Judy Warner Blog postings

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A few weeks back, I had the opportunity and pleasure to co-present a talk at PCB West in Santa Clara, CA. The topic we chose was: Navigating the Pitfalls of RF/MW and High Perfomance PCB Design and Fabrication. My co-presenter was Michael Ingham, of Spectrum Integrity, whose design firm is highly focused on challenging RF/MW and High Performance PCBs.

Once again, summer has evaporated at record speed. This morning, my two teen daughters trudged sleepily out the door for their first day back to high school; one a sophomore and one a senior. Wow...it seems like the first day of summer was just last week, and my kids were just starting kindergarten!

Bummer! Now, I’m going to have Queen camped in my head all day singing “Un-dah Presh-ah.” Well, let me see if I can drown him out with discussing the Wonderful World of PCB Lamination. Even I want to run screaming from my own brain after contemplating this topic for very long!

Play nice Share Don’t tell secrets Don’t judge a book by its cover Hard work can be really fun It’s great to have smart friends Social Media is not just for teenagers Nice people rock Mean people don’t Many hands make quick work…and a great conference The ones with the best questions often create innovations that change the world! RF/MW Geeks are the new Rock Stars Promote your peers and friends

Okay, here we go, blog number 3; but first allow me to do a quick review of what we’ve covered so far: 1.) Not everyone who says they can make RF/MW PCBs really can. 2.) High performance Substrates act NOTHING like FR-4 in the fabrication process, and a qualified supplier must be a Material Guru.

When discussing RF/MW PCBs, starting with base materials seems like a logical place to start. However, the topic of Advanced Circuit Materials is...well...complicated, especially for a single blog post. I’m sure this is obvious to you, but it took me the better part of this week to come to this conclusion with the help of Dale Doyle of Rogers Corp. and Denis Boulanger of Ventec. (Thank you both for your help, and graciousness!) In the end, I have resolved to leave the “heavy lifting” to the experts. Rogers, Taconic, Arlon, and Isola all have information-rich websites and employ amazing professionals like Dale and Denis who are invaluable resources. The “Rog Blog”, here on the Microwave Journal website, is an outstanding resource as well.

A few weeks back, I was having a chat with a national PCB broker who has a unique and broad perspective of the Printed Circuit Board and Electronics industry. We were waxing nostalgic about the “old days” and philosophizing about the days to come. When she asked about our company, Transline Technology, I told her that we manufacture a wide variety of boards, but that our strength and focus lay in RF and Microwave products, which account for about 60% of our business. I was bragging about our work and our customer base when she abruptly interrupted: “You know, Judy, not all board suppliers who say they can make RF boards, really can.”