You can draw circuits! But does it make sense? Conductive Ink Pen Experiment!

[@Casperdroid5]

You could say: "you can draw as much as you want, but not when it comes to current." 😆

[@chrisakaschulbus4903]

please uninstall your internet connection

[@greatscottlab]

Oh boy😅

[@rexsceleratorum1632]

@@chrisakaschulbus4903 He actually tried nine more puns to impress internet people. No pun in ten did.

[@chrisakaschulbus4903]

@@rexsceleratorum1632 "No pun in ten did." why are you like this? why?!

[@rexsceleratorum1632]

@@chrisakaschulbus4903 If you hate puns, more power to you, that is watt I think

[@putraadriansyah8082]

fixing broken traces with conductive pen seems like a brilliant idea!

[@gullreefclub]

Many years ago automotive parts stores used to sell pens like this to repair broken traces for GM dashboard instrument clusters

[@handlesarefeckinstupid]

I have used conductive paint to fix heated rear windows on vehicles before.

[@mcac-youtube]

Maybe only at low current circuits traces, how could we see.

[@xWonderxBreadx]

It is! And it's a savior for people like me, who have shaky hands and burn traces! It's been used in several solid state +500watt bass amplifiers at my job

[@tanishqbhaiji103]

Nope, just scrape the mask and use solder

[@mike_x48954]

Never thought I'd see someone solder on paper. It's something different.

[@mohamadmansour2595]

I fix keyboard tracks using silver conducive paint, works perfectly.

[@greatscottlab]

Good to know

[@vibrion121]

@@greatscottlab Also you can repair conductive rubber such remote control or wireless phones

[@bradprimeaux8443]

That what I was thinking a good use of this would be. PCB trace repair.

[@mrt1r]

Graphite is also conductive and pencils are much cheaper.

[@user-vn7ce5ig1z]

You must be using a good-quality one because the three syringes of wire-glue that I've gotten from Chinese sellers on eBay have been useless and don't work (they don't conduct at all whether fresh or dry), so I've got a pile of keyboard membranes waiting to be fixed. 😕 (The first one I got several years ago did work briefly but stopped after a while, the others never worked.) I got some copper tape to fix them instead. 😉

[@tanmay8017]

Tried it once, only recommended for low current applications.

[@sayantanmaiti2513]

Where did you buy it?

[@benbaselet2026]

Sooo.. works great as a fuse? :-)

[@tanmay8017]

@@sayantanmaiti2513 AliExpress

[@clifffton]

Great for fixing bad traces. Been using it for years.

[@mcac-youtube]

And i think about the performance of resistence/cm after a long time. Maybe the resistence/cm is going to be higher and higher.

[@gullreefclub]

This is not a new technology back in the 1980’s “squeeze pens” like this were sold to repair broken traces on GM dashboard instrument clusters

[@factorpotencia]

Yes made of silver

[@Alacritous]

I've used a pencil to draw circuits. The graphite is conductive. On the original run of Athlon CPUs you could enable overclocking by drawing a line with a pencil on the top of the chip to connect two contacts. I've used a pencil to draw to connect a broken trace on circuit boards.

[@greatscottlab]

Interesting!

[@emir4707]

I tried the same with a pencil, they are very good for making resistors

[@greatscottlab]

Graphite pencil?

[@Bhavesh_g20]

@@greatscottlab I also tried By creating a dark thick line with pencil And it was conducting too

[@Custmzir]

@@greatscottlab probably

[@attackaffection5444]

@@greatscottlab aren't all pencils graphite

[@emir4707]

@@greatscottlab Yes !

[@simoneazzoni3882]

This is actually something i have never seen that looks quite interesting, great video :D

[@greatscottlab]

Thanks! 😄

[@andreiciora2765]

@@greatscottlab I think I will buy this thing

[@thaneshwarpoudelchhetri4032]

What about your drone🇳🇵🇳🇵??that you had tell to build

[@andreiciora2765]

@Jaydeep Mondal probably the paper will be în fire .

[@liveroy]

Question is, why did you use it on a soaking surface like paper you've used. Wood or glass might have been much better option.

