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/diy/ - Do It Yourself

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339355 No.339355 [Reply] [Original]

I still have a bit over a kg of Fe3Cl from when I was etching boards more often. It's been stored dry for about a decade, and now I want to revive my hobby and etch a board again.

Turns out the Fe3Cl doesn't seem to work anymore. I have the board in it for over 20 mins now and can't see much progress at all. I remember it being way faster.

Is there a limit on how long you can store Fe3Cl?

>> No.339357

>>339355
google says ferric chloride has a couple year shelf life.

>> No.339393

>>339357

I've used the same solution for years. Sure it's slow, but it seems to regenerate itself somehow.

>>339355

Well, the previous anon is kinda right. It goes bad, but it should still work after 2 years.
Maybe you've forgotten that you'll need rather concentrated solution for it to act quickly? Or that slight heating speeds it up a lot? Or that shaking helps?
Sometimes it also forms a thin semi-protective rust cover on your PCB, which slows things down. This is quite likely with your old FeCl3.

>> No.339404

>>339393
I have it heated and fairly concentrated. I haven't done any exact measuring; I threw in a bunch of Fe3Cl into the hot water and dumped the board in it like I did in the past.

It's starting to work (waiting 2 hours now). Part of the problem might be the board itself which seems to have an exceptionally thick layer of copper. With my luck the results will be shitty thanks to thick copper and slow Fe3Cl.