Each manufacturer will have their own approach to this process, but basically this means creating a set of step-by-step instructions to build the PCB. When an order has been placed, the first step at the manufacturer is to go over the PCB designs and prepare them for production. (This ends up being a critical element for understanding PCB volume pricing: your cost per board is based on the number of panels being produced, not the number of individual pieces you want to order.) That relates to the processes described here because until the very last step when individual boards are cut out of the big sheet, all PCB manufacturing deals with PCBs in that large, panel format. Even if your circuit board is the size of an index card, it will begin production on a sheet of copper-clad material, usually 18” x 24”, and the design will be replicated across this sheet to produce as many boards as possible from it. No matter what the final size of the circuit board is, it is manufactured by making a large array of boards in a single sheet, called a panel. We’ll review the manufacturing processes for both double-sided and multi-layer PCBs. Bay Area Circuits can fabricate up to 30-layer PCBs! Multi-layer PCBs are more complex to manufacture (and more expensive) and require additional processes not used in the manufacture of double-sided PCBs. Multi-layer boards consist of alternating layers of conductive and insulating materials bonded together.
Double-sided boards are the most common: these are boards with conductive copper patterns on the front and reverse sides, with interconnections called vias between layers made by conductive plated drill holes called vias that connect one side to another. The first thing to know about a printed circuit board is how many layers of conductive copper form the “stackup” - 1, 2, or many. We’ll describe this process in detail, illustrated with photos tracking the production of circuit boards from Star Simpson’s Forrest Mims-inspired Circuit Classics kit. Voila, Circuit Boards! While you can find information on circuit board design easily, we sought to answer the question: what goes on behind the scenes at the PCB manufacturer? Bay Area Circuits, a Silicon Valley PCB manufacturer specializing in quick turn prototype manufacturing, was kind enough to give us an inside look at the process. Somewhere after this, those files are sent to a printed circuit board (PCB) manufacturer, or the “board house”, who manufactures the boards somehow and then ship them back to the designers. LPI - Green, Yellow, Black, Red, Blue, White, etc.How does a circuit board get made? Maybe you have a rough idea of the steps involved: someone designs a schematic, which is made into a layout for the physical design, which then gets exported into the machine-readable files. We focus on multi-layer printed circuit boards, impedance Controlled circuit boards and HDI PCBs in varying complexities, and we offer a wide range of helpful Cost-Free Options to make sure our clients always receive the best possible product. will meet your PCB manufacturing needs in a variety of materials and technologies, with an unwavering commitment to UL certification standards. Whether it is a single board for a prototype or large volume production runs, Bittele Electronics Inc. offers Printed Circuit Board manufacturing, providing consistent high quality and affordable price of Printed Circuit Boards. PCB Manufacturing Bittele Electronics Inc.