[@bloepje]

Or photo paper. But yeah glass sounds nice.

[@privatesector0422]

I don't see why you don't just use blue tape for your borders... Cardboard is a complete mistake the edges do not get sealed...

[@trombonebone17456343]

I used one of these pens to fix the traces on an old IBM keyboard a couple years ago! The repaired traces / pads still work.

[@OffGridInvestor]

Actually DECADES AGO as a kid.... I discovered something with graphite pencils drawing lines on paper....... and you can work it out yourself but I knew FOR YEARS. You won't believe it until you discover it.

[@danielfromca]

There is also 5mm conductive sticky tape on amazon as an alternative to conductive ink. Might be interesting to try it on a canvas and with through hole parts.

[@3DPDK]

These came on to the market some time around the late 1970s and early 1980s. Their specified intention was for circuit board repair. This was at a time before surface mount circuits. The smallest trace found on most PC boards was 0.1 inch which is the pad width for through-mount ICs. The only method of creating a PC board at that time, whether mass produced or hobbyist was a photographic process, and using caustic etching solutions to process the copper. Making a PCB as a hobbyist was possible, but more involved than many wanted to go into. The first PCB pens were actually black ink pens used to draw opaque traces on the transparent acetate to hand draw the photo positive for that photo process, and it actually worked pretty well for that purpose. The carbon based black ink in these pens was discovered to be conductive, and so the birth of this whole idea of just drawing the PCB directly.

[@doge5603]

I feel like the silver pen would be a decent thermal paste alternative while using small heatsinks.

[@TechBuild]

Yes, It seems to be worthy of a video.

[@michaegi4717]

What is the benefit compared to thermal paste?

[@xcsourceindustrialist7926]

@@michaegi4717 nothing, actually it is worse. there is reason thermal paste DOES NOT dry up and non-conducting, when you change thermal paste with conductive paint and it dry quickly you lose the properties for thermal conducting since the part should be in touch with the paste (dry = shrinking) and heatsink. the thermal paste works with filling the gap between heatsink and the parts, therefore the filling material should not dry. that's why when you see the thermal paste is dry you should change it with the new one. and the reason for thermal paste is not conductive is for safety reason in eletrical sense.

[@boulder795]

No, no it wouldn't.

[@simplywonderful449]

@@michaegi4717 IMO, there would be no real benefit, but this stuff would dry out, perhaps cracking between heat sink and device, which would alter the transfer of heat in a bad way.

[@mk_annan22]

I first saw the concept of conducive ink in around 2016-2017. It has come a long way since then.

[@wadeh486]

That is on another level, never even considered it.

[@liamridley1605]

how was this commented like 3 days before the video was released

[@wadeh486]

Pateron supporter, videos are released a few days early

[@n0madfernan257]

teacher: pass your prototype papers, And make sure its working at least... also get ready to explain it later Plot twist: the teacher is GreatScott

[@greatscottlab]

I like ;-)

[@bhoot1702]

Lol! An excuse for teachers. Students will be like "what do you mean?"

[@stevefox3763]

They are useful for repairing tracks in rear heated screens on cars, so many people have damaged a track or two where something has been in the boot and scratched though to the glass.

[@DrJALAGHARI]

Thank you so much for sharing this valuable information through this amazing video.

[@greatscottlab]

You are so welcome!

[@Rem_NL]

if you already like this look at Robert Murray's channel, he is a inventor and sells conductive ink. He shares a lot of his knowledge and perform lots of cool experiments with battery tech and his ink. kzbin.info/www/bejne/mXnUo5apfN6mY5I

[@DrJALAGHARI]

@@Rem_NL Thanks for sharing this valuable KZbin channel.

[@Rem_NL]

@@DrJALAGHARI that is actually his 2nd channel i think more aimed towards his ink, his main channel has way more videos (increasing in audio visual quality over the years ) kzbin.infofeatured

[@Convolutedtubules]

I would love to see this pen in a CNC pen plotter.

