Caveat Lector
With every Apex comes an outpouring of new standards, and this year’s conference was no exception.
As the demands of PCBs for automotive applications assert themselves as a unique class, the industry standards are being adapted in sync. To that end, IPC-6012, the longstanding bare board qualification spec, now has an automotive supplement, reflecting the “superclass” of reliability for that sector above and beyond Class 2.
Given that auto electronics are shrinking, the IPC task group has eliminated visual inspection in favor of AOI on all layers and recommends use of AVI (automated visual inspection) of the finished PCB.
The cleanliness testing requirement has also been rewritten. The automotive addendum includes a recommendation of tests to be used in Production Part Approval Process (PPAP) documentation.
As the seasons changed, so did the economic winds.
Housing price increases had outpaced the demand curve, as unit sales slowed and new starts cooled. Automotive sales dived for the longest stretch in years. The stock market tanked. Interest rates ticked up. The bond yield curve inverted, suggesting investors had turned pessimistic about short-term prospects for the economy. Foreign investment stalled. The government, having primed the consumer economic pump through huge capital inflows to the domestic economy, struggled over hard choices of whether to borrow even more in the hopes of stemming a potential recession.
Faced with all of the above, coupled with rising labor costs, a cascade of confusing new government rules, and an increasingly treacherous trade environment, manufacturers started looking for friendlier climes.
Still inspired by the session on the “The Future of PCB Engineers” from PCB West last fall, I spent my early December poring over courses at universities across the US, looking for signs of printed circuit board instruction. I’m happy to say it was a fruitful exercise.
