Solder Paste Printing and SPI Quality Control Solder paste printing is the operation that decides the ceiling on the quality of an assembly, and it is also the operation that receives the least attention when a product is being planned. Placement and reflow are visible; printing produces a deposit that…
0201 Components and Fine Pitch ICs: Printing, Placement and Inspection A board that carries 0201 passive components and a fine pitch integrated circuit on the same surface is one of the more demanding combinations in ordinary production. The two requirements pull the process in different directions: the tiny passives need…
PCB Flexible Circuit Stackup Thickness: Layers That Must Bend Modern electronics depend on boards that are assembled correctly the first time. Every product – a phone, a charger, a medical instrument or an industrial controller – relies on thousands of solder joints that must conduct current for years. This article…
SMT Capacity: Lines, Floor Space and How an Order Is Scheduled SMT capacity is usually presented as a pair of numbers, a floor area and a count of production lines, and those two numbers tell a buyer almost nothing about whether an order will be delivered on time. A large…
PCB Flex Bend Radius Design: How Tight Can It Bend Modern electronics depend on boards that are assembled correctly the first time. Every product – a phone, a charger, a medical instrument or an industrial controller – relies on thousands of solder joints that must conduct current for years. This…
PCB Flex Stiffener Material Selection: Rigid Where It Counts Modern electronics depend on boards that are assembled correctly the first time. Every product – a phone, a charger, a medical instrument or an industrial controller – relies on thousands of solder joints that must conduct current for years. This article…
Solution Development from Requirement Definition to Mass Production A solution development project begins with a requirement and ends with a product that can be manufactured, and the distance between those two points is filled with decisions that are much cheaper to take early than late. This introduction describes the route…
PCB Fabrication Capability: Two to Thirty Layers PCB fabrication covers a wider range than most buyers expect when they first place an order. The same shop can cut a two layer prototype on a Friday and laminate a thirty layer backplane over the following fortnight, and the reason those two…
PCB Flex Coverlay Selection: Covering a Flexible Circuit Modern electronics depend on boards that are assembled correctly the first time. Every product – a phone, a charger, a medical instrument or an industrial controller – relies on thousands of solder joints that must conduct current for years. This article explains…
PCB Design Service: From Schematic Capture to a Released Gerber Set A PCB design service is judged on two things that are easy to separate and hard to confuse: whether the resulting board works, and whether the data that leaves the door can be manufactured without a further round of…












