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PCB Design

How to Choose the Correct Solder Mask Thickness and Type for Your PCB

How to Choose the Correct Solder Mask Thickness and Type for Your PCB When looking at a circuit board, especially as a beginner in the electronics industry, I always wondered why the top layer of PCBs was green. The answer varies depending on who you ask, but one thing everyone agrees on is this: your solder mask aids inspection, provides protection for conductors, and prevents visual fatigue during hand assembly. The various PCB solder mask types differ in how they are applied, their composition, and of course Read Article

Circuit Design Tips: PCB Moisture Protection for Humid Environments

Circuit Design Tips: PCB Moisture Protection for Humid Environments Learn more about implementing PCB moisture protection and storage in your design to prevent corrosion and board failure. Read Article

Solar Cars of the Future Pioneered by Midnight Sun Solar Design Team

Solar Cars of the Future Pioneered by Midnight Sun Solar Engineering and Design Team Since the 1988-1989 academic year the University of Waterloo’s Midnight Sun solar team, under the guidance of faculty advisor Professor Gordon Savage, has been building and competing in the American Solar Challenge ( ASC) and the World Solar Challenge ( WSC). Each of these competitions are held alternately every other year. Running the helm of the electrical systems team are Minghou Ji (Engineering Manager), Yifei Li (Hardware Engineer) and Read Article

How PCB BOM Management Tools fit into a Paperless Manufacturing BOM System

How PCB BOM Management Tools fit into a Paperless Manufacturing BOM Software My wife is an avid reader, and we have a large selection of her favorite books filling the bookshelves in our family room. Lately though, she has been purchasing more and more E-books to read on her tablet. E-books are easier for her to store and transport, and she now prefers that format over the traditional printed book. This transition from paper to electronic format has been going on for a while now, and E-books are just a small portion of Read Article

Omer Mahgoub from Square Kilometer Array (SKA) Africa and PCB Design for Astronomy

Omer Mahgoub from Square Kilometer Array (SKA) Africa and PCB Design for Astronomy Judy Warner: Omer, will you please share what the SKA is, what countries are involved, and what purpose it serves? Omer Mahgoub: The SKA (Square Kilometre Array) is an international effort to build the world's largest radio telescope, with a total collecting area of 1 square kilometer and located on two continents (Africa and Australia). Organizations from 10 countries are members of the SKA: Australia, Canada, China, India, Italy, New Zealand Read Article

Obsolescence Information Management for PCB BOM Maintenance

Obsolescence Information Management for PCB BOM Maintenance In my home laboratory, the garage, I have many bins. One contains small springs, another gear-motors, yet another small bolts… and so on. Despite my girlfriend’s skepticism, these bits are actually very useful for fixing assorted gadgets and household appliances, and they also provide fodder for my weekend tinkering habits. Keeping track of what I have and where it is uses up quite a lot of mental capacity in itself. At work, the sheer volume of Read Article

From OrCAD to Altium: Evaluation Resources to Help You Switch

From OrCAD to Altium: Evaluation and Review Resources to Help You Switch As you dive into your evaluation of Altium Designer, you will find this information helpful specifically for someone like you that is coming from an OrCAD background. When we look at what engineers and designers do every day, we often see that as much as 61% of your day can be consumed with non-design related tasks. These tasks are a byproduct of using a collection of tools (toolchains), vs. the Altium Designer paradigm of using a Unified Design Read Article

The PCB Routing that Benefits the Most from Interactive PCB Auto Routing

The PCB Routing that Benefits the Most from Interactive PCB Auto Routing Years ago I helped to re-roof a house, and the first task was to remove the old shingles. Pulling up shingles one at a time, I was very proud of my efforts until a professional roofer came over to me shaking his head. Using a scoop shovel like a snowplow, he removed a couple a hundred shingles in less time than it took me to pull up five by hand. I learned up on the roof that day to always look for better ways to get the job done. When routing a Read Article