[@Zanoab]

Circuit Scribe has videos of their pen in a pen plotter to print circuits. Connecting components is still tricky but using extra ink and hot glue helps keep things together.

[@Convolutedtubules]

@@Zanoab Thanks.

[@YoutubeBorkedMyOldHandle_why]

Sometimes I've made double sided DIY PCBs using photo-resist and copper clad etc. This works nicely, but one issue is that the top/bottom vias are not connected after drilling them out. To solve this, I typically insert thin wires in all the vias, and solder on both sides ... but this can be a bit tedious. I wonder if this 'magic' conductive ink might be used to quickly plate the vias, by injecting it into the holes. If so, this ink might possibly be useful for 'actual' projects.

[@researchandbuild1751]

Something people fail to mention is with the silver inks you should actually heat them for a while to fully cure. The resistance will drop even lower is you do that

[@artbyrobot1]

good point. I am reading that a full 24 hours is required but applying hair dryer for 5 minutes can do the same job as 24 hour air dry

[@YukonK9]

I wonder if in the future as material science advances, we'll see conductive ink with as good conductivity as like raw copper or something, it'll be so cool and useful

[@greatscottlab]

Only time will tell ;-)

[@deadly_dave]

I think we can print (badly) with copper already (and it's super difficult) but it's not your standard FDM printing on account of needing ~1200 degrees to melt the copper. I think it uses powered copper and laser instead. I like you am super excited to see a day when we can print copper (hobbyist style) esp if you can print it inside a standard print.

[@simplywonderful449]

Since conductive 3D printer "ink" is already available, you can now quite literally "print" printed circuits using a 3D printer. I'm not aware of any standard inkjet printer ink that is conductive to this degree, though the problem with standard inkjets is that you can't "feed" a rigid surface through them, but you CAN 3D print on a thin board, for example.

[@woodywood1951]

I prefer to use double side tape (the thin one) and very small wires ( as 24 or 28 gauge) and lay the wires and components on the tape. And I use fine soldier to make the connection between wire and components. You can even print out a "circuit" with a printer and lay everything directly on the tape. Fast and reliable.

[@LightningHelix101]

That’s super cool! The conductive paint from a previous video seemed more permanent and professional, but this is probably better for quick demos

[@dodgydruid]

I use conductive paints and inks to replace acid destroyed circuit traces on my old Soviet quartz watches. Its actually pretty good and instead of all that soldering minute bits of wire onto a circuit board I just paint over the break and jobs a good 'un. I started using originally silver paint used for repairing the fine traces in rear screen demisters for your car, using that to create overclocking and unlocking bridges on AMD and Intel CPU's and was always useful for repairing a circuit board where a capacitor had let go or a coin battery had sprayed its love inside the device.

[@gopronomad4381]

It can be used to create or repair a flexible circuit material such as keyboard traces (on flexi plastic surface)

[@SudipChorghe-ym4is]

Was wating for this all day.

[@greatscottlab]

I hope you liked the video ;-)

[@mapsynth1596]

i've seen people on youtube draw circuits on paper by just using a pencil, stating that since graphite is somewhat of a conductor it was possible to make simple circuits with it. it never worked when i tried it, the trace resistance was way too high, in the order of kiloohms, even with very thick and short lines. perhaps i just have very bad pencils, i don't know.

[@vaibhavkhurana215]

Now I can finally make my own paper resistors!

[@ferdinandstrat]

IMO JLCPCB is one of the best services out there today

[@greatscottlab]

Brilliant! :-)

[@nullerrno]

I appreciate that it is more of a toy. But it does get me thinking about DIY flexible PCBs.

[@MuhammadDaudkhanTV100]

Fantastic idea

[@sandeepnaik6818]

It's supposedly used for acrylic or plastic sheet not on paper

[@artbyrobot1]

I recommend the cheapest silver conductive ink you can find that is more of a paste. squirt that onto a piece of plastic. now get a tiny tiny sewing needle and screw that into your exacto knife instead of the knife. now use the needle as a paintbrush to finely paint traces with amazing accuracy with this this paste into your substrate of choice. don't stop the trace shy of a component! set that component DOWN and trace up onto the leg of it with a little glob of paste to blue down the component and electrically attach it to your trace. no soldering needed AT ALL.

