Traditional electroplating of such components as bearings, pistons, andlanding gear parts often results in an uneven finish as well as wastageas the plating technician tries to achieve uniformity through grindingand polishing. HNKTech’s FEA software works by creating a densitymodel. The model is displayed after inputting your electroplatingset-up including the geometric profile, material properties, andboundary conditions. Using these variables, the software simulates theelectroplating process then displays the density model with predictedplating thickness and uniformity.

Engineers can review the density model and make changes to thepositioning of the jig, voltage, time, and temperature. The simulationis re-run until the engineer is satisfied with the thickness anduniformity predicted. The company says that the variation in thicknessand uniformity between what is predicted and what is achieved in thefactory is 95% accurate.

HNKTech’s software uses a customized user interface that is said to beeasy to use. No specialist training is necessary and even thosewith limited training can use the software effectively, according tothe company.

payday loans online

This program consists of an Operator Interface (OI) for parameter entry and display and a Control Server (CS) to control and monitor the rectifiers. These two applications use a Windows socket connection to interchange data using the Internet protocol. This two-part design allows DynaComm II to be installed on a single computer for a stand alone application or to be installed on separate computers where the operator’s and rectifier’s positions can be separated by feet or miles.

This dual application design also permits any application program that will support the Internet protocol to be connected to the Control Server. The company can create custom additions to the Operator Interface to control and monitor other plating line functions, such as temperature, pH, and so on, whether servers exist or need to be written.

DynaComm II allows multiple monitoring and controlling options. More than one Operator Interface can be connected to a CS for multiple monitoring/control locations for a single line. Or, multiple Control Servers can be connected to a single OI for monitoring of multiple stations from a single supervisory office workstation.

Data logging is an optional feature, and when enabled, this function automatically stores data accumulated during the plating operation. This data can be downloaded to an electronic spreadsheet for further analysis, providing users with a written record to verify rectifier performance for all parts and batch runs against specifications and tolerances required.

To prevent loss or corruption of data, DynaComm II also features UPS power monitoring and control. If AC power is interrupted, it senses the line loss or brownout, closes the open files, closes itself, shuts down Windows and disables the UPS output. The minimum system requirements include a 233 MHz Pentium PC, 32 MB RAM, 4 MB Video RAM, 6 MB free hard drive space, two RS232 serial ports and a 10/100 Base T Ethernet port. Additional hard drive space will be required for plating recipes and data logging storage.

Application of FPC
FPCs are employed in a wide variety of applications due to the nature of their characteristics. Examples of applications for FPCs include cell-phone liquid crystal display enclosure, hinge parts, keypad, battery enclosure and interface components. FPCs are also used in optical pickup and device interfaces inside hard disk drives, digital still cameras and digital camcorders. Desired performance characteristics are: 1) wiring within small spaces; 2) wiring connection accompanied by mechanical functions within working part/device and motherboard; and 3) high density interconnect resulting from denser and narrower features.

FPCs fall into three broad categories: single-sided flexible printed wiring boards, double-sided flexible printed wiring boards and multilayer flexible printed boards. Single sided and double sided FPCs are widely employed for personal computers, optical pickup (OPU), HDD and cell phones. When calculated based on substrate area, half of these are single sided and the remainder are double sided. Multilayer FPCs are mainly used in cell phones, OPU, portable music players and DSC/DVC. However, multilayer FPCs only represent approximately 3 to 4% of the total FPC production by finished board area base. This is because there are relatively few large volume applications for multilayer FPCs.

FPC Materials
Polyimide is a crucial material which provides key features to FPCs and is used in almost all FPCs. In general, FPC is manufactured with a flexible copper clad laminate (FCCL) or one of many combinations. FCCL may be broadly grouped into the following four types: 1) material made from single polyimide and copper clad sheets connected with epoxy adhesive; 2) material laminated using polyimide adhesive (laminate); 3) material made using polyimide film and a sputtering/plating method; and 4) material made by coating polyimide varnish on copper foil (casting) followed by a curing step.

Today, the dominant films for FPC applications are 12.5 to 25 microns thick, with the industry trend being toward ever thinner materials. Two major types of copper foil are used for FCCL–electrolytic copper foil and rolled copper foil. Electrolytic copper foil is typically 18 or 12 microns in thickness, and rolled copper foil 18 microns thick. Both types of copper foils are moving to thinner dimensions. Generally, rolled copper foils demonstrate flexural properties superior to those of electrolytic copper foil. HDD applications, in particular, require high flexibility and reliability, so rolled copper foils dominate this segment. In recent years, flexural properties of electrolytic copper foil have been much improved and these foils are being increasingly used for optical pickup applications.

FPC Manufacturing Process
As mentioned previously, FPCs fall into three broad categories; single sided, double sided and multilayer. Each type of FPC has a series of required manufacturing process steps, examples of which are provided below. In particular, multilayer FPCs have a wide variety manufacturing processes based on the specifics of desired structures and performance characteristics.