Julie: "Standard" acid Cu plating baths will deposit 1 mil of Cu in
1100-1200 amp minutes. If you plate at a current density of 25 amps per
square foot(ASF), it will take about 45 minutes. This current density should
give you satisfactory distribution across the panel and through the holes
for moderate to low difficulty boards.

A word of caution, this is an average deposit thickness. If you are trying
to plate a minimum of 1 mil of Cu there will be areas on the board that will
be less. If you set 1500 amp minutes as the target that will give you an
average of 1.3 mils and keep you from under plating the board. If you plate
at 25 ASF that equates to 60 minutes. On boards of higher difficulty keep
the amp minutes constant i.e. 1500 and lower the current density from 25ASF
to a 17-22ASF range.

Again the amount of time is simply the amp minutes divided by the current
density. The higher the current density(ASF)the shorter the plating time and
vice versa. There's a lot more to it than just this but it should give you a
starting point.


Regards

Michael Barmuta

Staff Engineer

Fluke Corp.

Everett Wa.

425-356-6076

-----Original Message-----
From: Julie Dixon [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Thursday, October 07, 1999 12:13 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [TN] plating times for pcb's


Dear Technet,

For a small shop without automation or ppr, what is a standard time
acceptable to
plate moderate to low difficulty double- sided boards to 1 mil with a
standard acid copper plating solution?
Our vendor can offer us a different brightner system, etc., I was just
looking for a
norm. We can make adjustments to speed our cycles, but we give up even
distribution.

Thanks,
Green

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