It’s Only Common Sense: Customers Capabilities—and Confidence
Marcy’s Musings: Operating Without a Rulebook
Beyond the Board: How a Diminished Supplier Base Affects Complex PCB Manufacturing Readiness in Defense
Bob and Me
Column from: Dan Beaulieu and Bob Tarzwell
Bob Tarzwell: Circuit Inventor and Consultant
A well known printed circuit inventor, has created and perfected many advanced technologies over the last 44 years and is now offering them for sale. The purchase of the X series product technology, is for the right for your company to manufacture the technology as printed circuits without limits or commissions, but not the right to sell or transfer or give the technology to a third party.
Dan Beaulieu: Management and Sales Consulting
Dan Beaulieu has over 30 years experience in the printed circuit board industry. He is considered one of the industry’s top marketing and sales experts, as well as perhaps the strongest and most focused strategist in the industry. selective
March 18, 2015
Controlled Impedance: A Real-World Look at the PCB Side
Bob Tarzwell writes, "As a designer, your project may require a specific impedance of, say, 52 ohms, plus or minus 7%. The big question is: Does the fabricator give you what you ask for? Well, maybe, and maybe not. Here is why."December 10, 2014
Bob and Me: The Key to Increasing Quality - Bribe Your Employees
Back in the 1990s when Bob owned a board shop in Canada, the company was going through a bad stretch, as board shops sometimes will. Yields were way down and they were losing a lot of boards for stupid reasons, many having to do with carelessness and apathy. Bob tried yelling and screaming, but, not being a naturally gifted yeller and screamer, Bob proved ineffective at this method. So he knew he had to try something new.November 12, 2014
Bob and Me: Tarzwell's First--and Last--Lean Meeting
In their latest column, Bob Tarzwell and Dan Beaulieu discuss the joys of Lean manufacturing, which lead Bob to murderous thoughts, and the four-year process that lead to the creation of a "super board."October 01, 2014
Bob and Me: A PCB Potpourri
In their latest column, industry veterans Bob Tarzwell and Dan Beaulieu discuss polyimide laminates, a board that could never be built, getting fired from consulting jobs because you're smarter than everyone else, and guaranteeing to save a company at least $250,000 after a short plant tour.September 03, 2014
Bob and Me: Spacing is Irrelevant Below 270 Volts
Dan Beaulieu writes, "[Bob] claimed (and this was 1997, mind you) that he was building boards with 18 ounces of copper on a routine basis. He also told me that he was producing lines down to 2 mils without any special equipment. My first reaction was that this guy was full of it; there was no way he was doing what he claimed he was doing. So I had to go see for myself."September 22, 2010
PCB 101: Coefficient of Thermal Expansion
Coeffecient of thermal expansion (CTE) is one of the phrases we use daily in the printed circuit business. But how many of us really know what CTE is and how it affects the way a circuit board is designed and fabricated? If you're working with large BGA packages, CTE is already a big part of your life.September 08, 2010
The Bleeding Edge: Serious as a Heart Attack
This Bleeding Edge is a bit different, though the word "bleeding" is quite appropriate. My ticker is on the mend and I'm feeling better. But I have to wonder: Did my 40 years of working with medical equipment companies save my life? I certainly believe so.August 19, 2010
PCB101: Fabricating High-Voltage Boards
If a customer asks you to build a PCB that can withstand 20,000 volts, would you know how to build such a board? First things first: You cannot just say, "Well, I think FR-4 will work." It won't, and the board will fail. Boom! Here's how to avoid arc-overs, coronas and, most importantly, any booms.July 28, 2010
New Column: PCB 101
We all know the buzz words: impedance, 50 ohms, 10%, balanced lines, CTE, dielectric constant and loss and countless more. In this new series, PCB 101, I will break down some of these buzz words in layman's terms in the hopes that more people will understand what's happening inside the circuit.October 21, 2009
The Bleeding Edge: Carbon Nanotubes 101
We can't use nanotubes in PCB applications--yet. But the carbon tubes' natural benefits, such as creating only 1% of the heat generated by current flow in copper, are enough to keep teams of researchers working to implement them at board-level.September 10, 2009
Printed Electronics: A Glimpse Into the Future
And I mean the not-too-distant future! Printed electonics will eventually work their way into household items like toothbrushes and newspapers. But besides being useful to consumers, printed electronics are also a marketing executive's dream.July 07, 2009
The Bleeding Edge: A Green, Profitable PCB Process
As a conservationist, I'm often caught between my desire to be green and my need to pay the bills. But over the years, I've found that going green often means going profitable too.December 10, 2008
The Bleeding Edge: Engineering Low CTE Boards
The first requirement for engineering low coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) printed circuit boards is to understand the physics behind the properties of CTE. One must know what creates problems and how to engineer methods to minimize the CTE effect on printed circuits.August 08, 2008
The Bleeding Edge: The Very Latest in R&D
Sierra has been producing lines as small as 380 nanometers in the lab for some time and will soon move the technology forward for limited alpha testing in the 0.5-mil (10 micron) line area.June 25, 2008
The Bleeding Edge: Why Do So Many Board Shops Fail?
