Visual inspections are performed following the manufacturing process of a printed circuit board to identify any potential problems. While that may work fine for a two-layer PCB, for multi-layer PCBs, it is almost impossible to visually inspect the internal layers …
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Solder Paste Stencil Basics
Solder Paste Stencils In the printed circuit board assembly (PCBA) and manufacturing electronics world, solder paste stencils are not so different from the common stencils used to paint letters/numbers or draw shapes. Solder paste stencils are designed for a similar …
Read MoreIntroduction to Drilling and Vias
It wasn’t that long ago a printed circuit board was drilled using a simple drill press. The operator had to manually move the panel to the correct x and y coordinate and then pull the lever to drill an individual …
Read MoreAdvantages of the Gerber X2 Format
In 2014, a new Gerber format was released call Gerber X2 (or version 2) by Ucamco, owners of the Gerber standard. If this is news to you, Ucamco has put together an excellent 5 minute intro video which can be …
Read MoreReshoring of Printed Circuit Board Manufacturing
For many people, the words “Made in the USA” have become a rallying cry. In fact, a survey done in 2012 found that 83% of US citizens disapprove of companies that manufacture their goods overseas and they are interested in …
Read MoreBay Area Circuits Celebrates Manufacturing Day
Bay Area Circuits, hosted a Manufacturing Day event on Friday, October 6th for the fourth consecutive year. The company opened its doors to give college engineering students a tour of its printed circuit board manufacturing operations and a look at the latest equipment upgrades and technological advancements in the industry.
Read MoreBasic PCB Design Tips & Tricks
Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) are made from fiberglass reinforced plastic with the copper wiring in trace form. All the circuit board components are held in position by soldering the components into place after drilling holes in the demarcated areas on …
Read MoreInstantDFM Pro Update: Actionable Intelligence for Designers
Silicon Valley, CA – September 19, 2017 – Bay Area Circuits, Inc., a leading manufacturer of quick-turn printed circuit boards (PCBs), today announced the release of a significant update to its automated, online DFM tool, InstantDFM. InstantDFM enables printed circuit …
Read MoreExcellon Installs HD-2L Intelli-Drill at Bay Area Circuits
Rancho Dominguez, CA – September 11, 2017 – Excellon announces the installation of an HS-2L Intelli-Drill System at Bay Area Circuits, Inc. of Fremont, California. The Excellon HS-2L Intelli-Drill™ System provides capabilities such as post lamination tooling optimization for multi-layers, …
Read More5 Electronics Design Tips for Beginners
The topic of Electronics Design can cover a vast array of technical options. This article will focus on some of the basics. A schematic drawing is only one part of creating a design in electronic engineering. Your schematic should be …
Read MoreAn Introduction to PCB Arrays
What is a PCB Array? What do you think of when you hear the word “array”? Perhaps you think of an antenna array, or possibly some type of mathematical array or maybe even Video Graphics Array (VGA like the adapter …
Read MoreEmpowering Education: BAC PCB Support Collegiate Solar Teams
Silicon Valley, CA, July 20, 2017 – Bay Area Circuits, Inc., a leading quick-turn manufacturer of printed circuit boards (PCBs), recently provided PCB manufacturing support to collegiate solar vehicle teams through its PCBs for Education program. The CalSol (UC Berkeley) …
Read MorePrinted Circuit Boards Require Counterbores and Countersinks
In this post, we’ll introduce the concept of Countersinks and Counterbores and how these are used in Printed Circuit Boards (of course, countersinks and counterbores are not anything unique to printed circuit boards and are used in a variety of …
Read MoreBay Area Circuits Annual Open House An Opportunity To Display Support For Education
This year’s event featured solar and electric vehicles on display from 3 local universities, all sponsored by Bay Area Circuits, including: CalSol’s solar vehicle from UC Berkeley, UCD Formula Racing’s electric vehicle from UC Davis, and Spartan Racing’s electric vehicle from San Jose State. The vehicles are designed and manufactured by the student teams...
Read MoreOpening Doors and Minds for National Manufacturing Day
“Last Friday, Fremont celebrated National Manufacturing Day by inviting students and jobseekers to attend 11 manufacturing facility tours across the City. We sat down with Stephen Garcia, President, Bay Area Circuits, a printed circuit board manufacturer, to debrief on the day …
Read MoreIllinois Urbana-Champaign – NASA’s Robotic Mining Success
Bay Area Circuits is proud to support many awesome student organizations with their printed circuit board projects, one of which is the IRIS Robotics Team at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. They recently competed in the NASA Robotic Mining Competition and we thought it would be interesting to share more about the group and their recent accomplishments.
Read MoreAnnouncing the Availability of PCB Creator v3
We’re excited to announce the availability of PCB Creator version 3, an update to our popular, free PCB Layout and Schematic capture software! Here’s a quick Q&A that includes more details on this new release.
Read MoreBay Area Circuit Online Store: Explore New Features for PCB
Silicon Valley, CA, August 1, 2016 – Bay Area Circuits, Inc., is proud to announce new benefits and improvements of its already impressive printed circuit board (PCB) online store. As a leading quick turn manufacturer of printed circuit boards, Bay …
Read MoreAn Inside Look at Manufacturing Circuit Classics PCBs
There's no doubt that we, at Bay Area Circuits, get to work with some very talented individuals working on some pretty incredible projects. Star Simpson is one of those individuals and Circuit Classics is one of those projects! Star is bringing to life classic circuit drawings from Forrest Mims' "Getting Started in Electronics" and recently made the designs available via Crowd Supply.
Read MoreHardware Manufacturing’s Comeback in Silicon Valley – BAC
Are we experiencing a rebirth of Silicon Valley hardware manufacturing? High volume manufacturing of hardware is not something commonly done in Silicon Valley, with much of that work finding its way to places around the globe. But a large amount of new product development, prototyping and low volume production seems to be firmly positioned in the Valley.
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