Since being named technical conference director for PCB West seven years ago, I have generally shied away from offering keynote addresses.

There are many reasons for my hesitancy, but primarily it’s because they seemed so out of place for a conference like PCB West. Since UP Media president Pete Waddell founded the show in 1992, its focus has always been on training. That sets it apart from the traditional research-driven test-and-report style events that populate this industry. Both have their place, but PCB West always has been about helping those in the trenches.

Keynotes, on the other hand, tend to fall in one of two categories. There are the rah-rah types, of course. These are the professional motivators: ex astronauts, generals, athletes. They tend to roll out the same old bromides, a takeoff on the theme of overcoming adversity. Audiences listen. They cheer. Their souls are saved. Then they go out and do the same things they’ve always done.

Read more ...

President Donald Trump issued an executive  order in March that introduced an often-threatened but rarely used measure to the world economic picture: tariffs.

Trump’s edict, which as of this writing was due to go into effect on Mar. 23, places onerous taxes on imports of steel and aluminum – 25% and 10%, respectively. The moves, the president said, were to reset trade imbalances and protect domestic metal producers, which have been decimated over the past two decades.

Or have they? The adjusted domestic steel production year-to-date through Mar. 10 was 17.2 million net tons, at a capability utilization rate of 74%. That is down 0.2% from the 17,221,000 net tons during the same period last year, when the capability utilization rate was 74.6%.
By comparison, total and finished steel imports over the same period were a combined 7.6 million NT net tons. The estimated finished steel import market share is 25% year-to-date.

Read more ...

The question – actually, it was more of a plea – was to the point: How are fabricators handling first article inspection requirements?

Confusion, the writer pointed out, appeared to be growing throughout the supply chain, as it attempts to sort out just how often FAI needs to be performed.

It’s a fair question. Inspection is time-consuming (and thus expensive) and considered in many quarters to be non-value-added. And that’s not just for manufacturers but also customers, which face both additional evaluations and a data avalanche. That avalanche is the result of the surge in acceptable quality limit (AQL) samples of FAI measurements as supplied to the customer, which then must enter, sort and distribute (as needed) all that data. It is one thing to impose requirements on suppliers, but in the case of AS9100D, those requirements might be backflowing.

Read more ...