PCB Nitrogen Consumption in An Oven: From Prototype to Volume Production Buyers and engineers often focus on the finished product and forget the production line behind it. In practice, most field failures can be traced back to process decisions made during assembly. Understanding PCB nitrogen consumption in an oven gives…

Laser-Cut Stencil vs Electroformed Stencil for SMT Printing The stencil decides how much solder paste lands on every pad, and that single variable drives bridging, insufficient solder, tombstoning and the yield of the whole assembly line. Two processes dominate the market: cutting the apertures with a laser, and growing the…

Medical PCB Requirements: What Changes Compared With Standard Boards A medical PCB is manufactured on the same equipment as any other board. What changes is the discipline around it: documented materials, controlled processes, evidence that each lot met its specification, and a quality system that can be audited. The circuit…

SMT Process Window and Process Capability Explained A process window is the range of settings within which a process produces an acceptable result. Process capability is the evidence that the line actually stays inside that range and repeats it shift after shift. Together they answer the question every customer eventually…

SMT Red Glue Stencil Aperture and Process Control Red glue is the adhesive used to hold surface mount parts on the underside of a board that will later pass over a wave solder bath. It is applied through a stencil or dispensed as a dot, then cured so that the…

What Tg Means on a PCB Laminate Datasheet Tg is the abbreviation for glass transition temperature, and it is one of the first numbers printed on a laminate datasheet. It describes the point at which the resin stops behaving like a rigid solid and starts to soften, and everything the…

Black FR4 PCB: Pigment, Process Window and Inspection Black is the most requested colour in PCB fabrication and one of the least understood. A black board can mean a black solder mask over a conventional laminate, or a laminate whose resin has been pigmented through the thickness, and the two…

Conformal Coating Types: Acrylic, Silicone and Parylene A conformal coating is a thin polymer film applied over a populated board to keep moisture, salt, dust and chemical vapour away from the conductors and joints. It is one of the cheapest reliability improvements available, and one of the easiest to get…

ECU PCB Design: Power Supply and Sensor Input Layout An engine control unit sits in one of the least forgiving positions in a vehicle. It draws its supply from a battery that can be disconnected while the alternator is charging, it drives inductive loads that generate large voltage spikes, it…

PCB Conveyor Speed in Reflow: The Clock of the Oven Buyers and engineers often focus on the finished product and forget the production line behind it. In practice, most field failures can be traced back to process decisions made during assembly. Understanding PCB conveyor speed in reflow gives you a…