When you’re just getting started on your adventures in PCB design, you’ll eventually need to test your prototype boards. Prototyping and testing are very important tasks for any designer, but you need to have the right set of equipment to ensure you can get accurate results.
In this article, I’ll go over some of the basic test equipment that new engineers should have in order to test and debug their prototype boards. We’re not talking about building a large company lab here, we’re more worried about giving you the basic capabilities you need to test and verify your first projects. If you’re creative and you make use of online retailers, you can probably find everything in this list for about $600. This will give you the basic capabilities you’ll need to get started so that you can build your testing skills and equipment over time.
A basic multimeter is the mainstay of any engineer who needs to probe and test a PCB prototype. There are plenty of basic multimeter options that provide all the standard measurements and ranges with high precision. Some will also allow for temperature measurements with a special probe.
Your multimeter should provide different options for probes, including very fine tip probes that allow probing of very small components. Tapping a probe to a 0402 or 0201 component can be very difficult with large probes, so it pays to buy an extra set of very fine-tipped probes for your multimeter.
Multimeter with fine-tip probes.For the embedded crowd, a developer will need to communicate commands to a chip on a PCB, and the simplest way to do this is with a USB to serial bridge. These devices plug into a USB port and allow you to send commands to a remote device via the USB connection. The interface is usually UART/USART, and commands can be sent over PuTTy or TeraTerm. These are sometimes based around a simple FTDI chip; you can also follow the example shown in this recent Altium Designer project from Zach Peterson.
USD to serial bridge from SparkFunIf you’re developing with a vendor’s IDE, then you will need a vendor tool to flash and program the processor on your board. This can be done with a vendor programming tool. Not all vendors create these tools, but there are 3rd party modules that can plug into your design, and you will use software to push a binary onto the end device.
For example, Microchip has developed their MPLAB module and software for programming applications onto PIC microcontrollers. Another popular tool is the PRESTO programmer from ASIX, which supports a huge list of microcontrollers and flash memories.
Basic soldering kits and thin-gauge wire are a must-have for testing and debugging. It’s very common that you’ll need to solder a small wire, remove a component, or swap a component during testing. Get yourself a low-cost soldering kit with temperature control and multiple tips. You should also get some solder wire, solder paste, and a braided wire so you can perform rework, even with small SMDs. Having multiple tips is also very important for applying heat in tight spaces and to very small pads.
Oscilloscopes can be very expensive, especially when they need to have very sample rate, bandwidth, and built in analysis capabilities. For beginner designers, or for a small lab that is just used for power-up testing, it’s a good idea to have a low-cost, basic digital oscilloscope for taking common measurements.
Here when we say “basic”, we really do mean that a low-cost scope will be fine for many tasks. The point is to detect whether the AC signal is present in certain areas of a circuit, such as being able to detect whether a circuit with feedback is oscillating. This is widely applicable in many circuits in a design, such as power regulators and amplifier circuits. A low-cost scope (about $300-$500) for these basic measurements up to ~100 MHz is a great way to round out your first set of testing equipment.
Make sure your scope probe has two attenuation options (1x and 10x) so that you can sense different outputs. Also make sure your probe has higher bandwidth than your scope!
Last but not least, we can’t forget about a power supply. A small benchtop regulated power supply is a must-have for any electronics engineer. For most boards, you will just need a basic DC power supply that provides reasonable voltage and current output.
You can find 100-200 W low-noise power supplies that output up to reasonably high voltages and moderate currents (up to 5 A) for around $100 on Amazon or eBay. Make sure to get a bench supply with some basic features like ON/OFF toggle and current limiting, the latter of which is very important for short circuit or low-load protection.
This basic DC power supply can be purchased from Digikey for about $90.As your projects and skill level grow, so will your necessary test equipment needs. Eventually, you might need to graduate to a set of more specialized equipment to test your prototypes. This could include:
Also make sure to check out this article from Mark Harris, it contains a longer list of materials and tools you’ll need to build up your lab.
Whenever you need to test your board, you can easily cross-probe between the schematics and your PCB within the unified design environment of in Altium Designer®. To implement collaboration in today’s cross-disciplinary environment, innovative companies are using the Altium 365™ platform to easily share design data and put projects into manufacturing.
We have only scratched the surface of what’s possible with Altium Designer on Altium 365. Start your free trial of Altium Designer + Altium 365 today.
Printed circuit board also called as circuit board
or abbreviated as PCB
is the lifeline of an electronic device; thus, this cannot be erroneous in any manner. A number of factors such as the material used, size of the holes, line spaces etc. contribute to the seamless flow of electronic particles through the circuit. It is the error-free flow of current which the PCB experts strive for while
designing and manufacturing PCB's. So here are the top 10 characteristics of a printed circuit board that is reliable and truly dependable in every sense.
