CHRIS’S CORNER
The Domestic Life Raft
The Domestic Life Raft Buying boards and electronic components from China has become less popular and more difficult. In fact, there are not many American companies bragging or even whispering about buying these necessary goods from there. One thing that came to light...
Things are looking up!
Things are looking up! We are starting to see some encouraging signs when it comes to bringing back electronics manufacturing to North America. Obviously, the supply chain challenges have spurred us to start building our own manufacturing infrastructures. This is...
We Are All In This Together
We are all in this together. More than at any other time in our industry’s history, we must stick together. I have been around a long time and my family has been manufacturing PCBs since the 50’s when taped artwork and mechanical routing with steel routing dies was...
Connecting the Dots
Get the heat out One of the principles I have always adhered to was that of being willing to try new things. Over the years at Aurora Circuits, we have always tried to get involved in new and innovative technologies that make sense, that are synergistically and...
The Compromise for Cheap: Is It Really Worth It?
The manufacturing of printed circuit boards is being taken overseas to cut costs—but does the price of “cheap” come with consequences? More product for a lesser price. More efficient timelines. As we all know, these are only a few of the assumptions of the “good” that...
Making Onshoring a Reality: An Action Plan
August 29, 2020 In the last two installments, I laid out an explanation of onshoring and why it holds the key to reclaiming military, manufacturing, and pharmaceutical independence in the United States. Obviously, we must take action. Especially in the face of...
How Do We Bring Manufacturing Home?
July 8th, 2020 First, we must recognize the need to reduce our total dependency on offshore manufacturing. Can we survive as a nation if we are dependent on others for our electronic systems - the systems that run and control everything from our electrical grid to...
How Did It All Begin? Was It Really Worth It?
June 4th, 2020 Well, it took a long-time, but it has finally happened. It took almost thirty years before people finally opened their eyes to the threat to our infrastructure and a global pandemic is the “smoking gun.” The “it” I am referring to...
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FEATURED CIRCUIT BOARD STORY
US Car Manufacturer Sitting Pretty With 67% Cost Savings
By reengineering this auto manufacturer’s PCB, the cost dropped to 33% of the original amount, saving over $375,000.
In late 2015, Aurora received an opportunity to quote a LED vanity mirror for a major, fully electric car manufacturer circuit board. The initial design was a plated-through-hole version that was fairly sophisticated for the application. The Manufacturer also required a production commencement in 60 days to prevent a shutdown of the production line.
The engineering team at Aurora Circuits suggested, after reviewing the manufacturer’s original design, that a redesign to a single-sided board would drastically save turnaround time and expense when starting production. The original design would sell for $2.25 each and require two separate printed circuit boards per vehicle. This particular part was reengineered into a single-sided, common version for less than $0.90 each, thus saving $2.70 per vehicle. When applying this to the production volume, Aurora Circuits is saving the manufacturer over $375,000 on a model year basis.
Also, to prevent any production line start up issues, Aurora Circuits built a small quantity of the plated through hole version until the single-sided version was fully tested and in full production.
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