What Is Turnkey PCB Assembly?

What Is Turnkey PCB Assembly?

Printed circuit boards (PCBs) act as the wiring backbone in electronics, forming both the structural foundation and conductive pathways for components. While PCB fabrication involves etching copper layers, assembly is the process of soldering pads to physically mount and interconnect components.

Turnkey PCB assembly offers full-service outsourcing bundling PCB fabrication, component procurement, automated population by pick-and-place machinery, soldering, cleaning and post-production electrical testing. This simplified, high-reliability approach minimizes effort to get boards ready for integration.

PCB Assembly Overview

Before components gets electrically and mechanically attached to boards, the bare PCBs undergo fabrication through:

  1. Photolithographic copper patterning
  2. Sheet lamination
  3. Drilling
  4. Plating and coating

This produces finished boards ready for population. Traditional board stuffing involves manual placement of components. But automated assembly relies on:

  1. High-speed surface mount device (SMD) pick-and-place machines precisely mounting components onto thin solder paste pads
  2. Reflow soldering ovens fusing parts in place
  3. Cleaning off flux residue
  4. Conformal coating application
  5. Testing assembled boards

An operator still inserts some larger through-hole parts beforehand or afterwards. But rapid precision automation allows high-density miniature electronics manufacture.

What is Turnkey PCB Assembly?

The term turnkey denotes a ready-made process requiring only a client’s inputs to execute from start to finish. It contrasts with complex in-house integration requiring procuring equipment, supplies, training personnel and establishing process design rules before production can begin.

In PCB assembly context, turnkey service encompasses delivery of fully assembled boards including:

  • Fabrication of the bare PCB foundation
  • Procurement of all required components
  • SMT population of boards by pick-and-place automation
  • Reflow soldering attachment
  • Cleaning and coating boards
  • Post-assembly testing

Clients simply provide Gerber files, bill of material (BOM) list, assembly and test specifications, then receive finished populated boards.

Benefits of Professional Turnkey Assembly

Significant advantages accrue using turnkey assembly versus DIY:

Convenience - Simply upload design files and receive ready-to-integrate boards in days without complex in-house processing.

Savings - Avoid expenses acquiring assembly tools, supplies and space or training staff, as low rates leverage economy of scale.

Quality - Process expertise, precision machinery and testing deliver reliable soldering, preventing field failures.

Speed - Parallelized pipelines allow very quick assembly turnaround once designs finalize.

While turnkey does sacrifice custom optimization or on-site process control, it simplifies development, prototyping and production for most applications.

Turnkey Assembly Process Overview

Complete PCB turnkey assembly entails closely coordinated milestone stages:

1. Design Finalization - Submit Gerber fabrication and BOM assembly files specifying components, solder paste stencil needs, tolerances, etc.

2. Fabrication - Generator PCB maker produces bare boards with copper traces, masks, markings, etc.

3. Components Procured - Vendors supply all required resistors, caps, ICs, connectors, etc.

4. Programmed Assembly - Software converts BOM into pick-and-place robot instructions assigning component bins and locations.

5. SMT Population - High-speed machines precisely populate boards with tiny surface mount devices.

6. Reflow Soldering - SMDs get solder-fused to pads in ovens forming electrical connections.

7. Cleaning/Coating - Flux residues removed, protective conformal coatings applied.

8. Testing - Both bare boards and assembled boards undergo electrical testing.

9. Delivery - Final QC check sets boards ready for system integration.

While turnkey providers handle the complex intermediate pipeline, design decisions set manufacturing success:

Turnkey-Friendly vs Unfriendly PCB Design

Certain design characteristics pose challenges for turnkey assembly, affecting outcomes:

PCB Design Considerations for Turnkey:

[+] Easy component availability 
[+] Standard sizes, pitches, footprints
[+] 0402+ sized SMD components
[+] >0.2 mm traces and >0.15 mm gaps  
[+] >0.3 mm cutout corners in ground planes
[+] Follow manufacturer design rules
    
[-] Tight pitched BGAs, 0201 devices
[-] Nonstandard footprint sizes
[-] High component mixing ratios  
[-] Tall connectors requiring support
[-] Heavy shielding or heat sinks 
[-] Via-in-pad footprints        

Upfront design-for-manufacturing (DFM) reviews optimize assembly productivity and reliability.

Comparing In-House vs Outsourced Turnkey PCB Assembly

Companies weigh cost/benefit tradeoffs selecting between in-house vs fully outsourced turnkey assembly:


Weighing demand forecasts steers the ideal service mix. Turnkey suits variable or peak volumes despite higher unit pricing.

Factors Driving Growth of Outsourced Turnkey Assembly

Many industry trends propel increased reliance on full-service turnkey assembly:

  • Focus on core competencies and getting products to market faster
  • Declining turnkey pricing from intense supplier competition
  • Shorter electronics product lifecycles requiring flexiblity
  • Scarcity and high cost of skilled in-house assembly technicians
  • Wide variability in demand volumes between product generations
  • Continuous improvement in turnkey quality and reliability

As capabilities improve while prices decline, barriers drop for designs getting professionally assembled without ownership of tools or process expertise.

Quality Control in Turnkey PCB Assembly

While outsourcing forfeits direct process monitoring, turnkey providers implement extensive quality frameworks:

  • Statistical process control tracking all production parameters
  • Documented procedures for material handling and workflow
  • Automated optical inspection at multiple process stages
  • Rigorous oversight of stored component moisture sensitivity levels
  • End-of-line testing meeting IPC Class 2 or 3 certification
  • Chain of custody and anti-counterfeiting measures on components
  • ESD handling compliance and operator credentials
  • Response systems if quality issues arise

Volume production efficiency integrates seamlessly with quality policies for reliable, repetitive turnkey assemblies.

Conclusion - The Promise of Turnkey PCB Assembly

Outsourced turnkey PCB assembly bundles fabrication, part procurement, automated SMT population, soldering, postprocessing and testing - everything between completed design and integration.

Relinquishing direct assembly control brings great simplification advantages through turnkey production scalability, speed, affordability and quality.

Continuous turnkey quality improvements expand applications benefiting from eased prototying and volume manufacture burdens.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Can a hobbyist use turnkey PCB assembly services?

A: Yes, leading turnkey providers have no minimum order quantities or scale requirements. Anyone can directly upload Gerber and BOM files to get a small batch professionally assembled.

Q: How are oddly shaped boards or flex PCBs handled in turnkey assembly?

A: Modified tooling aids irregular PCBs tracking through conveyorized population and reflow. Some flex PCB chemical compositions require adjustment to fluxes or other chemistries too.

Q: Can I specify particular component brands be used in turnkey assembly?

A: Yes, BOM component descriptions allows requiring or allowing particular manufacturer parts, useful for critical ICs. But required brands unfamiliar to turnkey partners may need longer procurement lead times.

Q: What level of production analytics do turnkey assemblers supply?

A: Most offer online dashboards tracking submitted orders showing completed stages percentage and expected delivery date. Some integrate MES modules detailing every board's assembly micro-parameters for analytics.

Q: Does my company retain rights to Gerber files or custom footprints submitted for turnkey assembly orders?

A: Yes, reputable turnkey assemblers sign NDAs and only utilize customer data to fulfill paid assembly orders. However some physical custom tooling for uncommon footprints may remain with the assembly partner.

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