PCB Manufacturing Blog | Bay Area Circuits

Makerbot Thing-O-Matic 3D Printer Time Lapse Build

I wonder if you have ever seen one of these 3D printers. They are used to make quick prototype designs and even can be used to make final production products. They are quite an amazing piece of technology. There are several ways that the process works but basically it is taking a polymer and applying [...]

Printed Circuit Board Finishes

In this post I wanted to cover some of the more common finish types that are used in the PCB Manufacturing process. After all the many processes are done to get to this point there are still a few steps left but we are getting very close to being finished. Most finishes are applied after [...]

Can Ferrite Cores Increase Emissions

This post is a guest post from Doug Smith. Doug is an electrical engineer who trains other electrical engineers in EMC Design. His website emcesd.com is a wealth of information. We appreciate his contribution to our site. If you have any comments or questions please post them below and we will have Doug answer them [...]

Agilent LCR Meter Teardown – Video Post

Ok, something a little bit different in this blog post. Not sure if you have heard of Dave Jones from Australia? He is an Electrical Engineer making a big splash on YouTube. One of my favorite things to watch is how he takes a product that you might be using in your design or assembly [...]

Outer Layer Image and Soldermask

Alright let us do a quick re-cap of what we have covered so far. We have given an overview of some basic materials and the initial process for developing imaging for inner layers. We have covered the lamination and drill process. Now we are coming down the home stretch. Now that the panels are drilled [...]

Lamination and Drill of Printed Circuit Boards

In our last post we learned how the inner core of a 4 layer PCB is processed prior to adding the outside layers. In this post we will take about the next part of our “sandwich” construction. The now etched panels with traces will need to go through an AOI or Automated Optical Inspection. Inner [...]

Pizza, Pop and PCBs at Bay Area Circuits

I just wanted to thank Angela Alexander from Iconnect007.com for attending our workshop and doing this write up. Angela also took the pictures you see here as well. Recently I was invited to Bay Area Circuits for an evening of Pizza, Pop, and PCBs. The event was organized by Peter Brissette, Marketing Manager at [...]

Multi Layer PCB Image Process

In our last post we talked about the basic material used to start the PCB manufacturing process. If we were doing a double sided board it would actually be going into drill at this part of the process. We will get to that eventually. What we are going to do is walk through the multilayer [...]

Manufacturing of Double-Sided and Multi-Layer Printed Circuit Boards

This is the first in a series of articles that will explain what is involved in the Printed Circuit Board (PCB) manufacturing process. Most of what we will cover will be very high-level to provide someone who is not familiar with the manufacturing process the basics of how a PCB is actually made. Those who [...]

Most Common Problems with Gerber Files and How to Avoid Them

Common Problems with Gerber Files and How to Avoid Them! The reasons we want to address these common problems is to help reduce the number of errors, mistakes and time delays when manufacturing your PCB. All of these reflect in higher costs in the long run which no one needs! Obsolete File Format: There are [...]

RS274D vs RS274X Gerber file format…what’s the big deal anyway?

For those that are not familiar with the designation of 274d and 274x we put together some basic information to help you understand the difference and why it is important in the PCB ordering and manufacturing process. How can just a letter make such a big difference? At first glance the “d” would seem like [...]

Bay Area Circuits, a PCB Manufacturer releases new customer portal and design file review service

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE BAY AREA CIRCUITS, INC PUBLISHES NEW WEBSITE WITH SECURE CUSTOMER ORDER PORTAL AND DESIGN FILE REVIEW SERVICE In its ongoing effort to provide outstanding service to their customers Bay Area Circuits, Inc has published a newly designed website that includes a secure customer portal and file design for manufacturability review [...]

Electronics manufacturers are testing their printed circuit boards with the Seica S240 Bare Board Tester now available at Bay Area Circuits

Saving time and money in the electronics manufacturing process is critical. Problems with faulty printed circuits boards can be avoided with flying probe electrical testing equipment provided by Seica. Bay Area Circuits, Inc. – Redwood City, California, April 12th, 2011 You have spent many hours in designing the electrical components for your primary new product [...]