheet of proper thickness and hard wiring underneth. Could be a better option.

Mike

[Devil_H@ck]

Maybe you could use a solder with silver in it and spread it all over the tracks of the PCB?

[andy_c]

Originally posted by Prune
Can anyone point me to some info on how to make DIY teflon/silver PCBs? I couldn't find anything during my Googling.

Information about teflon board materials can be found here: http://www.rogers-corp.com/acm/litintbl.htm. These boards are copper-clad and used for microwave circuit applications (see data sheets). I'm sure they are quite expensive too. As far as manufacturing the boards, the process is likely similar to epoxy glass, but I don't have first-hand experience with this.

If you want to have plated-through holes with teflon, that's a problem with most teflon materials. Teflon's coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) in the z direction (perpendicular to the board surface) is mismatched with the copper plating, resulting in self-destructing plated-through holes with temperature cycling. There is one teflon material that works well with plated-through holes and that's Duroid 6002, which has a z-axis CTE that closely matches that of copper. Data sheet for that is here: http://www.rogers-corp.com/mwu/pdf/6002data.pdf

I'm not sure why you'd go to this trouble for audio applcations though. Traces and pads on teflon boards lift much easier than with epoxy glass, making rework very risky. By silver, I assume you mean silver plating of the copper? I'm not sure how that's done. I'd suggest rethinking this idea, and avoid the expense and trouble of teflon.

[Peter Daniel]

Originally posted by Prune
Can anyone point me to some info on how to make DIY teflon/silver PCBs? I couldn't find anything during my Googling.

Of course it all depends how complex your circuit is, but you could get a bare teflon board, drill holes to mount components and connect them with silver wire. No problem with lifting traces and pads either

[Prune]

Well that's essentially point to point, and you can even skip the teflon and use air as the dielectric, as even soft temper silver wire tends to be stiff enough to provide a partial support structure. But my main interest was in using a teflon/silver PCB for a DAC. I'm not sure point to point can give reasonable performance in that application.

[Elso Kwak]

Originally posted by Prune
Can anyone point me to some info on how to make DIY teflon/silver PCBs? I couldn't find anything during my Googling.

Hi Prune,
Do you expect a better soundquality?

[Prune]

I don't know. I mean I made silver cables and I don't hear a difference, but hey, you never know, when other eqiuipment in the signal path gets upgraded, maybe if I tried the old cable then I would hear a difference. Silver/teflon PCBs are used in some commercial equipment anyhow.

[Upupa Epops]

Silver is good for bullets against vampires , but this must be spreaded with garlic . Try it with silver PCB, maybe sound will be catapulted to the unbelivable dimensions .

[analog_sa]

Do you expect a better soundquality?

Maybe not in a dac, especially if one can't hear a difference using silver cables...

Fwiw i recently rebuilt an opamp phono pre from using stripboard to a teflon board with bolted brass standoffs. No silver wire though.
The sound definitely changed in a positive direction - more coherent, less screechy, better dynamics, but the magnitude of the difference was significantly less than my expectations. It may well be due to the teflon vibrational characteristics rather than dielectric absorption.