Bill,

You present a common issue - transitioning from older cable technology to
newer techniques.  One common approach is to replace cables with flex or
rigid flex circuit boards.  I have seen jet engine contol boxes redesigned
and the manufacturing time went from thousands of hours (cabling) to tens of
hours (rigid flex)

The transistion cost is not nothing. (Purposeful double negative) Not
nothing means lots of $$$.  You will have to justify the cost which can be
hard.  Remember you will be trying to justify replacing a $200 cable with a
$2,000 rigid flex or flex part. You will be fighting a mind set that may not
see the advantage of less labor, higher build rate and higher yields.

As Ii write this I realize I'm sounding like a salesguy - not intentional.
I'm a QE at an OEM in the midwest...If you would like to discuss email me at
[log in to unmask]

Pete



>From: "Mengers, William D." <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: TechNet E-Mail Forum <[log in to unmask]>,              "Mengers,
>William D." <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: [TN]
>Date: Tue, 28 Feb 2006 16:10:49 -0500
>
>To All,
>
>Maybe somebody can help me out here.  I am a Manufacturing Engineer in a
>shop where we build military radar test sets.  These test sets are about
>the size of a refrigerator or sometimes twice as wide and a little
>taller.  We do quite a bit of cable building too to run between test
>sets and the radars being tested.  We also build these 10" x 20" x 15"
>boxes that are full of wire runs and PC boards.  These attach to the
>fronts of the test sets depending what radar system is being tested.
>All of this is hand built product, with some small bits and pieces using
>automatic equipment, i.e. crimpers, solder fountain for some thru-hole
>components on the boards, cable stripping, etc.  We build maybe two or
>three of something before the design changes and then we build something
>new.  I am being asked to come up with ideas about where new technology
>is driving us for future equipment and manufacturing needs.  Do any of
>you guys (or girls) do anything similar to this?  Do you have better
>ways of doing it?  Thanks for any help you can give.
>
>Bill Mengers
>
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