[@georgeabraham7256]

That conductive pen looks like the right stuff to fix old Potentiometers in restorations.

[@demonocolips]

i figured it would be for rapid prototyping, or making boge wires. depending upon how well the ink holds up repairing old conductive keyboards seems possible.

[@electropoint2.026]

You can use Chinese pen to make traces and Silver pen for soldering point. It can be less resistive and useful.

[@JoseGutierrez-cw1wn]

I always think of those pens as a way to make small fixes on boards.

[@aWildOcti]

I wanted to do this myself

[@axelurbanski2828]

Hallo Scott Auf gedruckten Schaltungen kann man bauteile kleben. Dazu gibt es Tinte für Plotter und leitenden Kleber. Hab ich leider noch nicht getestet.

[@goodgoat3096]

The problem with even simple LED circuits is that the resistance will cause the LEDs to light up at different intensities. Even the silver palladium and gold palladium inks from DuPont and others screen printed on hi alumina ceramic substrates had limitations. The polymer based inks are even more limiting.

[@GGP829]

Conductive pen can be use on fixing touch panel of microwave oven. Most of the time the ribbon in the touch panel is prone to worn out.

[@normswan5806]

I had used a conductive pen to jump pins on an old AMD Athalon 64 professors. Made it run faster speed. Worked well.

[@red1246]

Mhh, interesting, I'm also tinkering with some athlon 64, can I ask you how you did it?

[@normswan5806]

@@red1246sorry, I was wrong. I went and looked. It's on an Athalon XP chip. Bridge the L1 jumpers unlocks the multiplier. Guess I'm older than I thought.

[@red1246]

@@normswan5806 wow, that's a really old beast, how much more performance do you get from it?

[@normswan5806]

@@red1246 for the time it was worth it to me. Nothing compared to today. But, I also, "upgraded" by putting up a sign..."it's faster now". I felt better.

[@misfitsman805]

Used one years ago to modify an ATI Radeon 9500 pro 128 MB graphics card by unlocking more pipelines and bios flash it to a higher model card. Worked perfect!

[@michaegi4717]

This remembers me to smart textiles. It blew my mind when I realized how simple it is to sew a circuit to a textile. But I never figured out a real aplication. I guess it will be similar with such pens.

[@jumbocube]

if I was a kid seeing this on my physics class back in school I would be blown away!

[@JaseTheAussie]

Soldering on the paper never even crossed my mind… 🤯

[@CXensation]

I prefer the oldschool readymade hole or holestrip pattern PCB's for a quick prototype build. They are conveniently laid out with a 0.1" hole pattern fits leaded type IC's and all types leaded components. You can even use these PCB's as an overlay for cardboards and then with a nail or needle punch your hole pattern on to the cardboard. That makes for a very neat birds nest on the initial layout. You can always order from JLC pcb maker later on for your deluxe version project.

[@fvrrljr]

Goldsmith Master Jeweler here: silver pen is what was introduced in the Jewelry Business, they had a gold on also but didn't work. but like you said, for beginner's to learn, they kids at school i approve. i Like, OLE'!

[@patnutoris4054]

These pens are used for small temporary repairs (as you briefly show). Also, you can not use a normal DMM for low resistance measurements like you do. You need to use 4-point (4-cable) measurements as parasitic resistances are high. You are in essence measuring your test equipment and not the paste. You then need to use a test structure to determine the intrinsic resistance of the conductive paste, otherwise you are measuring your geometry which is useless for most cases. One such simple structure is called Transmission Line Measurement (TLM). All you need is a straight line of the conductive paste, a ruler and 4-point measurement. You are almost doing it during the max current test. It would be nice if you could the show the correct way to measure as most new engineers seem to have problem with them. If the conductive paste is silver then the line resistivity should be 3-10x that of bulk silver, i.e. very good. This kind of thermally curable silver paste are used for the pattern on the front of almost all (99.9%) solar cells. So 315x is an indication of poor setup+measurement rather then poor material. In this case, I believe it is due to use of paper which is extremely porous material so the conductive film is broken up in islands. Use a solid PCB as a carrier for the silver paste to avoid this problem. Again, don't use DMM as I have yet to see any DMM measure below a few hundred milliohm even with a dead short on the leads. Finally, the Chinese pen seem to be copper paste. These oxidize in air to that is most likely the reason why you can not solder on it. We had the same problem when we wanted to use Cu instead of Ag in our PV cell production to reduce price.

