New Emerging Technologies in PCB designing

Rather a journey heading towards the unstoppable technological advancements in the field of PCB designing and manufacturing.

It is one of the least expected disasters of the modern age that our very own new unparalleled access to information has come at the price of our capacity to concentrate on anything much. There has never been a more exciting period to be engaged in PCB designing and manufacturing. The need for ultra-fast PCB designing and assembly has never been much greater than at present. Consumers want to be connected to all kinds of things, all the time. They want to be able to control everything from their thermostat to their sprinkler system right from their tablet or phone. For many businesses, the competition to get products into the hands of customers is more than just an essence of the current time.

PCB to the utmost extent is the most proficient method of assembling modern electronic circuits. During the assembling and manufacturing of PCB, many defects are introduced which are harmful towards the enhanced and efficient performance of the circuit. In recent years and the years yet to come, the PCB industries will require enhanced automation due to various reasons. The most momentous reason being the technological advancements in PCBs designing and manufacturing. The latest electronic component fabrication technologies require an efficient PCB design and inspection approach with a compact yet efficient enough dimension as the complex and compact design causes difficulties towards the human inspection process. Perhaps another important factor is nevertheless the grave necessity to reduce the duration of inspection as well. These factors lead to the inclusion of automation in the PCB industry. Nowadays, automated systems are very much preferred in the manufacturing industry for higher productivity and profits.

Perhaps that’s a reason why several ways have been established to search and detect the defects which are found on PCB, but at the same time, it is also imperative to classify the defects found, so that the origin of those defects can be identified to avoid any further issues in the near future. In recent times, the morphological image segmentation algorithms and simple image processing theories are being used for detecting defects.

Few of the PCB defects can only exist in certain assort. Thus, it is quite obvious that the image processing algorithm could be improved by generating a segmentation exercise as well.

Let us throw some light on the various methods that are currently being evolved throughout the world for finding the defects on PCB.

A. Automated Optical Inspection (AOI)

Automated Optical Inspection (AOI) is an automated visual inspection of PCB where a camera autonomously scans the device under test for both catastrophic failure (missing component) and quality defects (fillet size/shape or component skew). It is commonly used in the manufacturing process due to the fact it is a non-contact test method. It is implemented at many stages through the manufacturing process including bare board inspection

B. Computer-Aided System

Computer-aided defect detection is an extension of automatic optical inspection systems mentioned in the previous system are used the inspection and assembling processes of PCB. For this purpose, ideal images are usually conforming to both CAD/CAM/CAE software and predefined models by standard databases.

C. Image Subtraction Method

We first compare a PCB standard image with a PCB image, using a simple subtraction algorithm that can highlight the main problem areas. Image subtraction operation is performed to get the differences between the two images. The method compares both images pixel-by-pixel using the XOR logic operator.

As a result, the image obtained after this operation contains few defects. The subtraction operation will produce either a negative or a positive image, 1 represents a white pixel and 0 represents a black pixel in a binary image two rules exist for image subtraction operation Rule 1: If 1–0 = 1 then it gives positive pixel image Rule 2: If 0–1 = -1 then it gives negative pixel image.

D. Machine vision (MV)

Machine vision is concerned with the theory behind artificial systems that extract information from images and a sequence of images. The image data can take many forms, such as video sequences, views from multiple cameras, or multidimensional data from a medical scanner. Machine vision can be implemented for the system involving the following processes:

I. Automated Inspection process

II. Process control

III. Database collection and indexing

IV. Modeling of system and environment

It’s a fascinating evolvement of new consumer technologies, advancements in medicine, breakthroughs in manufacturing, and intense political flashpoints. Incredibly, PCBs are present at the heart of it all.

As you can probably think, this tells that it’s an exciting time to be in this field at this stage of new upcoming technologies throughout the world where the uniqueness and innovation that exists in one has an incredible potential to change the entire layout of the PCB industries.

I do believe that many other technologies are yet to come and will without a doubt, prove to be wonderful marvels, that will blow the lid off the PCB market in the future!