Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1509257
42 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I OCTOBER 2023 of signal integrity are affected by the physi- cal geometry. e form and fit of the selected materials must be calculated, measured, and adjusted for their various compositions before any material is printed, etched, pressed, bonded, drilled, plated, coated, or soldered. Designers Must Look Outside of Their Caves, But Where? Now more than 40 years later, my woodshop teacher's maxim seems to be drowned out by a new wave of PCB industry social media influ- encers who constantly remind me to "always check with my fabricator." Some bluntly warn me, "Never trust component datasheets." Still others will push their own recipe for the "perfect" footprint to prevent an 0201 chip capacitor from tombstoning. With all due respect, can these sources for design wisdom be trusted? Do their methodologies consider all the manufacturing process stakeholders? Does their content only show how to get their design portion of the job done with the caveat, "But check with your fabricator," as an admis- sion that the content you've been watching for the last 15 minutes may not be producible under many circumstances? Just search a few PCB design topics on social media. How can there be dozens of "perfect" tiny chip capacitor footprints when the geometries all vary, and the critical considerations of solder deposition and thermal profiling are not even mentioned? How can a PCB designer check in with a fab- ricator when it is unknown where the design will be produced in volume? When it comes to a successful PCB design for production, the first step is for designers to admit that, in most cases, they do not know where the boards they design will be fabricated or assembled. e next step is realizing that for the world to stay in business, all the manufac- turing process stakeholders have built their process success around the ability to meet IPC standards. e final step is to become knowledgeable about IPC standards—not only those which apply to the PCBA design in process, but the ones which need to be appropriately specified in the manufacturing process notes. PCB Tech Spec Check Most every day I come across customer PCB design documentation showing severe gaps in PCB designer familiarity with outside materi- als and manufacturing processing. To make matters worse, the fabrication and assembly