The plating quality of the electro-plated copper within the PWB’s Plated-Thru-Holes (PTH) is of paramount importance and it is the cornerstone of the circuit board’s long-term reliability in the field.
Z-axis expansion in the field caused by high ambient temperatures and the circuit board’s own electronic devices can cause PTHs with insufficient copper plating to crack and separate, resulting in a failure of the entire assembly.
We target a minimum of 0.0010” of electro-deposited copper in the PTHs of IPC 6010 Class 2 fabrication and 0.0012” for Class 3 so that our PWBs can tolerate the most demanding of environments, whether rack-mounted in an office or placed in a remote outside environment and subject to harsh temperature variations.
