DIY Etching Tank With Aquarium Pump And Heater
I wanted to build an etching tank since i first saw one in an article on Make Blog. It was fun to make it and it will sure speed-up my PCB making process. The main thing that i wanted to achieve with my etching tank was to keep it thin so it holds up smaller amounts of etchant, it’s better this way because i need to store and work with smaller quantities. My finished tank holds 1,5 L of liquid when full.
In the article on Make the author made he’s from acrylic magazine holders. I chose to make mine from plexiglas. I got this 1500×1000x3 sheet for about $15 and now i got enough left to make cases for other projects. When working with plexiglas there are several methods of cutting it which include sawing it, cutting it with a hot wire or cutting it glass style. I used the method glass style which means you make repeated scratches on the same path using a sharp cutter.
Depending on the thickness of your plexiglas you have to make more or less deeper scratches. You’ve reached the desired scratch depth when you try to bend the plexiglas and it just snaps along the line. I would of shown you pictures from the making process but unfortunately i accidentally erased them 
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For gluing i used a PVC adhesive from Bison, it’s supposed to be used when gluing PVC pipes so i figured it should work on plexiglas too. The nice thing about it is that is leaves a nice transparent finish. After gluing i left it to harden for 24 hours.
Before assembling the etching tank make sure you’ve drilled holes for the heater and the hose.
On my DIY Etching Tank i also used a heater(an old aquarium heater that i used when i was into aquariums) to heat the etchant because heating it makes the process faster. Besides the heater i also added an aquarium pump that will agitate the liquid thus making the process even faster.
The parts used in the making are:
- 1500×1000x3 sheet of plexiglas $15
- PVC Glue $4
- aquarium heater $10
- aquarium air pump $10
- aquarium hose and disperser stone $2
Total: $41 . So with a little over 40 $ you can make your own etching tank
Here are some pictures with the tank being tested with watter:
June 6th, 2008 at 12:20 am
Hi, nice work but if you use disperser stone in ferric chloride… unfortunately it will dissolve quickly
Olivier
June 6th, 2008 at 7:01 pm
Hi Oliver, thx for the hint, i didn’t knew that, i would of taken to consideration other ways of doing the bubbles if i knew. So i guess I’ll be using it until it dissolves and than maybe I’ll make a better etching tank. (so far no damage to the stone)
June 14th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
[...] you are looking for something similar that has a bubble machine installed you should see YourITronics brand new PCB etcher with aquarium pump and heater. They use a bubble machine that speeds up [...]
June 16th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
[...] Learn how to make Etching tank [...]
June 16th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
[...] Learn how to make Etching tank [...]
June 16th, 2008 at 3:49 pm
Most home improvement stores carry solvents explicitly intended for acrylic and Plexiglass. The PVC cement may or may not hold up over time. Acrylic solvents actually fuse the material together, creating wickedly strong transparent joints. Also, compared to the PVC solvents I’m familiar with, the acrylic solvents have a low viscosity, very close to water. This makes them easy to work with in dispenser bottles with needle tips, or syringes.
June 24th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
JC thanks and welcome on Youritronics. I searched for that kind of solvents but they only offered me what can be seen in the picture. As you said acrylic solvents fuse the material and thats better.
November 7th, 2008 at 3:36 am
It seems a good idea!