Homebrew PCBs

I finally assembled all the pieces necessary to try out printing pcbs
with the EPSN R220, printer, three kinds of yellow ink, spare
cartridges and cartridge resetter.

I set up the R220 using some aftermarket dye ink cartridges (12 carts
for $20) to get a feel for how it ran and to do some general print
tests before actually going to pcbs.

The first thing that I noticed was the cheap cartridges did not match
the EPSON ink colors, the greys were very green and overall the
brightness was lacking. You get wht you pay for.

I then started to try some CD printing using the tray. I tried to
print a word document onto a CD using the tray, but received and error
message to close the CD tray and try again. :(

I then loaded the CD print software and tried it out. It great for
printing CD's but has a slight problem, it leaves a hole in the center
of the image. You can adjust the hole size but there is a minimum
value. The software is just too smart to let you print on the hub. Not
very good, unless you want skinny pcbs.

I then bought and downloaded the Epson R220 service manual and looked
at the schematics for sensing the tray vs paper. There are a couple of
switches involved and it appears some timing issues from the error
messages. It still may be hackable and worth some more effort.

Ideally, there is some software that will let you print over the hole.
I'll be looking at a few packages next.

I'll keep you posted

Myc