[@my3dprintedlife]

Always a good day when there's a new Great Scott video!

[@greatscottlab]

Thanks mate :-)

[@joveaaron-real]

NEXT VIDEO IDEA: DIY PCB PRINTER (on paper / cardboard)

[@dm5rkt]

In a similar vein, check out 3M's Z tape 9703. Double sided adhesive tape that only conducts in the thickness direction. Contains micro balls of copper. You can just stick an IC onto its footprint and all the pins make contact without shorting to each other.

[@deadbird99]

You should test conductive thread too.

[@greatscottlab]

Honestly never heard of it😅 But I will surely have a look😉

[@deadbird99]

@@greatscottlab Adafruit made some to be used with "wearables".

[@jamesregenold4617]

I designed a PCB for work, had it made and stuffed, but I forgot (So far in my analysis) exactly ONE pin, a reset pin on an IC that was left floating. No trace or connection anywhere, and in need it pulled high. BTW this particular IC is .5mm pitch SMD. Going to attempt to draw a connection (using tape to keep the ink from getting where it shouldn't) to pull it high, if it works I'll let everyone know, because I think this stuff has some serious practical application, especially in prototyping. It's less work than point to point wiring and more practical in circumstances like this.

[@someguy2741]

What if you used the cheapest solder paste to make the traces? You could also try putting the circuit into an oven to see if you could melt it before the paper lights... you could use parchment paper although you may need to rough it up to get some adhesion.

[@piconano]

I love building with perf-boards and the old school way with through components. When electronics looked like electronic artwork. Not like today's braille for the blind!

[@brunsniggel]

As in opposition to braille for the deaf?

[@Lucho24cr]

Seems good for fixing membrane keypad traces and ribbon or flex connectors

[@the_omg3242]

I wonder if a better way could be to crazy glue your components to your surface then draw the traces rather than trying to solder to the traces after. This way the trace is painted straight onto your contacts. As suggested in another post, use glass as the board surface so the trace doesn't try to soak into it.

[@sanfinity_]

Nice video Great Scott🔥 now I know about a new soldering pen which can be used for electronic arts

[@greatscottlab]

Glad to help

[@Averna222]

Something very similar is used for fixing the rear window defroster when the tracks have been damaged.

[@Lazarus65]

Use it like paint to cover small 3D printed objects for electroplating.

[@connormichalec]

Best youtube intro on the platform

[@CanineDefenseTechnologies]

Dip a blanket in this ink, run some power. Boom electric blanket

[@greatscottlab]

Haha

[@Bri-Sci]

I was starting to experiment with the conductive 3d printer filament. One low voltage application I wanted to try is see if I could make a potentiometer printed into the body of a robot arm. But found multiple issues with trying to get the slicer to print one line width wires.

[@manos7958]

Years ago in a galaxy far away these pens were used to repair PCBs but today it's a crazy world

[@raphaelwelti6632]

Hi Scott! Can you make a stylophone? There's lots of stuff to play around with while doing one. Greetings!

[@TheChemicalWorkshop]

tbh, i think some of this, glass and epoxy would make stunning artwork

[@alexoja2918]

What components can you create using that ink? You already made a fuse, now make resistors! Capacitor is pretty straightforward, and how about drawing in circles around a ferrite core? Or a coreless inductor using a cylinder of paper 🤔 also, led paint.

[@ast1527]

I wish I had this pen when I made my capacitive light switch. Great video mate. Cheers

[@greatscottlab]

Thanks mate👍

[@Krmpfpks]

If anyone can draw circuits it's GreatScott!

