Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1509873
38 PCB007 MAGAZINE I OCTOBER 2023 they have the right technical capabilities to build these boards. Choosing the right mate- rials and finishes is also critical, and the fin- ishes you select will depend upon the type of components on your boards. OSP (organic sol- derability preservative) is great, of course. It's very cost-effective, but if you have a BGA on your board, that might not necessarily be the right finish to choose. Once you've nailed down all these different points, make sure that you do a good inspec- tion on your board. A 100% test is always man- datory. Automatic visual inspection is very important, too. What we propose at ICAPE Group is a kind of double inspection. We have about 60 quality inspectors, and some of them are directly working with our engineering and manufacturing partners. eir job is to con- trol the quality of our boards at these different locations. We have double points of inspection in the process: 100% inspection on our boards at the factory, and then inspection with our own quality people at our partners' locations before we ship. Dack: For our designers who are designing to IPC class 3 expectations, what are some things for PCB designers to think about? Because it's possible to design a board that can't be built. Before we even start a quotation, we do a soware analysis of the Gerber files that the customers provide. In our case, we're using Ucamco soware. is soware makes sure dard consumer production where we are usu- ally talking about 250 PPM. e same applies to other critical industries, such as aerospace, with certifications like AS9100, and critical processes with sampling and DPPM (defective parts per million) controls. Dack: That's a pretty low defect rate. What are some of the most typical causes of failures you see in high-reliability fabrication? A lot of different points need to be checked. For me, it always starts with the design itself, and making sure that whoever designs the board follows the IPC guidance. We have spreadsheets and guidance sheets that we can share with our custom- ers. Let's say Bob is tasked with selecting the right manufacturer for his boards. Bob must make sure that, if you build a flex or rigid-flex circuit board, you're not work- ing with a factory that specializes only in rigid or metal PCBs. Select- ing the right manufacturer usually means auditing them to make sure Marc L'Hoste