1.
High quality of base material
The capacity of the board to conduct the flow of electrons is an obvious determinant of the reliability factor of a PCB. This capacity is achievable if the base material used is of advanced quality. A good quality printed circuit board base material helps avoid problems like open circuit, delamination caused by inflation, etc. Thus, base material should be tested before being put to use.
2.
Copper clad made tolerant as per international Standards
. This is essential for ensuring better control on the dielectric layer thickness. A considerably thick dielectric layer helps in reducing the deviation in expected value of performance. In addition, quality of components is also paid attention to, because the copper cladding alone cannot do the needful.
A highly reliable PCB has copper cladding that meets the tolerance standards set under quality criteria IPC4101 ClassB/L
3.
Hole wall thickness
The hole’s wall is clad with copper and made 25 microns thick. This feature makes board more reliable as it strengthens its ability to resist the expansion along z-axis. Care should be taken not to blow through the hole as it may lead to problem in electrical connectivity arising due to assembling shortcomings.
4.
PCB's with no track cut
A highly reliable circuit board can be achieved if the repair of any kind is not done by the way of soldering, nor there should be any break line repair. Soldering -free repair does not require any kind of maintenance. It also creates no error situation, making PCB close to perfect in functioning. Since there are no line breaks repairs, the possibility of break in the flow of current is reduced to nil. Thus, circuit boards with no soldering repair are considered highly reliable.
5.
Impeccably clean PCB
Printed circuit boards cannot afford to have even a speck of dirt or dust on its surface. A high reliable PCB is made completely free of dust and any kind of solder resistant material. If the material is not cleaned to perfection, bad solder points or poor connection can be the results.
6.
Treatments done on PCB
Nothing lasts forever
, not even the treatments done during . So, it is essential to ensure that the surface treatment is not metallurgically changed at the time of employing the circuit board. This is why; circuit boards are manufactured to go through a series of stringent quality tests before using them. PCB surface treatment, when reached beyond the shelf life tends to absorb moisture, making the soldering that much more difficult. There are more chances of de-laminating and circuit break., not even the treatments done during PCB fabrication . So, it is essential to ensure that the surface treatment is not metallurgically changed at the time of employing the circuit board. This is why; circuit boards are manufactured to go through a series of stringent quality tests before using them. PCB surface treatment, when reached beyond the shelf life tends to absorb moisture, making the soldering that much more difficult. There are more chances of de-laminating and circuit break.
7. Positional
Tolerance on PCB
A printed circuit board with well-defined tolerance of drill holes, tracks, vias and other shapes and mechanical features has distinct outline and scores high in terms of functionality as well as looks. The size of the holes and other features is very important and their tolerances should be well-defined. The idea is not to put the printed circuit boards to stress test, but to ensure that these are used exactly as per the limitations clearly defined so that their reliability is never lost.
8.
Thickness of solder resist layer
Though there are no relevant provisions described in IPC about the thickness of solder resistance, still it should be tolerant enough to support electrical insulation remarkably. An amply thick solder resist layer reduces the risk of peeling and makes it more tolerant towards any kind of mechanical impact. If the solder resist layer is not thick enough, it may get peeled off exposing the copper circuit to corrosive agents around. This leads to poor insulation. Thus, a high-reliability board has amply thick soldering resistant layer.
9.Industry approved solder resistant material
IPC – SM 840 standard defines the quality of solder resistant material that should be employed in making PCBs. The fully reliable board is inked using
UL approved solder resist material
so that it does not come off even under extreme conditions. Use of poor quality ink in solder resistant material causes undue hardness and leads to exposure of copper board to corrosive substances. So, to ensure proper insulation, best quality solder resist material is preferred.10. Purchase each part as per a pre-defined buying program
Buying all things in bulk in one go can lead to missing some points that may lead to erroneous designing eventually. All parts when bought as per the purchase program can be cross-verified with the specifications provided. Thus, the use of industry approved parts adds to the reliability of printed circuit board. Therefore, industrial buying is always recommended to go in consonance with the production plans and quality compliance.
A
high reliable Printed circuit board
can only be achieved if it is made of industry approved materials. The processes are well-defined and every process is checked for expiry of the treatment period. Also, the PCB's need to be checked thoroughly for quality of material, strength and shape of holes and various mechanical features compliance with standards of quality and safety.Speaking of quality and safety, Elecrow is a recommended place for buying high reliable PCB's where all these points are taken care of without fail.
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