[@greatscottlab]

Oh stop it. You are making me blush.....

[@gregorymccoy6797]

Great video. I was always curious about this. You answered every question I had.

[@ruix]

This would be useful for small projects with tight spaces. You can bend the paper.

[@ufochannel01]

maybe try attaching other components using the conductive pen ink as the connection instead of solder. after it is dry if you dont move it maybe it could work? you may need to find a different way to glue it into place though using this method. but that said it is worth looking into.

[@MartinBogomolni]

There is a VERY big difference between the pens from CircuitScribe ( nanoparticle silver flakes ) and the others which use powders. The resistance is MUCH lower.

[@MartinBogomolni]

If you would like me to send you a CircuitScribe pen ( silver gel pen ) I would be happy to do so.

[@abo1428]

JLCPCB left the room …

[@sciencesi5595]

U can also make a PCB 3D printer which prints with solder as it can melt at lower temps than usual metals

[@BESTvsWORST-vx2dg]

Thanks Great Scott. Loved this video

[@greatscottlab]

Glad to hear it!

[@chanakasampath9138]

Good Vedio and good idea, i think that it will be used for creat the damege path of PCB (when repairing the TV circuit bord and etc.).

[@trishanustech281]

hey i really enjoy watching ur videos.... I LOVE UR VIDEOS.... KEEP IT UP....

[@greatscottlab]

Thanks, will do!

[@fratermunky4336]

I could see getting a robotic arm to draw out fine circuits that could be electroplated. Dope the ink(or some sort of resin)with different ratios of materials and you could probably make resistors. You also may be able to make capacitors by layering strips of thin plastic or silicone to be rolled up. Idk just curious that's all

[@dc_labz]

Can you make a series on testing the CIRCUITS found on the internet. It'll be great 👍

[@kesor6]

Hmm... what about a stencil? Using this ink like a solder paste ; also use a non-soaking-surface so paper wouldn't be great at having a stencil with this thing applied on it.

[@greatscottlab]

I think the ink is too viscose for that...

[@StigDesign]

Quick Prototpying i think this can be Really usefull for a quick test before perfBoard, and also as a quick fix on pcb if its important, while waiting for spare part/Part`s :D

[@greatscottlab]

True

[@user-wg6ik1wi6s]

I bought some electrically conductive paint from Amazon but I've noticed while using it, it has Alot of resistance and you would never be able to make a circuit with it. Over a 2 inch span it will barely light up LED's.

[@BlackHoleForge]

I remember seeing something about this many years ago. I can't wait to see your take on it.

[@blanana_m]

Time to put this in my printer and print my buck converter on paper Soldering could be a problem tho

[@RitamSanyal]

Bruh😂 just 2 hours ago visited your channel,to see if you have posted any ney video since last week, and I was upset not finding one, and now you posted this masterpiece 🙏❤️ from India

[@vedritmathias9193]

Circuit Scribe immediately came to mind. I think they did a kickstarter years ago, which I backed. I never did any tests on the pen they sent, but I recall it being a lot less bulky than the pens you got

[@tech-dips]

Thanks @greatscott, i know the video is going to be awesome

[@dj_paultuk7052]

What about that silver conductive paint that is used for car heated screen repair ?. I guess that can handle higher currents.

[@terrancevangemert7508]

Well, that is nice to know however I stick with PCB and other types of soldering boards and bread boards for prototyping. DO not need the extra headaches.

[@shakila975]

Thanks so much 🙏🙏

[@gameratortylerstein5636]

You could also use a graphite pencil, but it will have higher resistance

[@JjMn1000]

Conductive solder traces It’s a copper pen. Never thought I would say the words “copper” and “pen” together

[@navorski7660]

Those pens are quite useful. For example I managed to fix my membrane keyboard's conductive film traces using this pen since they were corroded and was not conducting.

[@RakeGrayFox]

GreatScott! What about refreshing old and consumed contacts pad like silicone buttons in controllers and remote or flat contacts pad like in keyboards? Could be a durable fix? In some circumstances there are no spare parts to buy and maybe it can save your old electronics?