Questions pertaining to conductive pads on circuit boards

[Biased]

What are they actually called? What are they made out of? Can I roll my own on a PCB?

If you don't know what I'm talking about:


I mean the black conductive area where the soft buttons for the controllers complete the circuits, acting as a switch (the spots for up/down/left/right, start/select, ABXY). I know it coats the copper of the PCB, so it must be a conductive paint or ink that dries on top of it and it helps conduct electricity with the buttons better than bare copper can with them. Does it only protect the copper?

If you know better please inform me so I can stop speculating like an idiot lol

[Haunted360]

The black pads where the buttons where?


It is a conductive paste over the copper. So for example, lick your fingers (so it is salty) and then touch the pad. When it is plugged in, it will activate (close the circuit) on the pad.


So when you close them (bridge the circuit), you are allowing the current to flow. Thus, completing the circuit to the microcontroller which will detect basically what button has been pressed.

Well, thats basically it in a nutshell for you


You can sand them lightly, (remove all the black padding) and there will be copper underneath for you to solder too.

(http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/playstation3.htm)

[Biased]

Is there any way to make a conductive paste? Would I have to bake it?

[Haunted360]

Hmm I don't really know.

I would presume there is some sort of a conductive paste you could buy.

Maybe do dome Googling

[Biased]

Took a shower (where I do my best thinking) and thought about it. My guess is that I'd probably just use some sort of paint with silver or some other conductive material in it, right? I think of conductive paste as more of a heat-dissipation agent for heatsinks and the like.

[Life of Brian]

Get some liquid tape and graphite powder. Mix the two and you have conductive... stuff. Here are a couple of informative Instructables tutorials:

Make Conductive Glue and Glue a Circuit

Conductive Glue and Conductive Thread

[Biased]

Awesome, thanks man!