We've visited so many company auctions and read about so many closures that we wonder when the trend will end, and why the industry cannot stop such losses.May 27, 2008
The Bleeding Edge: High Resistance Circuits
Selecting the correct laminate is not really that difficult, but one must remember to account for all requirements and then try and balance cost and electrical and mechanical properties--all must agree with each other.October 11, 2007
The Bleeding Edge: Inventing the 'VSHDIHTLCTEHF' Microcircuit
Sierra Micro Electronics has just completed six months of R&D on an exciting new technology: a Very Small, HDI, High-Thermal, Low CTE, High-Frequency microcircuit.September 06, 2007
A New Third Dimension Now Possible for PCBs with 3-D Copper Structures
Three dimensional copper structures can be made to contact or align optics, position chip dies for testing, create locating pins for sockets or align bumps for components.August 24, 2007
Future Evolution of the PCB: Are you Ready?
With nano technology just starting to make its strength felt, we will see new laminates with significant changes in their properties.March 20, 2007
Bleeding Edge: Improved Reliability of PCBs for the Automotive Industry
The mechanicals of a printed circuit board that cause via failures after a series of thermal cycles are related to the coefficient of expansion differences between the laminate and the copper in the holes.September 25, 2006
Bleeding Edge: Extreme Printed Circuit Boards -- "Down the Hole"
For years, the "Down the Hole" industry used polyimide laminate. However, polyimide can suffer from early delamination caused by poor wetting and prepreg flow.June 26, 2006
Burning Issues of Burn-in Boards Resolved Through New Technology
A new technology for burn-in boards is the thermal plane, where the inner layers are made with 4 to 8 ounces of copper to handle the higher current and to provide a highly conductive thermal heat-sinking planeSeptember 03, 2014
Spacing is Irrelevant Below 270 Volts
Dan Beaulieu writes, "[Bob] claimed (and this was 1997, mind you) that he was building boards with 18 ounces of copper on a routine basis. He also told me that he was producing lines down to 2 mils without any special equipment. My first reaction was that this guy was full of it; there was no way he was doing what he claimed he was doing. So I had to go see for myself."October 01, 2014
A PCB Potpourri
In their latest column, industry veterans Bob Tarzwell and Dan Beaulieu discuss polyimide laminates, a board that could never be built, getting fired from consulting jobs because you're smarter than everyone else, and guaranteeing to save a company at least $250,000 after a short plant tour.November 12, 2014
Tarzwell's First--and Last--Lean Meeting
In their latest column, Bob Tarzwell and Dan Beaulieu discuss the joys of Lean manufacturing, which lead Bob to murderous thoughts, and the four-year process that lead to the creation of a "super board."December 10, 2014
The Key to Increasing Quality - Bribe Your Employees
Back in the 1990s when Bob owned a board shop in Canada, the company was going through a bad stretch, as board shops sometimes will. Yields were way down and they were losing a lot of boards for stupid reasons, many having to do with carelessness and apathy. Bob tried yelling and screaming, but, not being a naturally gifted yeller and screamer, Bob proved ineffective at this method. So he knew he had to try something new.
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