Dale, this was just brought up about a month ago but it was not the main
topic. I think it was part of the large discussion about coating that Doug
started. Here at Diamond-MT we are a conformal coating application house,
that's all we do. We coat for everyone from the big guys to the small mom
and pop shops. They send us the boards with a spec and we coat them in
whatever they want. That being said, of the thousands of different part
numbers we have coated over the years, I'd say less than ten required
coating on the edge. As a matter of fact, we have more part-numbers that
require us to leave the edges coating-free than be coated. Unless you have
something conductive exposed on the edge, there really isn't a reason to
coat it. (Of course we are talking about all liquids, parylene is a
different matter.)

Lloyd Duso
Diamond-MT
Plant Manager
(814) 535-3505
www.Diamond-mt.com


On Wed, May 15, 2013 at 3:08 PM, Dale Ritzen <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Hello Technetters,
> Don't know if this has come up before or not (nothing in the archives),
> but we are researching any conformal coating requirements specifying that
> the edges - not just the surfaces - of the boards be covered. With the
> emergence of automated coating equipment, i.e. moving away from the spray
> or dunk coating processes, we are finding it hard to identify a coating
> machine that can do board edges. So...
>
> 1. Is there a valid need to coat the board edges, or is this simply a
> customer driven requirement? (I'm waiting for an "It depends..." on this
> one.)
> 2. Are there any IPC standards that address this specific question?
> J-STD-001E, section 10, covers coating to "all areas designated for
> coverage on the assembly drawing/documentation", and does not specifically
> mention board edges. I don't have copies of HDBK-830 or CC-830B for
> reference, so am relying on your inputs and experience with this question.
> I would be glad to do some reading up on this if anyone has any suggestions
> for white papers or other documents that cover this (pun intended).
>
> We'd really like to understand what the industry-wide requirements are for
> conformal coat in this regard. Might be a lost cause already as we have
> been getting the boards sprayed for years, so the customer is used to
> seeing every surface coated, including edges. But, the only spec they've
> quoted so far is the old Mil-I-46058C which was removed from service back
> in the 1990's. After reading through it though, I don't find anything that
> specifically addresses this question.
>
> Any feedback would be appreciated!
>
> Dale Ritzen, ASQ CQA
> Manager | Quality Group and ISO Management Representative
> _____________________________________________
> Austin Manufacturing Services
>
>
>
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