3D Printing for Circuit Boards

[pcCoder]

I came across this earlier and found it rather interesting.

I was actually thinking about this several days ago. I could imagine a 2D printer-like assembly but with cartridges of some sort of copper liquid, some insulator material, a lacquer material, and something for silkscreens. Multiple passes could be made through a base board, printing copper traces and hardening them, then printing some insulator over the traces, leaving gaps for the thru connections to the next layer, and repeat for each layer, ending with placing protective lacquer on the board, printing the silkscreen, and maybe even drilling holes for components. I also imagine as this technology progresses, even things like integrated circuits could end up as printed instead.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

I came across this earlier and found it rather interesting.

I was actually thinking about this several days ago. I could imagine a 2D printer-like assembly but with cartridges of some sort of copper liquid, some insulator material, a lacquer material, and something for silkscreens. Multiple passes could be made through a base board, printing copper traces and hardening them, then printing some insulator over the traces, leaving gaps for the thru connections to the next layer, and repeat for each layer, ending with placing protective lacquer on the board, printing the silkscreen, and maybe even drilling holes for components. I also imagine as this technology progresses, even things like integrated circuits could end up as printed instead.

That's pretty much how integrated circuits are made - except the layers are MUCH thinner - often only a few molecules!