Same old song?

It’s not over until the fat lady sings – or so the old saying goes. In some ways, the same can be said for a design engineer faced with the prospect of expensive pcb redesign or repair costs due to component obsolescence or failure through manufacturing and test problems. You may think your board is beyond economical repair, but don’t throw it in the scrap bin just yet – there are sound alternatives that could yet prove to be music to your ears. Whether it concerns board redesign problems or alleviating the potential threat of obsolescence, many companies still labour under the misconception that the board is now beyond redemption in one way or another. A range of problems can quickly cause disharmony during the production life of a pcb including: exceeding development budgets; running out of spares for older projects; production failures which cost time and money; purchasing delays through component obsolescence; redesign costs to update circuits that are otherwise fully functional and physical damage from delamination and burnouts.