Epec's Blog | Electronics Manufacturing Solutions

Printed circuit board (PCB) designers often find themselves at odds with their purchasing and marketing departments after a design goes out for bids and comes back with a larger than expected price tag. Once the source of the high cost is identified, the questions fly, the fingers point, and the nerves fray.

Gold surface finishes serve different functions in printed circuits board (PCB) manufacturing, and selecting the right option depends on assembly requirements, durability needs, and overall cost objectives. Understanding the differences between ENIG, ENEPIG, hard gold, and flash gold helps designers choose the most appropriate finish for their application while balancing manufacturability, reliability, and lead time.

The holiday season is truly an exciting time of the year for many Americans, but inadequate planning for your custom cable assembly can create some less than desirable commotion for your company. Christmas is closing in, and manufacturers are already gearing up for the approaching holiday season.

Here at Epec Engineered Technologies, we believe that our customers come first. Everything we are is because of our customers. We also strive to make sure that our employees are happy. We are part of a family, and we want to make sure we work as a cohesive team; in fact, throughout our facility you will often hear the phrase “One Team, One Fight”.

The process of v-scoring has been used for many years in the production of printed circuit boards (PCBs). As PCB production technology rapidly advances, it is important to understand the most current PCB scoring guidelines to follow and how they may have changed from what you previously used. 

When developing a custom battery pack, the last thing anyone wants is to hear their development hit a snag. Batteries already have a lengthy timeline going from concept to production, so staying on schedule is incredibly important. Of course, sometimes delays can just happen for reasons you have no control over, making it even more necessary to nail down the areas you can influence. Factors such as knowledge of certification requirements, manufacturing support capabilities, and prototyping processes can help keep your development on the right track.

A smart battery pack is defined by software-driven communication between the battery, the device, and the user, along with integrated state-of-charge visibility. Core functions like protection, fuel gauging, charging/discharging control, and cell balancing, are managed through a battery management system (BMS). Together, these capabilities improve safety, optimize runtime, and extend battery lifespan.

Although the progress of technology moves fast and batteries are more popular for supporting mobile devices, it should be noted that the actual battery chemistries haven’t changed much over the last several years. The shift in hand-held devices are for rechargeable solutions with more energy and lighter weight which targets lithium chemistry.

There are many areas to consider when designing and building cost-effective custom cable assemblies. The areas of primarily importance to be reviewed are the raw material selection, ensuring your assembly is designed for ease of manufacturability, choosing the correct connector, and correctly specifying the criteria the assembly should meet or exceed. If all of these areas are optimized correctly in the design stage, you stand the best chance of keeping your manufacturing costs as low as possible.

Solving solderability issues for printed circuit boards (PCBs) can be a real hassle. Nothing is more frustrating than having lined up all your materials for an assembly, only to start running the package through reflow and discover that the solder paste is wetting poorly to the pads. Immediately, the profile is checked to confirm proper parameters.