December 2015

How To Present Your Bill Of Materials For Quote

What’s a BOM?
A BOM (bill of materials) is the list of materials and parts needed to produce a product. Clients provide us with a BOM so that we can build their product for them. A BOM inquiry lets us present you with a product quote.
Here at PCB Train we have developed software tools which assist with pricing up your BOM efficiently and accurately. If you follow the 3 tips below your BOM will be priced and sourced using the data you have supplied, without manual intervention from us. This improves accuracy, and speeds up processing. We can happily say that 63% of the BOMs we receive already follow these rules. However, we’re looking to increase this percentage, thus reducing the amount of manual processing needed for those BOMs that need some tweaking.

Facts About PCBs (That You Probably Didn’t Know!)

in Event

Why they’re green
Have you ever wondered why the majority of PCBs are that iconic dark green colour? The green that you see is actually the colour of the soldermask showing through the glass. In regards to the origins of the use of the green, there are a few theories.

Some speculate that green was the regulation standard when for when PCBs were used by the American military, and the use of it spread from there. It has also been suggested that green could have been the colour of the original solder mask resins, and that we continue to use green as a matter of convention, despite no longer using these materials. In modern circuits a soldermask can actually be made in any colour. However, green has worked well for us so far, and it makes it particularly easy for engineers to see faults in the traces, so many companies tend to stick with it.