Environmental Considerations for High Voltage PCB Board Design

Environmental Considerations for High Voltage PCB Board Design Several years ago, I had a date take me hiking. Beforehand, he gave me a long list of what to wear and bring for the hike. I had been camping and hiking in the mountains since childhood, and this guy was a southern boy, so I found it a little vexing to have him telling me what to do on my home turf. Fortunately, I had been raised to take environmental hazards seriously and tried hard to appreciate someone else who also had neurotic and Read Article

How to Implement Supervised Inputs in Your PCB Circuit Design

How to Implement Supervised Inputs in Your PCB Circuit Design Have you ever worked late on a design project and forgot to eat? I was literally starving when I finished off one of my regular design projects. I decided to go for a quick meal at a local eatery. I placed my order and hoped the service would be fast. However, after 45 minutes and no food, I was told that the kitchen has missed my order. I learned my lesson that you can’t expect that your order is being followed just because you placed it. The Read Article

PCB BOM Creation as a Living Document

PCB BOM Creation as a Living Document The other day my son bought himself a new phone because the navigator in his old phone was defective. Every time that he used the old phone for directions, he would end up getting lost. Although taking the time to get a new phone wasn’t in his plans, he could no longer afford wasting time trying to figure out where he was and where he needed to go next. His difficulties reminded me of the problems that I’ve seen in some PCB design groups where Read Article

Why an Auto-Interactive Router Routes Cleaner Traces than an Auto Router

Why an Auto-Interactive Router Routes Cleaner Traces than an Auto Router When I was a boy, my room was always a mess. Since I thought I knew where everything was, there was no reason to clean it. Finally, after a lot of pressure from my parents and my peers, I capitulated and cleaned up the room. The difference was amazing. It was so much easier to get around now that I had a clear path. The same can be said about PCB trace routing from an auto router. Auto routers are known for producing disorganized routes that are Read Article

Bill of Materials Inventory Management and the Benefits of an Online Parts Request System

Bill of Materials Inventory Management and the Benefits of an Online Parts Request Documentation Systems I once asked a family member to borrow some money to use as a down payment. His response included a counter-proposal that I didn’t understand, so I let it pass. Unfortunately by not understanding his answer to my request, I missed out on an even better opportunity than what I had initially asked for. That exchange has stayed in my mind as an example of how important clear communication is. In our world of PCB design, the need for clear Read Article

RF Interference Prevention and RF PCB Design in the Internet of Things

RF Interference Prevention and RF PCB Design in the Internet of Things Have you ever been to a party where there was so much noise you could barely hear yourself think? I’m a dedicated introvert, but sometimes my friends lure me out to such gatherings with promises that it will be “very relaxed.” They never are, and I don’t seem to learn. It’s times like those that I wish it was socially acceptable to wear noise-canceling headphones to such events. In the world of electronics, the burgeoning Internet of Things (IoT) Read Article

Important Considerations in Your Embedded System's Master-Slave Communication Model

Important Considerations in Your Embedded System's Master-Slave Communication Model It can take a few weeks or months to finish a working prototype of an embedded system. Sometimes I would spend days working on a single part of the project. However, when your boss is looking for updates every day, it can be particularly distracting and hinder your productivity. When I started my design company, I learned not to repeat these mistakes on my team. Like a human, embedded systems come in various shapes and sizes, and more importantly Read Article

High Speed PCB Design Considerations: Bypass Capacitor Place and Route Tips

High Speed PCB Design Considerations: Bypass Capacitor Place and Route Tips Many years ago, the majority of the board designs that I was involved with were simple digital designs. Placing and routing bypass capacitors in those designs was very easy, and often the circuitry was slow enough that ceramic capacitors were not needed. Most of the time we considered bypass capacitor placement and routing as more of an afterthought than as a primary design consideration. I remember how some of the engineers even instructed me to Read Article

The Importance of Compliance Awareness in Circuit and PCB Design

The Importance of Compliance Awareness in Circuit and PCB Design I had an English professor once who was a lot of fun, but man, his requirements for essay writing were brutal. Making a decent grade required a ton of work. I had to check and recheck my paper’s content to make sure that every detail he asked for was painstakingly covered. These tedious rituals, though annoying and painful, helped teach me how to be thorough with my research. This was something that came in handy when I began my career and had to Read Article