Why use printed circuit board

Where are printed circuit boards used? Here are 10 of the most common PCB applications by industry. The healthcare sector is using growing numbers of PCBs as technologies advance, revealing new capabilities. PCBs play a role in devices used for diagnostics, monitoring, treatment and more. Special attention must be paid to ensuring reliability when producing medical PCBs because proper functioning can be critical to patient health.

In many cases, PCBs must also meet strict standards for sanitation, especially those used for implants. Boards used for implants and many other applications, such as emergency room monitors, must also be relatively small. The medical sector is continually coming up with more uses for electronics.

As technology improves and smaller, denser, more reliable boards become possible, PCBs will play an increasingly important role in healthcare. Light-emitting diodes, or LEDs, are an increasingly popular lighting technology used for residential and commercial lighting and across numerous industries including the automotive, medical and computer technology sectors.

LEDs are favored for their energy efficiency, long life and compactness. High temperatures decrease the average life of LEDs. Because of this, PCBs used for LEDs are typically made with aluminum, which can transfer heat better than other metals. This eliminates the need for an additional heat sink to a design and means it can be more compact.

LEDs are becoming increasingly common in a variety of applications, meaning PCBs will likely continue to play a more prominent role in lighting. Smartphones, computers and the many other consumer products that people use daily require PCBs to function. As we add electronics to more of our products, PCBs become a bigger part of our daily lives. Manufacturers are producing smaller and smaller smartphones and laptops that still have many advanced capabilities, which require small PCBs with a high volume of connections.

PCBs used for consumer electronics also need to be relatively low-cost to keep the price of the final product low. Manufacturers also want reliable boards, because they need their products to function as expected to stay in business. The use of PCBs in consumer products is certainly not slowing down. The proportion of Americans who own a smartphone is now 77 percent and growing. Printed circuit board uses in the industrial sector vary widely.

Electronic components power much of the equipment in manufacturing and distribution centers as well as other types of industrial facilities. The PCBs used in the industrial sector often need to be especially high-powered and be durable enough to withstand the harsh conditions that exist in industrial facilities. PCBs may need to be resistant to rough handling, vibrating machinery, extreme temperatures or harsh chemicals. To meet this need for durability, industrial PCBs may be made with durable metals or thermal-resistant materials and be thicker than other kinds of PCBs.

Industrial PCB assembly services may include thru-hole technology to increase durability. As robotics, industrial IoT tech and other types of advanced technology become more common, new uses for PCBs are arising in the industrial sector.

Automotive manufacturers are using growing numbers of electronic components in their vehicles. In earlier times, PCBs were only used for things like windshield wipers and headlight switches, but today they enable many advanced features that make driving safer and easier. Depending on what part of the car a PCB is used for, it may need to be able to withstand extreme temperatures or vibrations.

Because of these challenges, manufacturers may use high-temperature laminates, aluminum or copper substrates, or thru-hole mounted components. They also use flex-rigid PCBs because of their ability to withstand vibrations. These sensors are part of what enable cars to be self-driving. Fully autonomous vehicles are expected to become common in the future which is why a large number of printed circuit boards are used.

The electronics used in aerospace applications have similar requirements to those used in the automotive sector, but aerospace PCBs may be exposed to even harsher conditions. PCBs may be used in a variety of aerospace equipment including planes, space shuttles, satellites and radio communications systems. Each component was connected to the others using copper wire as part of a long, labor-intensive process.

PCBs changed all that. Able to be printed in vast numbers using machines, this sped up production massively and made them cheap enough to use in all manner of products. The first PCBs were used for radios and other military applications.

After the end of World War Two, they found their way into industry and ultimately the fledgling market for consumer electronics. Today, PCBs can be found everywhere we look, from PC motherboards and memory sticks to mobile devices and controllers in household appliances. As a basis of modern electronics, printed circuit boards are present in medical devices such as scanning equipment and digital measuring devices. They are used in manufacturing machinery, from switches and controllers to monitoring equipment—and even the machines used to design and make more PCBs.

From consumer electronics and home appliances to automotive and aerospace applications, it is impossible to imagine the modern world without PCBs. The most basic type of PCB is the original single-layer board which, as the name suggests, involves mounting one layer of copper on a substrate.

Later developments led to double-layer and multi-layer PCBs, which saw multiple copper layers applied to two or more substrate layers. This made it possible to add a much higher density of components to the PCB and use them to create more powerful devices. Today, just about every electronic appliance in your home contains a printed circuit board of some type: computers, printers, televisions, stereos, musical instrument amplifiers and synthesizers, digital clocks, microwave ovens, telephone answering machines and even cell phones.

The "motherboard" in a computer is the main printed circuit board that is the heart of a computer. Other circuit boards inside a computer performs functions such as RAM random access memory , power supplies, modems and video "cards.

Motorola's Quasar TVs were among the first to use removable printed circuit boards, designed for quick in-home repair. Dan Keen is the publisher and editor of a county newspaper in New Jersey.

For over 30 years he has written books and magazine articles for such publishers as McGraw-Hill. Keen holds a degree in electronics, was chief engineer for two radio stations and taught computer science at Stockton State College. Advantages of a PCB Board.