CO2 laser drilling of the resin coated copper (RCC) layers of laminated circuit boards has been investigated at different fluence levels. The threshold fluence for copper layer drilling is found to be 570 Jcm(-2) for 51mum and 1500 Jcm(-2) for 12 mum copper thickness, using laser pulses in the 10 mus and 20 mus FWHM respectively. Undercut in the resin layer is found to primarily depend on the amount of excess energy in the pulse tail. Methods to reduce the pulse decay time have been investigated, giving smaller diameter breakthrough holes close to threshold, which should aid the control of hole drilling in RCC. High-speed videography has been used to verify the observations of post-processing analysis.