I ran my first electro etch cycle with the pnp blue masked copper plate that was described in the last post.  There were no subtle changes in etch quality but huge positive (or is that anode) changes!

 

I ran the plate for 3 hours at .8 volts and a resulting .35 amps at 2 inch gap.  There was absolutely no lifting of the resist.  The finest details were maintained.  My previous best experience with puretch was 1 hour before lifting occurred and long before the etch depth,  that I was seeking, was obtained.

 

I obtained an etch depth of 7 mil (.007 inches.) vs. my previous best of 3 mil.

 

The pnp blue “ground” was still aggressively adhered and when given the clear-packing-tape pull test, none of the resist was removed from the plate.

 

Clearly, a step-change has occurred for me in this process. I will now prepare some plates and more aggressively etch them by raising the amperage per square inch of etched surface to find the sweet spot that can yield a deeper etch.  

 

I am defining the sweet spot as one hour time to etch 10 mils with no lifting of the resist (10 scale etch quality) over a 4 square inch plate.